The Te Deum and the Ninth Symphony

Bruckner died on 11 October, 1896, when he was still engaged on the composition of the last movement of his Ninth Symphony. In fact, he did some work on it that very day. The earliest sketches had been made as many as nine years earlier, just after the completion of the Eighth. But revision of the Eighth, First, and Third Symphonies interrupted work on the Ninth, and it was not until 1891 that he returned to it.The first two movement were finished by February 1894 and the Adagio was completed by the end of November. From then until the end of his life Bruckner worked on the finale, the sketches of which are extensive and which end, significantly, with a quotation of the ostinato motif from the Te Deum with the words “Te Deum” written on the manuscript.

This allusion led the Bruckner disciple, Heinrich Loewe, to believe that Bruckner intended to introduce the Te Deum into the finale of the Ninth Symphony. When he conducted the first performance of the work - in Vienna in 1903 - he added the Te Deum to the three complete movements as a substitute finale. Modern scholarship, righting the many wrongs done to Bruckner by his friends - like Loewe’s quite unwarranted rescoring of the Ninth Symphony - went too far, however, in abusing Loewe for adding the Te Deum to the first three movements.

“There is no shred of truth in the assertion that Bruckner ever wanted the Te Deum (a work of very different stylistic bent) to be used to round off the incomplete Ninth Symphony,” says one authority. But Bruckner is quoted as saying, in a lecture which he gave to his students in November 1894, that this is precisely what he did want. Unless the report (in E. Schwaranza’s collection of Bruckner’s lectures) is a completely fabricated, there is at least a shred of evidence to support the validity of what Loewe did. For us, it is difficult to believe that Bruckner could have thought of putting the two works together in that way. Never having heard the Ninth Symphony with a finale, we find it a complete and rewarding experience as it stands. The composer, on the other hand, had a vision of it in four movements and, as far as he was concerned, it was not only unfinished in three movements but also unperformable. Rather a Symphony in D minor with the Te Deum as a finale, he must have thought, than no Symphony in D minor.

Of course, it will not do to tack on the Te Deum as the fourth movement: the key is wrong and the style is wrong. On the other hand, the spirit is right. Bruckner once declared that, having dedicated one symphony to a king and another to an emperor, “I am now dedicating my last work to the King of Kings, our Lord, and hope that he will grant me enought time to accomplish it.” Of the Te Deum he said in similar terms: “When God calls me to Himself on day and asks what I have done with the talent he gave me I shall show him the score of my Te Deum and He is bound to judge me mercifully.” Performed after or even before a decent interval, the Te Deum makes a fitting complement to the three movements of the incomplete Ninth Symphony.

Te Deum

for chorus, soloists, orchestra and organ ad libitum

Te Deum: allegro

Te ergo quaesumus: moderato

Aeterna fac: allegro

Salvum fac: moderato - allegro

In te, Domine, speravi: mässig bewegt

On the title page of Gustav Mahler’s copy of the Te Deum the direction “for chorus, soloists, orchestra and organ ad libitum” is replaced in his own hand by the words “for angels’ tongues, God-seekers, troubled hearts and souls purified by fire.” Clearly, although the Te Deum has less in common with his own music than most of Bruckner’s works, Mahler was profoundly impressed by the massive sincerity contained within its relatively small-scale structure. Completed in March 1884, six months after the Seventh Symphony, in comparison with that work it seems not only short but almost stark in its simplicity - in the regular structural pattern, the fidelity to C major, the use of the primary vocal colours, and the straightforward choral textures which prevail until (as an inspired afterthought) they spectacularly divide in the brief but complex double fugue on In te, Domine, speravi. In some ways it resembles Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis, which is neither short nor simple but which is similarly inocent of seductive guile, voluptuous detail and easy compromise.

Te Deum

At the beginning of the Te Deum - with the chorus in unison doubled by brass alternating the two notes C and G against an ostinato of the same two notes on strings in octaves - Bruckner’s vision is presented in its elemental simplicity. This is the point to which the work periodically and finally returns. The ostinato of fourths and fifths, which was fundamental to Bruckner’s conception of the Te Deum from the moment he started work on it in 1881 (and which he quoted in the sketch of the finale of the Ninth Symphony), is present in one form or another in all the choral movements. A variant of it runs through the first solo ensemble, which offers valuable lyrical contrast with a useful change of harmony, and it returns in its original form when the chorus brings the key back to C major on Sanctus and back again on Te gloriosus. The chorus remains in rhythmic unison until Tu ad liberandum and divides into counterpoint for the first time at Tu devicto mortis - only, of course, to make an affirmatory return to C major, in company with the ostinato on the strings, at Tu ad dexteram Dei sedes.

