Anton Bruckner
March d-Minor (WAB 96) – Three Orchestral Pieces (WAB 96+97) – Overture g-Minor (WAB 98)
During his work as organist at the cathedral in Linz (1855-1868), Anton Bruckner met the ten-year-younger theater conductor Otto Kitzler (1834-1915), who gave him the decisive inspiration for composing symphonic orchestral works between December 1861 and July 1863...
The orchestral pieces presented here as an organ transcription and the Overture in G minor (WAB 96 to 98) are Anton Bruckner's earliest compositions for symphonic orchestra. They were written between October 1862 and January 1863 at the end of his studies with Otto Kitzler in free composition1, which had begun in late autumn 1861 with simple exercises in form theory and ended with the composition of his first symphony in F minor (WAB 99) in the summer of 1863.
The March in D minor (WAB 96) and the Three Orchestral Pieces (WAB 97) are based on Bruckner's first short pieces in his study book, in which he had become acquainted with the 'three-part song form' as a way of extending periods: they are short symphonic character pieces without any internal connection.
The Overture in G minor, his first extended sonata movement, provides further revealing insights into Bruckner's characteristic symphonic form principles: although it is based on the traditional sonata form (Bruckner's expression in his study book), which he had become acquainted with through Otto Kitzler, primarily on the basis of the composition theory of Johann Christian Lobe2 (here also with a slow introduction subsequently created on his advice), the sonata movement of the already 38-year-old composer deviates from this and is aimed primarily at the end of the piece, where the main theme surprisingly appears in a new sound form.
(Dr. Ruolf Innig)