RE-CREATING THE SACRED: ROMANTIC AESTHETICS IN
SACRED CONTEXTS IN THE LATE 19TH CENTURY
by
JAMES B. BERRY, B.A.
A THESIS
IN
MUSIC HISTORY AND LITERATURE
Submitted to the Graduate Faculty
of Texas Tech University in
Partial Fulfillment of
the Requirements for
the Degree of
MASTER OF MUSIC
Approved
Christopher Smith
Chairperson of the Committee
Wayne Hobbs
John Dickson
Accepted
John Borrelli
Dean of the Graduate School
May, 2006
CONTENTS
LIST OF EXAMPLES
iii
CHAPTER
I.
INTRODUCTION
II.
SECULAR MUSIC BROUGHT TO THE CHURCH FRANZ LISZT
10
SACRED MUSIC BROUGHT TO THE WORLD JOHANNES BRAHMS
29
SECULAR IDEAS COMBINED WITH SACRED MUSIC ANTON BRUCKNER
45
CONCLUSIONS AND FURTHER APPLICATIONS
59
III.
IV.
V.
1
BIBLIOGRAPHY
63
ii
LIST OF EXAMPLES
1.
Liszt’s use of the “rorate coeli” chant Melody.
23
2.
Liszt’s use of the "Benedicamus Domino" chant melody.
23
3.
Liszt’s use of the “Stabat mater” chant melody.
24
4.
Motives in Gran Mass.
25
5.
Harmony in the Legend of St. Elizabeth.
27
6.
Harmony in Christus.
27
7.
Treatment of “Warum.”
38
8.
Op. 78/1, second section.
39
9.
Brahms’ use of chorale style.
40
10. Op. 110/3, mm 1-4.
42
11. Op. 110/3, mm 13-19.
43
12. Crescendo lifting up the cross.
54
13. Uses of Kyrie Motive in Mass in f minor.
55
14. Use of the Bassoon.
57
iii
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION
Throughout the history of Western music contrasts between sacred and secular
compositional styles have waxed and waned. During the late nineteenth century the gap
between these styles grew to an especially wide extent. While in previous time periods
music written in a sacred context could be stylistically similar to that written in a secular
context, the late nineteenth century saw the establishment of highly contrasting
expectations, goals, and stylistic characteristics for sacred as opposed to secular idioms.
Sacred music, for the most part, was expected to fulfill its functional purpose in worship
and carry on relatively conservative stylistic traditions while secular music began
exploring progressive topics and techniques that were increasingly considered to be
unsuitable in a sacred context. This created a situation in which secular music was
expected to push the boundaries of harmony and form while much of sacred music was
still rooted in old traditions. These contrasting expectations also account for the relative
dearth of musicological study on sacred music in the late nineteenth century. Composers
who desired to write in both sacred and secular idioms were thus forced to find a way to
bridge this stylistic gap. The strategies which each composer chose to employ illuminate
both specific characteristics of that composer’s music and also the overall contexts in
which sacred music was written in the nineteenth century. In this study, I will explore
this thesis through the works of three composers: Franz Liszt, Johannes Brahms, and
1
Anton Bruckner. These composers provide good examples of the effect of the
contrasting stylistic expectations on sacred music in the late nineteenth century.
In a study of this sort, in which the precise period connotations of abstract terms
are so important, definitions are important. I would like to make clear the definition of
secular and sacred as it pertains to this discussion. Though there is not a definite
agreement between musicologists, critics, or religious scholars about what music should
be termed "sacred", there were specific expectations for such music in the period.1
Therefore, for the purpose of this study, sacred music is any music composed for use in a
sacred context, or music written to a text from a sacred source. This definition is
purposefully broad in order to reflect the conventions of the period. Secular music, then,
is the remaining music not falling into one of these categories. Typically, and as we shall
see in this study, such idioms were conventionally assumed to occupy distinctly different
realms.
The expectations for a composer of secular music were dramatically different in
the nineteenth century than they had been in previous eras. The Romantic period was
unique among stylistic periods in that it was driven by a self-conscious artistic
philosophy. While composers in the Baroque created a moderately uniform style, the
articulation of this style’s aesthetics only came about years later. In contrast, when artists
in the nineteenth century created their artworks, they were explicitly conscious of both
their place in history and their importance to the future. Each new composer sought to
find a way to separate himself from the artists who came before him and to explore his
own individual artistic expression. This is what Berlioz was doing when he increased the
1
For more information about the use of the term sacred, see Mansfield, “What is Sacred Music.”
2
size of the orchestra and experimented with programaticism; what Wagner was trying to
obtain with the Music of the Future; what Brahms was developing when he synthesized
old music with new.
In the nineteenth century, critics, writers, and thinkers about music began to
expect that a composer should find his own unique, individual style. Individualism was
one of the thumbprints of the time period. In the period devoted to the Promethean hero,
the genius composer, it was impossible to be anything but an individual. The very words
Romantic composers used to describe what they were doing, “the New German School”,
“Music of the Future”, tell much about their desires and motivations. These names
clearly demonstrate that these composers were interested in promoting themselves as
progressive. The secular composers of this time were concerned with making a place for
themselves in history by creating a new future.
In terms of musical style, the Romantic period was one of constant stylistic
change. This is to be expected considering the value placed upon individualism by these
composers. For the purposes of this study a concrete definition of Romantic musical
style is not needed; however, it will be helpful to keep the following characteristics in
mind:
A preference for the original rather than the normative, a pursuit of unique
effects and extremes of expressiveness, the mobilization to that end of an
enriched harmonic vocabulary, striking new figurations, textures, and tone
colors.2
This search for new directions guided the artistic efforts of the composers themselves,
and in turn forced later composers and critics to deal with these same expectations.
2
Plantinga, Romantic Music, 21.
3
Along the same lines, goals and expectations also existed for sacred music. This
music was different for reasons which originate from its contrasted contexts and function.