Te Deum laudamus: te Dominum confitemur.

Te aeternum Patrem, omnis terra veneratur.

Tibi omnes Angeli, tibi coeli et universae

potestates:

Tibi Cherubim et Seraphim, incessabili voce

proclamant:

Sanctus: Sanctus: Sanctus Dominus Deus

Sabaoth.

Pleni sunt coeli et terra majestatis gloriae

tuae.

Te gloriosus Apostolorum chorus:

Te Phrophetarum laudabilis numerus:

Te Martyrum candidatus laudat exercitus.

Te per orbem terrarum sancta confitetur Ecclesia:

Patrem immensae majestatis:

Venerandum tuum verum et unicum Filium:

Sanctum quoque Paraclitum Spiritum.

Tu Rex gloriae, Christe.

Tu Patris sempiternus es Filius.

Tu ad liberandum suscepturus hominem, non

horruisti Virginis uterum.

Tu devicto mortis aculeo, aperuisti credentibus

regna coelorum.

Tu ad dexteram Dei sedes, in gloria Patris.

Judex crederis esse venturus.

We praise thee, O God: we acknowledge

thee to be the Lord.

All the earth doth worship thee, the Father

everlasting.

To thee all Angels cry aloud, the Heavens,

and all the Powers therein.

To thee Cherubin, and Seraphin, continually

do cry:

Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God of Sabaoth.

Heaven and earth are full of thy

Majesty and Glory.

The glorious company of the Apostles,

the goodly fellowship of the Prophets,

the noble army of Martyrs praise thee.

The holy Church throughout all the world

doth acknowledge thee;

the Father, of an infinite Majesty:

thine honourable, true and only Son;

also the Holy Ghost, the Comforter.

Thou art the King of Glory, O Christ.

The art the everlasting Son of the Father.

When thou tookest upon thee to deliver man,

thou didst not abhor the Virgin’s womb.

When thou hadst overcome the sharpness of death,

thou didst open the Kingdom of Heaven

to all believers.

Thou sittest at the right hand of God, in the

Glory of the Father.

We believe that thou shalt come to be our Judge.

Te ergo quaeseumus - Aeterna fac - Salvum fac

The two most expressive episodes in the work are the Te ergo quaesumus and the first part of Salvum fac. They are both in F minor and both are led by the tenor, who is joined by the other soloists at the cadences in Te ergo quaesumus and by the chorus as well in Solvum fac. The relationship between the Te Deum and Beethoven’s Missa solemnis seems to be confirmed, incidentally, when the violin solo introduced as a radiant contrast to the sombre clarinet and viola colours in Te ergo returns in Salvum fac on the words et benedic - which is more or less where Bethoven’s violin solo comes in.

Between the two F minor episodes, the chorus Aeterna fac echoes the opening of the work but in the wrong key. There is no danger of disorientation, however, for Salvum fac runs straight into an elemental C major chorus on Per singuloso dies, which is confirmation enough even though the movement ends uncertainly in a quiet prayer reflecting the contrapuntal Tu devicto mortis in the first movement.

Te ergo quaesumus, tuis famulis subveni, quos

pretioso sanguine redemisti.

Aeterna fac cum Sanctis tuis in gloria numerai.

Salvum fac populum tuum Domine, et benedic

haereditati tuae.

Et rege eos, et extolle illos usque in aeternum.

Per singulos dies benedicimus te.

Et laudamus nomen tuum in saeculum, et in

saeculum saeculi.

Dignare Domine die isto sine peccato nos custodire.

Miserere nostri Domine.

Fiat misericordia tua Domine super nos, quem

admodum speravimus in te.

We therefore pray thee, help thy servants,

whom thou hast redeemed with thy

precious blood.

Make them to be numbered with thy

Saints in glory everlasting.

O Lord, save thy people, and bless

thine heritage.

Govern them, and lift them up for ever.

Day by day we magnify thee;

and we worship thy Name, ever world

without end.

Vouchsafe, O Lord, to keep us this day

without sin.

