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I listened to the 2 movements of his Symphony 2 that I could find as well as parts of the Missa Brevis. I must say I feel I got lucky with the CD I have since to me he is much better at chamber music than choral or symphonic music. The tenuousness of his choral music was a bit surprising since he is much interested in music for the Catholic Church. I think I was on target noting an English romantic feel to the music since his forthcoming symphony 3 is called "The English". The orchestral music is competently written but as you say is more along the lines of soundtrack at best. The thought of music CDs to relieve stress also seemed to fit.  My memory got jogged that the NPR interview was also about a book he wrote and I found it on Amazon: 

https://www.amazon.com/Sound-Beauty-Classical-Composer-Spiritual/dp/1621642712/ref=sr_1_1?s=music

Kurek also is much older than I thought, now going on 70. He seems to have suppressed a lot of his music since there is no sign of a Symphony 1 nor much before the mid 1990s. He was or is a music professor at the US Vanderbilt Univ. in Tennessee.

Let me try again keeping to musical issues. To explain briefly my use of the term Poetic Romanticism (lyric poetry, not narrative) was meant to convey a musical aspect common to certain romantic symphonic works roughly between 1888 and the 1950s. The musical issue is the degree of perceived orderliness from one musical passage to the next within movements. Lyric poetry is rather non linear in its sequence from one thought or image to the next, certainly compared to narrative poetry. The lyric art is creating such sequences that somehow still seem interesting and novel when considered as a totality.

When music has a clear formal structure that is mirrored with the musical content listeners have an easier time grasping it. Shorter harmonically structured melodies are heard as tunes while long complex melodies are heard more as melodiousness. Non linear (less expected) musical sequences within a movement are harder to grasp and the listener spends time puzzling over them rather than continuing to listen without loss of attention.

To loop back to Hurwitz' comment about too much non-linear musical thinking (spasmodic) in Brun's symphonies, it presumably lay behind Rimsky's observation to Sibelius about his Sym 3 being too hard for audiences to understand. Given its modest proportions and circumspect harmonic practice, it seems rather surprising for Rimsky to say that but he was astute. The Sibelius Sym 3 has been his least popular symphony and is rarely performed well either. This is not to say that this kind of music is without value or interest which is the logical leap that Hurwitz makes. Rimsky was more acute in simply saying that audiences were going to have more trouble with following it because of the way that the music was organized.

There is a commonality of sorts with the late chromatic romantic style that was discussed here with Erlanger and the Belle Epoque French opera composers as well as the composers like Schreker, Zemlinsky, Szymanowski.

What these styles of music require of listeners is a certain immersion into them to grasp the totality of the content in a movement and the entire work rather than using certain separable passages as stepping stones to understanding the movement or work as a whole. The practical problem is a Catch 22 process whereby orchestras don't play the works because audiences find them a bit more challenging to grasp and audiences find the works in the style harder to grasp because orchestras don't program them enough.

I am a reasonably experienced musical listener and I noted above that I found it challenging per Rimsky to grasp what Brun and others in this style were doing at first and second listen. It took repeated listening to begin to get comfortable enough to start to make judgments as to the relative success of a given movement or work as a whole given the features of this particular style. I think trying to use the usual normative Romantic works as a basis for comparison here is not apt. Works that seem to fit within "Poetic Romanticism" or late chromatic Romanticism have to be evaluated for the degree of excellence within the character of their respective styles alone. The only fair alternative is to reject the entire style.

I think also we need to see both these styles as based on the observations of talented composers in this time period that the normative Romantic symphonic style after 50 years was becoming increasingly predictable. So this generated various attempts to reintroduce a certain amount of novelty to such works.

Adriano,
 
 Thank you very much for the additional citations of Schoeck songs that have been orchestrated. Makes a big difference, to me at least. I don't think a full orchestra is required but woodwinds and strings are essential IMO.

 As for Brun, your box set jogged me into a journey of discovery here perhaps to the annoyance of some. What I have termed Poetic Romanticism to distinguish it from High Romanticism, Classical Romanticism and Neo Tristanesque Romanticism, in the event was not a big success with audiences.  Even though there is not much harsh dissonance, languor or bombast about it, audiences and even critics found it puzzling, or their favorite term, enigmatic.