One of sacred music’s primary functions was still considered to be aiding in a worship
ceremony. Music which was intended for use in worship developed formal conventions
which became as sacred as the subject itself. In addition, Christian sacred music was
often expected to differentiate itself from secular music. Consequently, sacred music
commonly carried more conservative elements than other music of its time. This
tendency toward conservatism often manifested itself in a close affinity with music from
the past.
According to Carl Dahlhaus, the ideal of Nineteenth Century church music
embodied “the concept of ‘pure’ composition combin[ing] the notion of strict
counterpoint and a cappella style, unsullied by instruments, with a sense of moral
integrity and religious exaltation beyond the world of the profane.”3 Sacred music began
in the Nineteenth Century to carry connotations of “purity” and “noble simplicity” which
were to differentiate it from other music of the time.
The Catholic Church had long been ambivalent about musical styles which it
perceived to represent “frivolity and worldly ostentation in liturgical music.”4 The
Council of Trent in 1545, Pope Alexander VII in 1657, Innocent XII in 1692, and
Benedict XIV in 1749 had each addressed the issue of stylistic propriety in worship
music. In practice, this tended to demand conservative and traditional compositional
approaches. During the nineteenth century, Popes Leo XII in 1824 and Pius VIII in 1830
3
Dahlhaus, Nineteenth Century Music, 181.
4
Hutchings, Church Music in the 19th Century, 79.
4
continued these strictures, leading up to the ‘moto proprio’ of Pope Pius X in 1903 which
reiterated the importance of chant and restricted the employment of modern music traits.
I will address this item in more detail in the last chapter, but its mention here reminds us
of the continuing inclinations of the Church toward a set of expectations that differed
from those of secular composers.
One of the most significant groups in regards to these reform efforts was the
Cecilian Movement. The Cecilians, founded by Franz Xaver Witt in 1868, promoted a
church music based primarily in Renaissance a cappella music. They supported the
creation of music based on Renaissance styles and techniques and favored congregational
hymnody and dignified organ music. In particular they began what may be deemed the
“Palestrina Revival.” This renewed interest in Palestrina’s music brought an “enthusiasm
for a ‘seraphic tone’ in church music…intimately connected with the ideas of ‘noble
simplicity’ and ‘edification’.”5 The beliefs of the Cecilians are good examples of the
expectations composers of sacred music faced.
In the process of preparing this study, I have drawn on the works of many authors
and I have read and analyzed many who are not mentioned. Leon Plantinga’s Romantic
Music (1984) provides an overview of the Romantic Period and its many styles.6 It
covers in concise detail the primary trends and composers who wrote during the
nineteenth century and how they influenced musical style. The first chapter is
particularly relevant to this discussion in its analysis of Romantic ideals and culture. But
the book is lacking in any systematic discussion of sacred music. This highlights the
5
Dahlhaus, 181.
6
Plantinga, Romantic Music.
5
issue that sparked my initial research into this area: many books covering the Romantic
period do not include a discussion of sacred music, and if present it is usually a cursory
analysis covering only a small number of pieces. This in turn emphasizes a primary goal
of the current study; that is, to examine a genre which has been left out of the primary
history of the late nineteenth century.
For a more lengthy discussion of nineteenth century sacred music, there is Arthur
Hutchings’ Church Music in the 19th Century (1967).7 This work is written from the
perspective of a church musician looking back in order to justify the music of the present
day. The first part of the book addresses the contributions to sacred music made by great
composers. Hutchings confirms the general sense that the vast majority of late-century
church compositions were written in an imitation of traditional styles, but he does not
offer any explanations for this phenomenon. My thesis will suggest that contrasting
expectations account for this lack of material from great composers.
I have already mentioned the present focus on the three composers Franz Liszt,
Johannes Brahms, and Anton Bruckner. I have made the determination to use these three
particular composers because in each case the complexity of contextual expectations
shaping compositional style is particularly clear. Liszt provides an example of a
composer of secular music who began writing purely sacred music later in life, thus
bringing secular techniques to sacred music. Brahms was a composer of secular music
who appropriated elements from sacred music in service of a more universal, less
doctrinal “religious feeling”. Bruckner offers a contrasting example in that he began his
7
Hutchings, Church Music in the Nineteenth Century.
6
career as a traditional sacred music composer and only later incorporated secular
elements.
On the subject of Franz Liszt, the best source for pertinent information is Paul
Merrick’s Revolution and Religion in the Music of Liszt (1987).8 As is suggested by the
title, the primary focus of this book is to draw connections between Liszt’s interest in
revolutionary activities and his interest in the church. Merrick argues that Liszt’s later
church music is an outgrowth of revolutionary ideas he inherited from Saint-Simon and
the Abbe Felicite de Lamennais, to be discussed ahead. Merrick goes into great detail
about the religious areas of Liszt’s life. His analysis of Liszt’s sacred music is thorough
and applicable, and I have drawn heavily on his presentation of primary source materials
in my discussion. Merrick concludes that Liszt’s sacred music was unsuccessful because
it was too experimental. I will expand upon these insights with my analysis in terms of
the differing expectation placed on this music.
Daniel Beller-McKenna’s Brahms and the German Spirit (2004) discusses
Brahms’ sacred music in terms of German nationalism.9 Beller-McKenna argues that
Brahms’ settings of Biblical texts, especially those taken from Luther’s Bible, connect
him with the spiritual roots of the German people. The argument is well-conceived and
Beller-McKenna’s insights into Brahms’ faith and religion are supported by the facts he
presents. However, I do not believe that these conclusions are sufficient to explain the
context in which Brahms wrote sacred music. While there is certainly an element of
8
Merrick, Revolution and Religion in the Music of Liszt.
9
Beller-McKenna, Brahms and the German Spirit.
7
German nationalism in this music, I will argue that analysis of Brahms’ response to
sacred versus secular expectations provides a more complex and nuanced set of insights.
