Austrian Music: Linz's Bruckner Festival

Bruckner Festival, Linz
Until September 30
Bruckner Mass No 3 Basilica of St Florian, Linz
September 11 

The Bruckner Festival is a vast musical event that focuses on the composer's work but the programme also includes performances of work by Bach, Beethoven, Rachmaninov, Shostakovich, Tchaikovsky plus a dozen more.

There are symphonic works, chamber pieces and soloists as well as a performance of Verdi’s La Traviata. Among the Bruckner works are his Symphony’s No 4, No 6 and No 7.

Most of the concerts are performed in the city’s modern Brucknerhaus, which houses the local Bruckner Orchestra, but there are a number of other orchestras performing during the festival including the Vienna Philharmonic and the Macau Symphony Orchestra.

One of the highlights of the festival in its opening week was Bruckner’s Mass No 3. This was performed in the Basilica of the Monastery of St Florian, the resting place of the great composer which towers above the small village of St Florian just outside Linz.

The church is grand Baroque building with rich ornate moulding, a fair amount of gold and large trompe l’oeil ceiling murals. Bruckner’s tomb is embedded in the church foyer which made one aware that the mass was in some way a memorial service to the composer and for most of the audience who made the journey from Linz this was a something of a pilgrimage.

Before the mass the choir performed a set of Bruckner motets.

These unaccompanied works immediately showed the choir's strengths, producing a rich glorious sound. They were a great example of the composer’s ability to use the voices as instrument as they intersected, merged and clashed.

Conductor Markus Landerer skilfully balanced the pace and strength of the singing from mere whispers to organlike crescendos. He managed to extract a range of moods – a brooding intensity, quiet contemplation along with some achingly beautiful sounds – aspects of the composer’s music that provided a foretaste of the much grander work to come.

Also on the programme was Bruch’s Kol Nidrei, his Adagio on two Jewish melodies for Cello and Orchestra with Harp, one from the Yom Kippur service, with the cello imitating the voice of the cantor.

The cellist Florian Eggner played with a contemplative elegance as though in a reverie. His playing was sensitive and evocative, creating what seemed to be private spiritual moments that were a contrast to be big public expression of religious devotion in the Bruckner Mass.

The Bruckner mass brought together the forces of a big orchestra and a big choir. It is a robust work with elements of various other composers, hints of Mozart and Beethoven giving the work an operatic character.

Although the orchestra provided an underlying drama to the work, it was the choir and the soloists who provided the narrative and emotion.

The four soloists were used only occasionally but when they were used they provided intense dramatic moments and vivid highlights.

They were, however, never used for extended arias. Bass Yasushi Hirano possessed a strong voice which had a real sense of introspection and when he was joined by Markus Miesenberger’s carefully enunciating, softer voice the two sounds complemented each other superbly.

Regina Riel’s soprano voice occasionally lacked the power to rise over the orchestra and choir but she had a clarity of delivery which had an emotional richness. Mezzo-soprano Angelika Kirchschlager’s more extroverted delivery afforded an angelic presence. Singing together they created a brilliantly textured sound often piercing through the sound of the orchestra and choir.

The singing of the Benedictus saw the conductor almost sparring with the soloists using them to create theatrical flourishes while in the Agnus Dei the soloists provided a sense of dignity.

For all the skill of the soloists, it was the choir that shone with an impressive display. Some parts of the mass were Wagnerian in their scope, with some headlong dashes of singing which the choir handled stylishly.

The musical programme for the Brucknerhaus for next year is comprehensive, featuring number of visiting orchestras including The Ural Philharmonic and the St Petersburg Philharmonic along with the New Barock String Quartet and The Strato Quartet.

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