Sibelius Sym 3 which I for years thought of as an inexplicable style change I see now has certain characteristics typical of Poetic Romanticism as does to a lesser extent his Sym 6. It is interesting that Sibelius himself recounted that when talking to Rimsky Korsakov after an early performance of the Sym 3 that Rimsky-Korsakov shook his head and said: 'Why don't you do it the usual way; you will see that the audience can neither follow nor understand this.'

On the surface the Sym 3 seems fairly tidy and normal and almost classical in form with its 3 movements  but the sequential movement of the segments are  atypical and they don't flow in either a straightforward Classical or Romantic way. We can compare it to Prokofiev's Sym 1 which is clear neo-classicism and easy to follow even for average audiences. The Sibelius Sym 3 is not at all like that nor are the other works in this style by Bendix, Hermann, Brun and others.

Mr Howe,

 The only music I have of of his is a CD called The Sea Knows from 2017 that has a string orchestra work and some chamber works featuring harp for which I have a predilection. He was interviewed some years ago on the US public radio NPR and does have a certain rep in what is called Traditional Classical Music per Billboard in the US. From what I remember he did not start out as a neo Romantic composer but was a modernist composer early on who I guess could be called a refugee to neo Romanticism. The CD mentioned above was more along the lines of maybe RVW or perhaps Alwyn in their more romantic flights, definitely more early 20th C than late 19th C. I will take a listen to the symphony later this week.

I am listening to the Brun Symphony box for the second time and just listened to Symphonies 7 and 8. These are perhaps the two loveliest of his symphonies and I wanted to commend the playing of the Moscow Phil and the conducting by Adriano. While I understand there are some better orchestras, these were very sensitive old school performances and I am sorry for whatever negative reviews have been made about this set. I think the musicweb reviews have been more supportive on the whole.

In addition, I was struck by the orchestrations by Brun of 3 songs by Othmar Schoeck originally for voice and piano. What a difference the sensitive orchestrations make! I am admittedly not the biggest fan of combining voice and piano since the voice is highly flexible and the piano is highly inflexible. But in Schoeck's case, because of his ultra romantic style, the piano is particularly constraining. Quixotically I hope someone orchestrates all Schoeck's songs.

PS Happy New Year everyone!

I accept people may not agree with me and I think there may be disputes about the exact nature and boundaries of Romantic pastoralism. But I did try to be specific in my comments so at least people can see why I am saying this.  Going back to my survey of Louis Glass symphonies I did make the specific point that there was an evolution in this style and that unlike the Glass Sym 1, which was only a few years after the Bendix Sym 2, the Glass Sym 4 (1911)and 5 (1919) seemed more similar to the early Brun style rather than pointing backwards to the Bendix Sym 2 of 1888.  And to be clear I am leaving off the High Romantic Bendix Sym 1 and starting with his Sym 2.

Mr Howe,

 I'm not sure if you were directing your comment to Ilja, to me or both. Yes pastoralism was an important aspect of standard Romanticism, both literary and musical. There was the Pastoral Symphony of Beethoven of course. I did note that the Bendix style did have a vague feeling of pastoralism in a post above but I am not sure that is really the case now the more I listen.

As I tried to show in my example of the Glass Sym 4 Finale there is a very direct subversion of Romantic style rhetoric though without overt satire. This softening of the tension and urgency of standard high Romanticism can approximate certain aspects of pastoral music but it is far from identical. The symphonies of Lange Muller are definitely along the lines of folk pastoral but he still employs Romantic symphonic rhetoric in restrained fashion typical of Romantic pastoral.This is not really the case with the Bendix et al style IMO.

I think composers by 1890 or so were starting to realize that the high Romantic style was becoming predictable. Some adopted neo Tristanesque chromaticism, others continued on unwilling/unable to change and other composers were experimenting.

Ilja,

 The reason I call it the Bendix style, referring to his Sym 2 onwards, is that I can't find an earlier example of it. If I or someone else does find an earlier example then I will call it by them.

As for Sinding, his symphony 1 of 1890 seems standard high Romantic style to me. It is only the Symphony 2 of 1902 where there is some leaning towards a less rhetorical style of Romanticism. That's 14 years after Bendix 2, 8 years after Glass Sym 1 and 7 years after Hermann Sym 1. Incidentally the Sibelius Sym 3 is now looking less surprising. 