The available sources addressing Bruckner’s sacred music are much fewer than
those for Brahms or Liszt. Of the few, one of the best is A.C. Howie’s “Traditional and
Novel Elements in Bruckner’s Sacred Music” published in the Musical Quarterly
(1981).10 The very fact that the best discussion of Bruckner’s sacred music appears in an
article and not a book-length study confirms one of my central premises: that Bruckner’s
sacred music has been neglected by serious musicological study. The overwhelming
majority of scholarship on Bruckner has been done on his symphonies, yet such emphasis
distorts the actual profile of Bruckner’s output: sacred music was his only output during
the first forty years of his life and even when it was not, he still composed many small
sacred works. Howie’s article gives an in-depth analysis of Bruckner’s sacred music and
identifies compositional elements which are new for the time period. My analysis will
put these observations into context in order to help understand the methodology and
reasoning behind this music.
Central to this discussion is each composer’s concept of the sacred in music.
Therefore, each chapter begins with an examination of available evidence regarding the
composer’s belief system and religious convictions. Following that discussion I provide
a study of each composer’s reception by contemporaries or later generations. Because
the main focus of this thesis is the impact of contrasting expectations on the composition
of sacred music, the responses of others toward these composer’s efforts becomes highly
significant.
10
Howie, “Traditional and Novel Elements in Bruckner’s Sacred Music.”
8
Finally, each chapter concludes with an analysis of several specific works that
demonstrate how each composer addressed and synthesized various expectations. This
three fold analysis will allow me to illustrate the contexts from which each composer
wrote sacred music and elucidate the overall use of sacred music in the late nineteenth
century.
9
CHAPTER II
SECULAR MUSIC BROUGHT TO THE
CHURCH – FRANZ LISZT
Because of several elements of Liszt’s character and musical style, an analysis of
the contextual factors surrounding him is particularly telling. Most studies give a cursory
glance at Liszt’s sacred music, focusing instead on his virtuoso years. That earlier period
fits well into a discussion of Nineteenth Century style, Liszt being widely perceived as
the epitome of the Romantic artist. The problem created by this superficial portrait of
Liszt is that it ignores the years following 1847 when he no longer performed regularly.
Such a portrait might not anticipate Liszt’s turn to the Catholic Church. Many
interpretations categorize this move as an attempt to escape matrimony. Others see it as
spiritual suicide or a rejection of changing compositional practices of the time. However,
none of these interpretations agree even with Liszt’s own letters, much less the evidence
of his previous life. The attempt to somehow explain Liszt’s late career is caused by the
desire to perpetuate the view of Liszt as a concertizing Romantic virtuoso. In fact, it is
easier to explain the virtuoso years, not the later religious period, as atypical.
This view is key to understanding the context from which Liszt wrote sacred
music. For him, the impulse to create in both the sacred and secular realms arose from
the same deep spiritual convictions. He took the same style he used for the secular world
and brought it to the Catholic Church. For Liszt “it was not style that was religious” but
instead it was religion that permeated his style.11 The use of a deeply religious mood,
11
Merrick, Revolution and Religion in the Music of Liszt, 165.
10
thoughtful texts, and the programmatic usage of plainchant, regardless of specific
liturgical function, can still provide the essence of the sacred. In this interpretation Liszt
may be seen as a composer of much more sacred music than is commonly thought. Piano
pieces like Harmonies poétiques et religieuses are entirely instrumental yet carry a deeply
religious tone. The piece is titled after a set of poems composed by Abbe Felicite de
Lamennais, whose relationship with Liszt I will discuss below. These poems are
collections of prayers which provide the program for the piano piece. In it, Liszt bases
melodic ideas on chant melodies or psalm tunes: for example the use of a pater noster in
No. 5.
By writing his sacred music with many of the same style characteristics he
employed in his secular music, Liszt showed a way to deal with the growing gap between
the two. Liszt took a secular, Romantic idiom and combined it with the musical
traditions he found in the realm of sacred composition. This chapter explores this thesis
through consideration of three main points of evidence: the writings of Franz Liszt,
demonstrating the intentions of the composer; the views of Liszt’s contemporaries and
later historians; and an analysis of Liszt’s sacred music, showing how the composer
employed secular techniques in his sacred compositions.
Liszt was successful as a virtuoso pianist because he was able to assess the culture
of the time and create a stage personality to exploit it. The solo piano recital, particularly
in Liszt’s terms, was an artistic creation. Liszt saw that the growth of the middle class
had created an audience who would pay to attend concerts in grandiose and flamboyant
style. However, despite outward appearances, a more nuanced interpretation of the
evidence supports the claim that the purpose of his concerts was not self-glorification.
11
To cite only a few contradictions: Liszt wrote of his concerts, “All the time I am asking
myself why I have come here, what I am supposed to be doing, what good the
acclamations of the crowd are doing me, and the empty, noisy, puerile celebrity.”12
Such statements articulate a clear ambivalence about fame. A commonly
attributed motive for his concerts is financial gain: he had three children and their mother
to support. But again this is to oversimplify. Liszt gave many concerts to raise money
for charitable causes. The first performance of the Gran Mass in Paris was made under
horrible circumstances. The mass was performed after a series of polkas played by a
military band and was interrupted by barked commands from the military officers and the
ill-prepared performance of the musicians. When asked about the performance, Liszt
said, “The mistake I made was not to have forbidden a performance given under such
deplorable conditions. [But] I did not wish to deprive the fund for the poor of the
guaranteed receipts of more than 40,000 francs.”13 It was this type of concert, Liszt said,
that “determined me on a virtuoso career.”14 This gets to the heart of Liszt’s sacred
beliefs, that “if Art was God given, something had to be given back…This most
wonderful of arts ought not to be sacrificed on the alter of Mammon, but should be used
to benefit the whole of humanity.”15 All this goes to confirm that Liszt was not a worldly
man whose “religion must be insincere, a mere theatrical gesture made by a hypocrite,”
12
Ollivier, Correspondance de Liszt et de la Comtesse d’Agoult, 227.
13
Walker, Reflections on Liszt, 243.
14
Weilguny, Das Liszthaus in Weimar, 3.
15
Walker, 242.
