Bruckner: Symphonie No. 8 (Mariss Jansons) (CD, Br-Klassik)

The development of Anton Bruckner’s Eighth Symphony was probably influenced by the suddenly awakening fame, which strengthened the composer’s always unstable self-confidence: after the performance of his Seventh Symphony, the famous conductor Hermann Levi had proclaimed him the greatest symphony orchestra after Beethoven’s death In Vienna, Bruckner was finally taken seriously and laughed at, acknowledging his importance, and the Emperor of Austria had awarded him the Franz Joseph Order, which made Bruckner particularly proud. In the summer of 1884 he got to work and in August 1887 the symphony was finished after three years of work; due to energetic objections from Levi, it was not performed for the time being. Bruckner revised his work thoroughly between October 1887 and March 1890; The new version of the eighth symphony was finally premiered on December 18, 1892 by the Vienna Philharmonic under the direction of Hans Richter – it was an extraordinary success. Hugo Wolf reported: It was a complete victory of light over darkness, and the storm of enthusiasm broke out as if with elemental violence. In short, it was a triumph that a Roman emperor could not wish for more beautiful. Bruckner’s eighth symphony has since been an integral part of the symphonic repertoire, but it continues to challenge the performers to the greatest extent. The musicians of the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra and its former chief conductor Mariss Jansons, who died in 2019, are more than up to the extraordinary demands of this masterpiece. The recording of the Munich concert event from November 2017 is already being released on CD by BR Klassik: the exemplary interpretation of one of the most important compositions of the symphonic repertoire of the late Romantic period in its version from 1890.