From: cb@tamarack13.timbuk (Chris Brewster)
Newsgroups: rec.music.classical
Subject: Bruckner editions
Date: 5 Oct 92 16:14:25 GMT
Organization: pubs

Tong Bo-Ming:
   >	I don't think there is a better Bruckner 8th than Giulini.  His 
   >9th (DG) is also great, except the recording.  Why didn't he record 
   >a complete cycle, or the 7th at the very least ?

Deryk Barker:
   He did - the 7th with the VPO is on DG 419 627-2. (Or my copy is anyway).

Any discussion of Bruckner 8 (especially Giulini's recording) should
mention the question of editions.  Some of the best-known recordings
(such as Haitink) use Haas, and Giulini uses Novak.  If you know and
love the work, you *will* notice the difference--it's not trivial.
(Haas was the version I knew first, and my first hearing of Novak was
striking and intriguing.)  Following is a repost on this subject:



From: midkiff@portia.Stanford.EDU (Neil Midkiff) 
Date: 16 Dec 90 03:27:00 GMT 
Organization: AIR, Stanford University

By far the most helpful discussion of this topic is Deryck Cooke's
article "The Bruckner Problem Simplified" (originally published in _The
Musical Times_ in parts from Jan-May 1969) which is in a collection of
his essays entitled _Vindications_ (Cambridge Univ.  Press, 1982).
Bruckner's original scores were revised, sometimes by himself, sometimes
by others, but always as a result of his own lack of self-confidence in
response to criticism.  Usually the Haas editions reflect the composer's
first version; Nowak is more inclined to take into account later
revisions.

Summaries: (from Deryck Cooke's conclusions) Symphony #1 has two
authentic Bruckner versions, his own of 1866 "Linz" (available in both
Haas and Nowak editions, virtually identical) and his 1891 Vienna
rewrite (also available ed. by Haas).

Symphony #2 : Cooke greatly prefers the original 1872 version, ed.
Haas, to the 1876 version whose revision was strongly influenced by
Johann Herbeck (this is the version Nowak presents).

Symphony #3 : The first version that Bruckner himself was satisfied with
was the 1877 version (available in Bruckner Society edition by Oeser, a
colleague of Haas); Cooke prefers this to the Nowak edition which is
based on Franz Schalk's revisions of 1889.

Symphony #4 : Once again, Bruckner's "first definitive" version is the
one that Haas presents (1880 version); Bruckner made a few orchestration
modifications in 1886 for a New York performance, and this is the basis
of the Nowak edition.  Schalk's later revisions have been rejected by
modern editors.

Symphony #5 : Both Haas and Nowak present Bruckner's original 1876
version; Schalk's edition of 1893-96 is "spurious" and has been
abandoned.

Symphony #6 : Haas and Nowak agree (apart from minor misprints in each)
on the 1881 version.

Symphony #7 : Haas and Nowak differ very little, but Cooke prefers Haas
as being a "cleaner" version of Bruckner's own 1883 score; Nowak
introduces some alterations and tempo markings from an 1885 published
edition which Schalk and Loewe retouched a bit.

Symphony #8 : A confusing case! Nowak has edited a version of the 1887
original score, but it appears that Bruckner himself was dissatisfied
with this one, and he responded to (conductor) Hermann Levi's criticisms
with a thoroughgoing revision which Haas (and Cooke) considered to be
"authentic Bruckner improvements" except for some cuts which were
apparently influenced by Schalk.  So Haas came up with a version which
incorporated the 1890 improvements but restores the 1887 material in
those places where Schalk's cuts leave gaping holes.  Nowak's edition of
the 1890 version rejects this approach as too conjectural, and presents
the Bruckner-Schalk version of 1890.  Cooke prefers the Haas version as
closest to what Bruckner's own rewrite would have been without Schalk's
interference.

Symphony #9 : Unfinished, and unpublished in its authentic form (a
"version" by Loewe was published in 1903) until 1934, edited by Orel, a
colleague of Haas.  The Nowak edition is identical except for correcting
one or two misprints.

For extensive discussion of the history of these versions and musical
illustrations of the differences, see Cooke's article.

-Neil
Newsgroups: rec.music.classical