Symphony No. 5 in B-flat

Anton Bruckner composed his Fifth Symphony between 14 February 1875 and 16 May 1876, only to revise it between May 1877 and 4 January 1878; he continued to make sporadic changes to it through 1887. Despite all that, in the case of this symphony, and in contrast to the first four and the eighth of his numbered symphonies, there is only one version that issued from Bruckner’s pen. Bruckner heard it only once, and then only in a two-piano arrangement by Josef Schalk (1857-1900). This provisional premiere, as it were, took place in Vienna on 20 April 1887 — Schalk and Franz Zottmann (1858-1909) were the pianists — and was received with enthusiasm by the public. Because of the work’s difficulty and length, its accession into the orchestral repertoire remained out of the question for quite some time. As it was, Bruckner allowed the performance of Schalk’s arrangement only after several grueling rehearsals, and the memoirs of Friedrich Klose (1862-1942), who attended them, strikingly contradict the typical image of Bruckner as a timid, modest person who could be easily persuaded to act against his own interests. The arrangement Schalk prepared for this concert has been lost, but probably corresponded to Bruckner’s own (and final) version of the work.

For performance materials, please contact the publisher E. F. Kalmus, Boca Raton (ww.kalmus-music.com).