12
but instead was a deeply religious man who created a worldly persona to accomplish his
goals. 16
Adam Liszt once chided his teenage son for his desire to become a priest, saying
“You belong to art, not the Church.”17 From the very beginning Franz Liszt was led to
perceive a difference between the artist and the priest. It was taken for granted that to be
a successful artist was to give up the desire to become a priest. Later in life, Liszt sought
forced to find some way to join the two. In April 1846 he wrote to his long time
companion and confidante Comtesse d’Agoult: “My Manuscripts have too long been in
abeyance, and I feel terribly a longing to write, but unfortunately the things I want to
compose would not bring in any money.”18 Clearly Liszt did not believe the music he
wished to write would fulfill the expectations of his audience. A case could be made that
he was simply referring to music in a more complicated style. But knowing that the years
1846-7 saw a Pater Noster and an Ave Maria, along with the beginnings of Harmonies
poétiques et religieuses and the Male Chorus Mass and Liszt’s prose writings of the time
(discussed below), it seems reasonable to say that “the things [he] want[ed] to write”
included serious sacred music.
Later in life, even after devoting more of his compositional energies to sacred
music, Liszt still lamented the widening gap between sacred and secular music. He wrote
to fellow composer Mihalovich:
16
Merrick, Revolution and Religion in the Music of Liszt, 185.
17
The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, s.v. “Liszt, Franz”.
18
Ollivier, 355.
13
Everyone is against me. Catholics, because they find my church
music profane, Protestants because to them my music is Catholic,
freemasons because they think my music is clerical…Italians, in spite of
Sgambati, if they support Garibaldi they detest me as a hypocrite, if they
are on the Vatican side I am accused of bringing Venus’ grotto into the
Church.19
This passage provides several key insights for this discussion. First, it shows that despite
the hyperbole of the first line, Liszt clearly had some supporters, including the Italian
composer Giovanni Sgambati, who promoted Liszt’s music throughout his life, and at
least some members of the Vatican. Whatever else Liszt’s music did, it certainly caused
controversy; but it did not destroy all churchly support.
Secondly, we see a reference to the common critique of Liszt’s sacred music: that
it brought something sensual or sinful into a holy place. I will discuss this concept in
greater detail in the next section, but this letter confirms, preliminarily, that Liszt was
sensitive to these concerns.
Liszt chose to bridge the widening gap by melding its two sides. This was a
conscious effort on his part, as confirmed in several letters. In 1863, while composing
Christus, Liszt wrote “I will confess that I think more highly of certain ideas formerly
preached by the disciples of Saint-Simon…’art joined to worship’…does not seem to me
a fantasy empty of sense.”20 The idea of “art joined to worship” embodies Liszt’s
response to the gap between secular and sacred music. A quintessential romantic, he
would not abandon the progressive musical techniques so dear to him. Instead he took
the same compositional modus operandi he used in secular contexts and combined it with
sacred themes to create works which brought a romantic musical style to the church.
19
La Pleiade (Paris, 1963), s.v. ‘Histoire de la Musique’ 2:535.
20
La Mara, Franz Liszt’s Briefe, 169.
14
Hence, the response of the “Vatican side” in Liszt’s letter takes on even more
significance because it confirms some official reception to this melding of styles. This
idea is made even more clear when we see a letter Liszt wrote after the completion of his
Gran Mass in 1857: “Thus much I may in all conscientiousness affirm, that I composed
the work, from the first bar to the last, with the deepest ardor as a Catholic and the utmost
care as a musician.”21 Liszt’s two concerns were for his faith and his art and he refused
to sacrifice either for the other.
His efforts to blend secular and sacred styles did not originate simply from a
desire to continue writing in a style he knew. From very early in his life, Liszt had been
concerned with renewing church music. In 1835, Liszt wrote in an article entitled “On
the future of Church Music”:
This Church which is only concerned with muttering old formulas and
living comfortably as possible in its dilapidated state…has completely
ceased to win the love and respect of our age. Forsaken by the people, by
life and art, it seems that its destiny remains none other than to perish,
exhausted and abandoned.22
Such revolutionary ideas about sacred art derive almost directly from the beliefs of the
Catholic reformer Abbe Felicite de Lamennais, to whom Liszt dedicated many of his
early works and whose writings provided programs for other Liszt works, including
Harmonies poétiques et religieuses.
The chief concern of Lamennais was liberty and the equality of man.23 He felt
that the church should politically oppose and vigorously resist inhuman injustice; it was
21
Bache, Letters of Franz Liszt, 334.
22
Chantavoine, Franz Liszt, pages romantiques, 62.
See Abbe F. de Lamennais, The Words of a Believer, (London, 1848).
23
15
these ideas, that violence could in some cases be necessary or justified, that caused
Lamennais’ separation from the Catholic Church.
To say that Liszt was influenced by these views is almost an understatement.
Merrick claims that Lamennais was “undoubtedly the greatest single non-musical
influence” on the young Liszt.24 That the influence faded in the latter years of Liszt’s life
is shown by the fact that though Lamennais moved away from the Catholic Church, Liszt
moved toward it. What Liszt did retain from Lamennais was the deep desire for social
justice and a desire to help the poor.
Lamennais’ influence is also seen in Liszt’s desire to bring progressive change to
the music of the Catholic Church. In Liszt’s article “On the future of Church Music”,
drafted after a visit with Lamennais at La Chenaie in 1835, he articulates his desire to
create church music with the people in mind, music that would bring men back to the
church. He writes “art must leave the sanctuary of the temple, and, coming abroad into
the outer world, seek a stage for its magnificent manifestations.” Liszt described this new
music as “humanitary, must be inspired, strong and effective, uniting, in colossal
proportions, theatre and church; at the same time dramatic and holy, splendid and simple,
solemn and serious, fiery and unbridled, stormy and calm, clear and fervid…This will be
the fiat lux of music.”25 Liszt’s later masses and oratorios derive directly from this
philosophy. This theatricality, the joining of “theatre and church”, exemplified in his
masses and mirrored in his symphonic poems, is an attempt to link the two disparate
genres of sacred and secular music.
24
Merrick, Revolution and Religion in the Music of Liszt, 7.
25
Ramann, Franz Liszt, Artist and Man, 383-5.
