Lachner Symphony No.7

[ferrux]

Can anyone tell me something about Lachner's Seventh Symphony in D minor Op. 58 (Elegie in Form einer Sinfonie)? No cd, no score. In fact it remained handwritten. It has probably come down to us in fragments; or hasn't it been completed? Maybe it was reused in a Suite. The Seventh Suite?  See RISM. Thanks!

[Alan Howe]

Please see this thread:
http://www.unsungcomposers.com/forum/index.php/topic,7016.msg74578.html#msg74578

[ferrux]

Many thanks, but of course I had already read eschiss1's nd White's posts, but I was hoping that in the meantime some new data had emerged. Perhaps some specific book might be useful; but there are very few. I only know: Wolfram Steinbeck, Lachner und die Symphonie. I haven't read it, but it's an 11-page article included in Franz Lachner und seine Bruder and probably isn't very detailed. Only 8 pages has another article: Andrea Harrandt, F. L. zwischen den Zeiten. Does anyone have Ludwig Karl Meyer, F. L. als Instrumental Komponist or Harald Mann, F. L. als Dirigent und Komponist available?

[eschiss1]

Ok, briefly, what I gather we do know right now, btw...:

A complete piano duet reduction in manuscript of the 7th symphony exists, see here, reduced by Heinrich Esser from the orchestral score whose current state is conjecturally explained on another page: the first two movements were incorporated into the 7th suite, the last two movements in autograph can be found @ here -

"Fantasy and fugue from the "Elegy in the form of a symphony".
At the end: "Franz Lachner, Munich 1837".
The first two movements were apparently removed and incorporated into the 7th suite, see D-Mbs, Mus.ms. 5878.
Short title recording made by the owning library."

The titles of the RISM catalog entries say "sketches" but the state suggested by the complete descriptions sound a bit more coherent than that.

[tpaloj]

Right Eric, they're no mere "sketches" but indeed complete manuscripts of the whole 7th Symphony! The 7th Suite is a revised version of the original 7th Symphony in all but its name.

In the suite, the opening allegro and the scherzo are almost identical to the symphony with very slight differences, sometimes a few measures here and there are removed. The orchestration in the suite is improved in a few places.

The Fantasia is very different. The two pieces share the same fugal theme and the concluding fuga is the same (but the suite has a longer coda for it). No matter which version you prefer, it does prove Lachner could write a great Fugue when he put his mind to it!

I was also intrigued with this work, and had typed out the Fantasia for Noteperformer many many months ago, but never uploaded it here (I figured I'd finish the symphony in its entirety but never found time to create the other movements). Would this help? Sorry if the sound quality is off in places, I don't have time to improve the mixing right now.

https://easyupload.io/h9h1fr

A recording of the 7th suite can be found on Youtube - compare the final movement of that with this Fantasia to see the difference!

If you can excuse the poor computer sounds and just take the music as it is, which version of the final movement would you prefer?

[Mark Thomas]

Fascinating. I'm still unclear how different the 7th Suite's two final movements are to the corresponding movements of the Symphony. In comparison with the movements of Lachner's other symphonies, the Suite's final two seem very short.

[tpaloj]

The 7th Symphony is something of a watershed moment in Lachner's career as it seems to represent a clear deviation in trajectory from the previous six. He did stop composing symphonies for a long time after it (the 8th appeared only much later). The 7th only had three movements: the opening Allegro, the Scherzo, and this Fantasia (with a concluding Fugue). I find interesting the date "1837" at the end of Lachner's autograph of the Fantasia movement of this Symphony, yet Hall's chronology lists the work completed in 1839-40...?