O Lord have mercy upon us.

O Lord, let thy mercy lighten upon us,

as our trust is in thee.

In te Domine speravi

The last movement opens in C major with a solo ensemble which quotes on Non confundar the noble phrase which Bruckner had already used in the Adagio of the Seventh Symphony. The choral fugue, though based on two themes - one introduced by sopranos on In te, Domine, the other by the altos on Non confundar - is short and, instead of rising to the expected climax, it gradually disintegrates. The soloists introduce another theme from the Seventh Symphony, and it is on this that the ostinato makes its return, at first over a chorus in B major but finally - and after a brief fanfare on the brass - as part of a brilliant C major reflection of the elemental opening chorus.

In te Domine speravi: non confundar

in aeternum.

O Lord, in thee have I trusted, let me never be confounded.

Symphony No.9 in D minor

Feierlich, misterioso

Bewegt, lebhaft - schnell

Langsam, feierlich

The Ninth Symphony begins in D minor and ends in a radiant E major farewell, never to return to the troubled point from which it set out. The symbolism, though not exactly what the composer intended, is both apt and moving. In so far as there is a problem it is one of proportion: the weight of material in the exposition of the first movement, which must have been intended to balance an equally massive pillar at the other end of the symphony, might seem too heavy for a work deprived of the counterweight of the finale.

Feirlich, mysterioso

After the exposition, the construction of the first movement is concise or even, in comparison with its melodic abundance, abbreviated. There are three particularly important ideas: the powerful main theme of the first subject which, at the first big climax, crashes in on a fff full-orchestral unison; the first theme of the second subject which, after a ritardando and a diminuendo, is softly uttered in A major by first violins over an undulating counterpoint on second violins; and, after much development of the second subject, a third subject quietly introduced by strings in D minor, brought to a climax and calmed with a pastoral closing theme of bird calls and horn calls.

The development, as a distinct section, is short: it is very obviously ended by the D minor main theme of the first subject crashing in again. Development continues after that, however, and its only after another climax on less important first-subject material that the second subject makes its formal reappearance in D major. The third subject, originally in D minor, is recapitulated in B minor, which means that a coda has to be set up to end the movement in the tonic - though whether in the major or the minor Bruckner’s open fifths do not finally decide. The last movement would surely have resolved that particular ambiguity.

Bewegt, lebhaft - schnell

The D minor second movement is quite different from the usual Bruckner scherzo. It is a persecuted and violent scherzo based harmonically and melodically on the vicious discord plucked no fewer than thirty times by the second violins in the first twelve bars. Even the quicker and more playful F sharp major trio is based on the same sort of theme. There is occasional evidence of a better humour in the scherzo itself, and there is a valuable lyrical contrast near the end of the trio, but the general conclusions of the movement are not cheerful.

Langsam, feierlich

It is in an E major area remote from these D minor problems that the great slow movement begins. In spite of its key and in spite of its Wagnerian associations, however, the first theme has certain rhythmic and melodic characteristics in common with the first-subject material of the first movement - which is one reason why this slow movement makes a not uncompletely unsatisfactory conclusion to the symphony even in conventional terms. The other important first-subject themes are what have been described as a “fate” motif, cutting through the first full climax on trumpets, and a “farewell” motif on two horns and four tubas as the climax subsides. The very beautiful second subject in A flat major, introduced by violins with an undulating counterpoint on violas, also reflects its first-movement equivalent.

The development in this case scarcely exists as a distinct section, since the recapitulation could be said to begin at the same time: the first subject reappears immediately in its original key and is never heard again in such complete form. The climax of the recapitulation is the appearance of the second subject in the tonic and in broad rhythmic augmentation. But it is not the climax of the movement. For it at this point that Bruckner quite deliberately begins to take his farewell.

Flute and clarinet reveal that the first phrase of the second subject is a variant of the Miserere theme from the Mass in D minor of 1864. It is on this prayer, combined with the first four notes of the first subject, that the last great climax is built - and abruptly broken off. The rest is epilogue. The Miserere theme is now combined with a clarified version of the “fate” motif and then, by the curious and highly symbolic means of introducing reminiscences of two earlier symphonies - the Eighth on the four tubas, the Seventh on the four horns just before the last E major chord - Bruckner separates the end of the movement from the issues which had preoccupied the symphony in its life on this earth.

programme notes by Gerald Larner©