16
Liszt’s desire for change translated directly into his music. When trying to
compose in a style with a long tradition, a composer must make decisions about the
synthesis of tradition versus personal style characteristics. In the case of sacred music,
traditional styles tended to originate from the models, if not the actual pieces, of the late
Renaissance and Baroque periods, especially Palestrina. The compositions of the “savior
of church music” could still be heard ringing through the cathedrals of Catholic Europe.
We know Liszt had an interest in studying Palestrina. He owned a well-marked book
called Ueber das Leben und die Werke des G. Pierluigi da Palestrina. He noted
instances in which Palestrina used Plainchant in his masses, passages detailing of the
banning of musical instruments in church, and cases when secular melodies were used in
sacred music. Each of these techniques is employed in Liszt’s sacred music. The
implication is that Liszt studied Palestrina and drew from that study the elements of older
church music that he could include in his sacred compositions.
However, while Liszt both studied Palestrina and incorporated some elements of
his style, the nineteenth century context expected quite different musical goals. While
preparing for the first performance of the Missa Choralis, Liszt commented on the ability
of the choir from the Sistine Chapel: “I doubt whether they would be willing to take the
trouble to rehearse sufficiently in order not to spoil some of the modulations – which I
could not leave out without the risk of falling into an archaic style devoid of the feeling I
want to evoke!”26
The same Liszt who founded the New German School and invented the
Symphonic Poem sought programmaticism in sacred music. Of course most choral
26
La Mara, 80.
17
music has a program, as it is usually sung to a text. In Liszt’s case, though,
programmaticism went further than simply telling a story. Liszt’s programmaticism
emphasized the same devotion and emotion that he himself felt when writing the music.
In 1857, when preparing for the performance of his Male Voice Mass, Liszt gave these
requirements:
Above all, religious absorption, meditation, expansion, ecstasy, shadow,
light, soaring – in a word, Catholic devotion and inspiration…mystic and
ecstatic joy…expressive of reconciliation and full of faith…[the mass]
should float away like sweet-smelling incense.27
This language directly evokes contemporaneous religious rhetoric. For Liszt,
sacred music had to make the same connection to the audience’s emotions that he himself
made with the creation of his stage persona. He later wrote: “The best part of my
religious compositions is the emotion evoked by them.”28 Sacred music was the venue
through which Liszt could express deeply-felt religious convictions, drawing upon the
traditions of Palestrina, Bach, and others while employing the progressive techniques
Liszt himself had developed.
The reception of Liszt’s sacred works also exhibits a tendency to “bridge gaps.”
Liszt created a large media following during his time as a touring virtuoso, primarily
reflected in newspaper and journal articles. It could be said that the most important thing
Liszt learned from his virtuoso years was the “value of effective press coverage.”29
When he began his center for new music at Weimar, he took those lessons to heart, using
the Neue Zeitschrift für Musik to give his movement a national profile. The press
27
28
29
Bache, 315.
Hugo, The Letters of Franz Liszt to Marie zu Sayn-Wittgenstein, 227.
Deaville, ‘Liszt in the German-Language Press’, in The Liszt Companion, ed. Ben Arnold, 45.
18
continued to respond, throughout his time in Weimar. But following the 1860’s, the
press generally moved away. According to James Deaville, “the turn to the composition
of sacred music did not necessarily excite reader or writer, not at least in comparison with
Wagner’s music dramas.”30
The entry into minor orders and move to Rome obviously had something to do
with this change, but I believe his shift of focus toward a more sacred compositional
output was also a factor. The secular press simply did not put as much store in the music
Liszt wrote for the church. It is significant that the only two pieces to receive attention in
their own right were the two oratorios, The Legend of St. Elizabeth (1862) and Christus
(1872). These two are the most theatrical works of Liszt’s sacred repertoire, especially
St. Elizabeth.
Other responses tell us about the reception of Liszt’s church music. When the
Gran Mass was performed in Paris in 1866, a critic wrote, “So much passion, so much
fire, so much anger in a religious piece. Indeed the author of the Revolutionary
Symphony is not dead in Liszt.”31 This critic believed that Liszt maintained the same
ardor and conviction in his religious compositions as in those earlier secular works
addressing social injustice.
Yet, after this same performance, Berlioz expressed his disapproval of the work,
calling it a “negation of art.”32 Berlioz regarded Liszt’s composition of sacred music as
moving away from stylistic autonomy. He had worked his whole career at freeing
30
31
32
Deaville, 49.
Haraszti, Franz Liszt, 226.
Tyler, The Letters of Franz Liszt to Olga von Meyendorff, 423.
19
himself from conservative expectations and to him Liszt was putting those limitations
back on by submitting himself to the expectations of the Church. This sentiment was
echoed by many “progressive” musicians. The 1866 performance of the Gran Mass, his
first Parisian appearance since his virtuoso days, was met with criticism from virtually all
sides, including that of Berlioz and d’Ortigue, two men whom Liszt formerly considered
supporters.
A similar critique came from Wagner after hearing the Christus oratorio: “That
one can so use the resources of a great and noble art to imitate the blubbering of priests,
that is a sign of intellectual poverty.”33 While Wagner acknowledged Liszt’s use of
modern techniques, he could not legitimize his decision to write in the sacred idiom. The
same fire of Catholic passion that Liszt instilled into his sacred works was the thing that
drove other musicians away. What Berlioz and Wagner recognized was that Liszt was
trying to bridge the gap between their expectations of “modern” music and those of the
Church.
Contrasting responses also came from those within the sacred establishment.
Liszt was accepted as a member of the minor orders virtually immediately; there does not
seem to have been opposition to him taking these orders. However, in nineteenth century
Catholicism, the roles of priest and church musician were seen as separate functions;
Liszt encountered considerable difficulty when he sought performances in the sacred
venues in Rome. Specifically Liszt’s letters confirm that he desired to have his works
performed in the Sistine Chapel. This is consistent with Liszt’s choice to set many of his
masses a cappella, the musical practice expected in the Sistine Chapel. But he was never
33
Gregor-Dellin , Cosima Wagner’s Diaries, 7 June 1872.
