Face it, Max Bruch has been condemned to the musical purgatory of those composers known only for a handful of works, in his case the first Violin Concerto, the Scottish Fantasy, and the Eight Pieces for Clarinet, Viola, and Piano among chamber music fans. Much of his work, though not a little recorded, remains a mystery to the average music lover, especially his other violin concertos (four in all) and symphonies.
This release, done by a provincial orchestra that plays with authority and great exuberance, and coupled with spectacular surround sound, seeks to rectify this situation. Here we get all three symphonies, the second concerto, and the little known Concert Piece for Violin and Orchestra as well. The results are eminently gratifying, and show that there is a lot more to Bruch than we might expect.
The first symphony is almost Mendelssohnian in nature by virtue of its clarity and cleverly classical orientation, though with a passion that the older composer did not know except in a few instances. In its time it was very well known and regarded, but the Greats of the Romantic age left it in the dust, which is a shame, for it can hold its own. The three-movement second symphony had a miserable beginning, and was never to achieve the success of the first. It is far darker, and far less classical in nature, which may be the reason that audiences were not favorable to it. This alone would not seem to affect a period of history where doom and gloom were constantly being shown to audiences, but even a composer like Schumann usually stuck to traditional structures, and Bruch follows his own road in originality in this piece that proved too much for his own time. The third of his symphonies was commissioned by Walter Damrosch, and given its first performance in New York in 1882, and subsequently Bruch toured the United States with it. Again, critical reaction was mixed even though the populace seemed to like it. Personally, I think it the most interesting of the bunch, even though the notes to this release consider the orchestration a problem in spots and the finale as lacking inspiration—not to these ears.
The Second Violin Concerto has suffered unexplained negligence because of its older sister, and this is a shame, for the work is replete with high drama and wonderful emotion, even opening with a long adagio, something Brahms thought should be legally banned as it could not be “endured by ordinary people”(!) The Concert Piece is another fine, underperformed work that Maud Powell premiered on U.S. shores. Only the Swedish Dances remain a bit of a mystery. Obviously looking to score a big punch the way Brahms and Dvorak did, Bruch chose to make his set of dances for many instrumental combinations, but the nature of these pieces is far more sedate and lyrical than those of the other masters, and did not quite ring the musical chimes of the eager public in the same way. Nonetheless, it is nice to hear them in a performance as fine as this, and in such splendid sound.
Ursula Schoch, first violinist of the Royal Concertgebouw, plays the violin works with unalloyed authority and lyrical passion. So this is a very worthy set of Bruchian miscellany that fills an important gap. I can’t see that you would ever need to replace it.
— Steven Ritter