He added a completely new Intermezzo for the suite. The "Chaconne" is also pretty much new with only the concluding fugue lifted mostly from the 7th Symphony. Hopefully this can clear up the genesis of these two, admittedly confusing, works a little better 


(As an aside, I found no evidence that the discarded Andante from the 6th Symphony was used as the slow movement of the original 7th Symphony.... It's strange to me why this is not the case: this Andante would fit in well – the key (D) is the same, and its melodic material seems to resemble that of the 7th in some ways. Structurally it would round up the work (Allegro - Scherzo - Andante - Fantasia) closer to Lachner's proper symphonic form.)
https://imslp.org/wiki/Andante_in_D_major_(Lachner%2C_Franz_Paul)

[Mark Thomas]

Thanks, and apologies for my befuddlement. Now I understand (I think).

[ferrux]

Thank you all for this interesting and intriguing research on the Seventh Symphony. Certainly heralds a moment of crisis with her future transition to the Suite genre. So much so, the late Octave (a very beautiful work) will be quite another thing, very different from the previous ones. After all, Lachner devoted himself to string quartets from the 1840s onwards.

[tpaloj]

So here we are! I hope you can enjoy this Noteperformer recreation of the 7th Symphony by Lachner.

We've heard most of the music already in his 7th Suite - there is an 1990 Marco Polo recording with Polish SO. There are some minor differences in the first two moments. I haven't found a score of the 7th suite to compare whether there are any cuts in the Marco Polo recording of the suite. Still, the opening movement of the Symphony is somewhat longer. The scherzo is mostly the same. The fugue was re-used in the suite with a longer coda. Most of the preceding Fantasie was discarded in the Suite.

Without a proper "slow" movement in this Symphony to round things off, it ties with Lachner's 1st for the shortest of his eight symphonies and consequently the tempi are fast and energetic almost throughout. The dramatic first movement is absolutely brilliant: all the themes tie well together contrapunctally and Lachner's orchestration is balanced and masterful. Perhaps my favorite opening mvt in all his symphonies.

https://youtu.be/NrSIbxAuyBM

[Mark Thomas]

Thanks very much for the 7th Symphony realisation. It's great to be able to hear all eight of his symphonies, mixed bag though they are, and also to compare this one with its revision as a suite.

[Ilja]

Tuomas, thank you so much once again! With all the work you, Martin, Gerd and others are doing, it's become rare that a week passes without us being able to enjoy a new work. Hoping to add to that tally soon, but it's still slow going as I still have to learn a lot (and Sibelius doesn't always help...).

Having listened to the symphony and suite, it's difficult to see what makes the 1874 revision more "suite-y" than the original. I've seen editions of Bruckner symphonies that were more dissimilar from one another than these two. It somehow reminds me of another "faux-symphony", Tchaikovsky's Third Suite from 1884, which the composer himself was long unsure how to label. It may be that, like Tchaikovsky, Lachner called it a suite to liberate himself from symphonic conventions - only to stick to most of them anyhow: the "suite" feels more like a regular symphony than the "symphony" ever did.

On balance, I think I prefer the revised version; the light-hearted Andantino morphs well into the moody opening of the finale, whereas the first version's finale gets repetitive after a while.

[eschiss1]

Why he didn't call it a belatedly issued and revised 7th symphony, I don't know, though there was enough info published about the first version that he couldn't wholly pretend it never existed, maybe. Revising it as a 9th symphony was something he would have avoided, otoh.

[eschiss1]

@tpaloj: there are full scores (Schott, 151 pp, published around 1882?) of op.190 at Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin, at Wissenschaftliche Stbib. Mainz, Royal Danish Library, a duet arrangement @ Nederlands Muziek Instituut
Muziekbibliotheek; RISM notes the autograph full score and 2-piano reduction are at D-Mbs... a request to the appropriate institution may help...

[Ilja]

Why he didn't call it a belatedly issued and revised 7th symphony, I don't know, though there was enough info published about the first version that he couldn't wholly pretend it never existed, maybe. Revising it as a 9th symphony was something he would have avoided, otoh.

It might be an ethical matter - I'm not really at home with the attitude toward revision in the romantic period. Later in the century, revisions were rampant of course, causing all sorts of practical (and artistic!) issues. I simply don[t know enough about it, really.