20
successful and his music was never heard there.34 Merrick comments, “The music, unlike
the man, could not enter the church.”35 Many times Liszt was forced to look outside
Rome and outside a church to find a venue for his sacred music.
The motives behind establishment misgivings about Liszt’s sacred music are
clear. The music was simply “too modern, too revolutionary.”36 Those in the church saw
the techniques signaling passion and feeling in the sacred works as too similar to those he
used in his secular works. In this sense the media attention Liszt had cultivated during
his virtuoso and Weimar years worked against him. Whether or not the works were
devoutly religious, many in the church could only see in them the earlier, secular
composer of the music of the future. Liszt’s thick textures, chromaticism, and extreme
dynamics contrast strongly with the stylistic imitation of traditional styles that were
commonly heard in the churches of the time. The response of the church mirrors that of
the secular world. They saw only an unacceptable combination of the sacred idiom with
secular techniques.
Three examples from Liszt’s sacred music help elucidate his synthesis of sacred
and secular. First, Liszt uses plainchant as programmatic melodies in his sacred works.
Like his successors Mahler and Ives, Liszt used allusion to elicit certain responses from
his audiences. In Liszt’s case, plainsong was a key allusion. These chants were the same
chants sung in churches at the time and would have been familiar to the people Liszt was
writing for. Liszt uses chant in the same way he uses other melodies of his own
34
That Liszt later added an organ part to those masses can be seen as an acknowledgement that they would
never be performed there.
35
Merrick, Revolution and Religion in the Music of Liszt, 123.
36
Ibid, 51.
21
invention: he subjects it to transformation and variation in a very free manner. In
subjecting chant melodies to his favored transformational techniques, Liszt treats them
freely, much more freely than contemporaneous church musicians. We can see such
progressive experimentation with plainsong even in the simple textures of his Responses
and Antiphons37. In this work, essentially simply a borrowed chant with an invented
piano harmonization, we see the kernel of Liszt’s appropriation of chant for
programmatic purposes.
Beyond just his sacred vocal masses, many other Liszt works include plainchant
melodies. For example, the main theme in Totentanz is based on the Dies Irae chant, the
Dante Symphony ends with the Magnificat, and Hunnenschlacht includes the Crux
Fidelis. The Christus oratorio contains many examples of Liszt using plainsong chant in
a programmatic way, three of which I will show here.
First, the introduction is based on the Rorate coeli chant, found in Liszt’s copy of
the Graduale Romanum (see Example 1). The chant provides the structure of the
melodic line as well as the motivic open fifth that will be developed further in the
oratorio. This chant is also used in the last number, ‘Resurrexit’. The second example of
plainsong is from No. 10, ‘The Entry into Jerusalem’. Here Liszt uses part of the
plainsong Benedicamus Domino (Example 2). This time Liszt keeps both the melodic
line and the rhythm in augmentation. He first employs the chant in unison with all
voices, then in harmony, and at the end of the movement, he draws on the chant as the
basis for a large fugue.
37
see Merrick, “Responses and Antiphons: Liszt in 1860.”
22
The final example of plainsong is from No. 12, ‘Stabat mater dolorosa’. Here
Liszt creates a large set of variations on the plainsong Stabat mater dolorosa, a source
melody found in his copy of the Nouvel eucologe en musique (see Example 3). He
structures this number much like a theme and variations, stating the plainsong in the first
verse and making each subsequent verse a variation on the plainsong. Such use of the
plainsong as a programmatic device is thus consistent with his views on program music.
By writing sacred music employing techniques which signaled feeling and passion, Liszt
incorporated his prior experience as a secular composer into the sacred idiom.
23
A second key aspect of Liszt’s sacred music is its formal similarity to secular
music. Two works in particular, the Gran Mass (1856) and The Legend of St. Elizabeth
(1862), provide good examples. The Gran Mass, while in the form of a liturgical mass,
employs many elements that originate in the concept of the Symphonic Poem. One of the
goals of a symphonic poem was to narrate an extra-musical idea. While this often
mandated one large movement, Liszt’s Faust and Dante symphonies provide examples of
multi-movement symphonic poems. The main thumbprints of these symphonic poems
are the use of an overriding program, and the application of recurring themes and
thematic transformation to provide musical unity.
The Gran Mass draws on precisely these ideas in its construction, in particular its
use of thematic transformation and recurring themes. Nine separate repeated themes in
the Gran Mass are used to accompany texts of certain subjects. For example, a different
24
theme is utilized to refer to Christ, Christ as man, Holy Lord, God of Hosts, and Peace
(see Example 4). At times, Liszt draws on these themes to illustrate some deeper
meaning in the text, for example, at the Agnus Dei text he combines the ‘Christ’ theme
and the ‘Christ as man’ theme to show the idea of Christ becoming the Lamb of God.
Liszt also develops the themes as a unifying element, balancing their use inside
movements, like in the Gloria and the Credo, and also balancing between movements,
thus providing cohesiveness to the entire mass. These ideas derive from Liszt’s
symphonic poems, in turn providing more evidence of the synthesis of sacred and secular
elements.38
38
On an interesting side note, Liszt’s use of recurring themes has often been attributed to Wagner’s
influence; however, the Gran Mass was composed in 1855-56 while Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde was not
composed until 1857. While Wagner used recurring themes in several earlier operas, none until Tristan
exhibit the level of intricacy Liszt used in the Gran Mass.
25
In a similar fashion, although Liszt adamantly refused to stage St. Elizabeth, the
work has many qualities that make it resemble a staged opera. The work is organized
into scenes like a traditional opera, and the music follows the same function as that in an
opera; for example, the ‘Chorus of Welcome’ that begins the work is similar to the chaos
often seen at the beginning of an opera. The traditional aria/recitative/chorus form is
accentuated by properly dramatic dialogue. Each of these elements suggests that Liszt
envisioned an opera, but was prevented from writing one by his sacred topic.