Ilja said:  The problem with the Todorov recording (the whole set is rather more miss than hit, I'm afraid) of Glass' 4th Symphony is that it's played much too slowly.

I agree completely. I am just listening through them, concentrating on the sequential structure and basic material.

It was a bit of a trial listening again to the Glass Sym 4 which was stretched out to an hour by Todorov. However, I am convinced that it does fall into the Bendix style although significantly expanded. I think it is instructive to listen to the  Sym 4 Finale and compare it to a typical Romantic symphony Finale. This is the one movement where Glass actually fakes a typical romantic movement with its rhetoric. The Finale starts out with a forte brass outburst, not ominous just boisterous. This goes on for 90 seconds when the brass suddenly pause. Then they sputter out a few more notes mezzo forte then stop again, Then the violins begin with a variant of the brass melody and go on in melodic fashion for several minutes until the brass come back with another boisterous section which also sputters out. Then the strings start up again with the melody in genial fashion until they start picking up the pace. Suddenly there is a bit of repetitive content and the music builds slightly and then the movement ends quickly on a few cadential chords performed without much vigor as if the Finale was an opening movement.

The Bendix style is Romantic but in a way that constantly subverts typical Romantic rhetorical gestures that appear for example in Glass' own Sym 2.

Symphony 2 has a male chorus and organ. That does tilt it to typical high Romantic style.   

I took a listen to the rest of Louis Glass' symphonies per Ilja. My initial thoughts follow. (I may change my mind about Sym 4 and 5 with more listening.)

Sym 1 is in the style of the Bendix Sym 2
Sym 2 and 3 are normative high Romantic symphonies pre-Tristan
Sym 4 is tough to classify but it seems to be more in the category of what I faute de mieux call Poetic Romanticism although tending more in the direction of early Brun (Sym 2 and 3)
Sym 5 seems more like poetic Romanticism in the manner of Robert Hermann or later Bendix
Sym 6 is back to high Romanticism

In summary Glass Sym 1 is definitely in the Bendix Sym 2 style while Sym 4 and Sym 5 seem to be moving to a bit later Bendix style in his Sym 3 and 4 as well as Hermann and Brun. The rest are normative Romantic symphonies.

I remember someone telling at this forum that the long delay of releases is partly the fault of the writer of the lining notes procrastinating...

Have they checked for a pulse lately? Why don't they ask one of us to do it in half the time? 

Also, here's an article (in Danish- a translator thing is useful) based on Cornelius' book from soon after it came out. Doesn't answer your question but summarizes some of its content.. Pov.international, Poul Arnedal, July 30 2021, "Victor Bendix: The Forgotten Composer and His Erotic Escapades"

Yes in perusing his website I noted the several reviews of the Bendix book and saw this from POV a music streaming site. Their review title does suggest that the author was not doing much music analysis above liner notes in the book.  I have no doubt he did a competent job of doing a Bendix biography. He noted that he went through letters, newspaper accounts and the like. The photos are probably all that survived and reproduced adequately. I am sure there are no music examples. I do agree that the price is low and after the holidays I will try to get a copy but have low expectations at this point.

Wheesht,
 I understand that a composer bio doesn't need to have lots of music examples. The issue is that what we are talking about here is musical style. Reading the liner notes of Cornelius to the Dacapo Bendix CD he certainly recognizes stylistic shifts but doesn't go into much detail about it or its possible genesis. That's what I'm interested in though.

Mr Howe,

Bendix knew Liszt since the Sym 1 was approved by Liszt but this is not that surprising given its programmatic nature and the use of certain Lisztian techniques. But the Sym 1 is the most normative of his symphonies. It is only starting with the  Sym 2 in 1888 that I hear something quite novel that Ilja also seconded with the Louis Glass Sym 1, both students of Gade. Then we can throw Robert Hermann into the mix who apparently knew Grieg fairly well. Hermann's Sym 1 came out in 1895 one year after Glass. So something was going on in Scandinavia around 1890 that ended up producing these stylistically similar symphonies quite different from the standard symphonic fare of the time.