The final aspect of Liszt’s sacred music illustrating secular influence is his
harmonic language. Obviously his harmonic language is drastically expanded compared
to that of the earlier sacred music composers he had studied. Liszt’s very approach to
harmony as vertical rather than horizontal is a change from the Renaissance perspective,
yet he makes it work in a remarkable synthesis. Merrick puts it this way: “[Liszt’s sacred
music] manages to combine features normally considered incompatible, namely an
asceticism derived from the Renaissance with the harmony and rhythm in use in the
nineteenth century.”39
This Late-Romantic harmonic palette is shown particularly in these two examples,
first from St. Elizabeth and a second from the ‘Tristis est anima mea’ from Christus. In
the St. Elizabeth example, Liszt is portraying the power hungry Landgravine Sophie
whose quest for power leads her to banish Elizabeth (see example 5). By using an
39
Merrick, Revolution and Religion in the Music of Liszt, 127.
26
augmented fourth, Liszt is able to use harmony to enhance the scene he is creating. The
Christus example creates a scene of suffering when Christ is praying in the garden of
Gethsemane. The harmony here creates directionless movement and symbolizes
confusion. Again the harmonic underpinnings help create the scene (see example 6).
both cases the harmony adds to the theatricality of the writing and exemplifies Liszt’s
synthesis of sacred and secular.
Liszt attempted to bridge the gap between contrasting expectations by using
similar stylistic techniques in both his secular and sacred works. He had a strong
connection to progressive movements in music during the Nineteenth Century, and his
dedication to those movements would not allow him to write sacred music in the
prevailing imitative style. Instead, Liszt chose to transfer his developing techniques to
27
In
his work in the sacred idiom. Evidence for this is seen in reception of his sacred music
by both artists and critics from the secular world as well as spokesmen of the church.
28
CHAPTER III
SACRED MUSIC BROUGHT TO THE
WORLD – JOHANNES BRAHMS
In this discussion of late nineteenth century aesthetics, an examination of Brahms
provides a slightly different perspective than one of Liszt. While Liszt sought to
transport the distinctive techniques developed in his secular music into a later sacred
idiom, Brahms borrowed compositional elements from his studies of the sacred idiom to
express his unique spirituality. In this chapter, I will seek to articulate Brahms’s own
rather amorphous spiritual convictions and show their manifestation in his sacred music;
second, I will explain how Brahms’ study of old music affects his sacred music; third, I
will compare Brahms’ secular vocal works with his sacred vocal works in order to
demonstrate the similarities in their structure and function.
Brahms’ faith is notoriously difficult to nail down, as he tended to keep the details
of his religious beliefs to himself. My goal in this section is specifically to present what
we know about Brahms’ religious beliefs and to “read” his evidence as specifically
revealing of priorities in sacred music composition.
Brahms was introduced to the Protestant Christian tradition early in life. In a rare
record of Brahms’ comments on his faith, he told Richard Heuberger of the importance of
early Bible training:
29
We learned the Bible by heart, without understanding any of it. Should a
light ignite in one later, then one already has all the material which then
suddenly comes to life. As a lad I was always fanciful and a daydreamer.
Thank God none of my teachers cared, and I had to learn notwithstanding
my Schwärmerei. Children cannot understand all that they have to learn.40
To the extent that his background was Protestant, Brahms may be thought of as a
Christian, but even those who knew him well disagreed as regards the relative abstraction
or literality of that faith. Walter Niemann called his charity and piety “real, effacious,
practical Christianity,” saying: “Brahms was a convinced and believing member of the
Lutheran Protestant Church.”41 Others however had a different view. Publisher and
friend, Fritz Simrock, recalled that “Brahms was no churchgoer,” but admitted “he was of
a deeply religious nature.”42
Brahms often gave the impression that he was irreligious simply through his
questioning of common Christian beliefs. In 1897, he told Max Kalbeck that neither at
that time nor thirty years earlier when he wrote the German Requiem did he believe in the
immortality of the soul.43 In an earlier conversation with Dvorak, Joseph Suk recalls:
Then faith and religion were discussed. Dvorak, as everybody knows, was
full of sincere, practically childlike faith, whereas Brahms’ views were
entirely the opposite. ‘I have read too much Schopenhauer, and things
appear much differently to me,’ he said…Dvorak was very reserved on the
way back to the hotel. Finally, after a long time he said: ‘Such a man,
such a soul – and he believes in nothing, he believes in nothing!’44
40
McKenna, Brahms and the German Spirit, 38.
41
Niemann, Brahms, 182.
42
McKenna, Brahms and the German Spirit, 31.
43
McKenna, “The Great Warum”, 232.
44
McKenna, Brahms and the German Spirit , 31.
30
Brahms had a thorough textual knowledge of the Bible upon which he drew
extensively to craft the texts for many of his vocal works. Young Brahms’ education was
not limited to the Bible, however; he was also a voracious reader, particularly responsive
to the literary suggestion of his piano teacher Edward Marxsen. Although the Bible was
a large part of these studies, it occupied a place on the same level as other romantic
authors such as E.T.A. Hoffman and Jean Paul, as is evidenced by “Des jungen Kreislers
Schatzkästlein”, a journal in which Brahms collected quotes that interested him. In this
journal, citations of scripture are mixed with secular extracts to express the emotions
Brahms was wrestling with at the time. This is an extremely important insight: it
suggests that Brahms thought of the Bible as a literary, not a theological source. The fact
that some excerpts were from scripture was not in itself the reason he choose to include
them; rather, it was because something in a given text articulated a touch of what Brahms
was trying to express. Hence, inclusion of scripture was made according to the same
criteria he employed in choosing secular quotes to include in his journal. This ongoing
approach to scripture as a literary phenomenon continued to the end of Brahms’ life,
causing him to later remark, “People do not know that we North Germans long for the
Bible every day and do not let a day go by without it. In my study I can lay my hand on
my Bible even in the dark.”45 Although Brahms’ interest in scripture reveals a true
identification with the Christian faith, it is also true that he treated scripture as a literary
rather than a theological resource.
Brahms’ first biographer, Max Kalbeck, when speaking about the German
Requiem, wrote this: “Before him hover human ideas, worthy of a worldly philosophy
45
McKenna, 38.
31
which permits peace and rest not to the dead, but rather to the living. This idea is secular,
however, not irreligious, it is philosophical, yet it is pious and beautiful, and it is
thoroughly anti-dogmatic.”46 Also speaking of the Requiem, Hans Gal commented: “It is
remarkable how Brahms has, in this work of profoundly religious substance, avoided
anything that might be dogmatic, in favor of a more general and deeper metaphysical
idea.”47
We can see some of this in the famous exchange between Brahms and Reinthaler
regarding the first performance of the Requiem. Reinthaler wrote to Brahms concerned
about the lack of mention of Christ in the piece: “In this composition you stand not only
on religious but also certainly on Christian ground…But what is lacking, at least for a
Christian consciousness, is the pivotal point: the salvation in the death of our Lord”48
Brahms responded by defending the intentional ambiguity and universality implicit in his
text selections: “also with my best knowledge and will I would dispense with places like
John 3:16. On the other hand, I have chosen one thing or another because I am a
musician, because I needed it, and because with my venerable authors I can’t delete or
dispute anything.”49
This small discourse is evidence of the certainty with which Brahms selected his
texts. In composing the Requiem, Brahms was creating a work that would speak to him
personally, about his own feelings regarding death and comfort. The lack of a mention of
Christ in this work, even in the face of sharp objections from others, confirms the non46
McKenna, Brahms and the German Spirit, 41.
47
Gal, Johannes Brahms, 187.
48
Gal, 187-8.
49
Ibid.
32
theistic, universal quality of Brahms’ religious beliefs. He sought a non-dogmatic, nontheistic spiritual expression, a philosophical spirituality which addressed his concerns
about life and death. Brahms treats his sacred texts the same as any other secular text.
As McKenna says, “For Brahms the Bible was but one more great work in the German
literary tradition he revered, and could be used to express a highly individualistic
religious attitude.”50
For Brahms, faith was not about following a set of precepts or subscribing to a
particular dogma, it was a matter of wrestling with challenging philosophical ideas like
death, suffering, and eternity. This view is vitally important in the understanding of
Brahms’ sacred music: while other composers of sacred music were concerned with the
implications of using secular techniques, Brahms had no such unease. To such a
composer, if the specifics of creed are not important, then sacred music becomes simply
the musical exposition of spiritual ideas, which can be done with or without reference to a
specific sect’s scripture. In other words, and most profoundly, in Brahms’s world a piece
of music written to a secular text can be just as sacred as one written to a scriptural text.
That is the essential key to understanding the relationship of music and the sacred in
Brahms’ work.
Additional confirmation for this ‘universalist’ interpretation of the sacred
connotations in Brahms’ music is found in his manipulation of texts for choral works.
Brahms began composing for choral groups as early as the 1850’s. At that time, his
selected texts were primarily in Latin: Ave Maria, op. 12, Drei geistliche Chöre, op. 37,
50
McKenna, Brahms and the German Spirit, 41.
33
and Missa Canonica, WoO. 17-1851 and it seems clear that these were tentative and
experimental early works. In the Missa Canonica, for example, we find the only attempt
made by Brahms to set the Mass text. After 1860, he chose instead to set choral music to
German texts: both Catholic and Protestant hymns and passages from Luther’s translation
of the Bible.
I believe this move away from the common Latin texts exemplifies his desire to
use sacred music to express a more universal, less theistic or doctrinal religious mood. It
was not acceptable to Brahms to simply reiterate the same texts, with the same
associations and expectations, as were employed by more conventionally ‘religious’
composers. In order to capture this universalist religiosity, he needed to control not only
the music, but the words as well. For Brahms the text was a vessel through which he
could express the more complex, less doctrinal, and indeed more ‘romantic’ elements of
religious feeling. Whether it is the sacred text of the Third Movement of the German
Requiem or the secular poem for the Schicksalslied, Brahms wrestles with the concept of
fate and death and how to respond to it.
Further evidence is found in Brahms’s treatment of meaning in his biblical texts.
For instance, Brahms wrote to Elisabeth von Herzogenberg: “Please try to get me some
texts…The Bible is not pagan enough for me; now I have bought myself the Koran, but I
still can’t find anything.”52 Such a remarkable willingness to draw from both “pagan” as
51
This last work, the Missa Canonica, was only recently discovered after having thought to have been
destroyed by Brahms. Although only partially complete, it represents the only known attempt Brahms
made to set the Latin liturgical mass texts. It was most likely the product of his studies of counterpoint
with Joseph Joachim. Much of the material from this Mass was used again in the Op 74 motets.
52
Gal, 195.
34
well as Christian sources, in a more-or-less sacred context, is extraordinary for a late
nineteenth century composer.
Even when Brahms draws exclusively from Biblical texts, his selection and
juxtaposition is personal, unusual, and universal. In the op 74 motet “Warum ist das
Licht gegeben”, Brahms crafts a series of Biblical texts into a larger message about death.
The first passage is from Job 3:20-23, “Why is light given to him that is in misery, and
life unto the bitter in soul; which long for death but it cometh not; and dig for it more
than for hidden treasures; which rejoice exceedingly and are glad, when they can find the
grave? Why is light given to a man whose way is hid, and whom God hath hedged in?”
In this text, the speaker longs for death which will not come. Life is bitter and death’s
release is far away. The question is intensified by the repeated insistent statements of
“Warum?”
To this opening note of despair and melancholy Brahms adds two contrasting
sections of text which begin shift the motet’s focus. From Lamentations 3:41, “Let us lift
up our heart with our hands unto God in the heavens,” and from James 5:11, “Behold, we
count them happy which endure. Ye have heard of the patience of Job, and have seen the
end of the Lord; that the Lord is very pitiful and of tender mercy.” Here the speaker is no
longer questioning, but giving the answer. The text has moved from a bitter longing for
death to endurance in the face of suffering.
The work then ends with a chorale written by Martin Luther, “With peace and joy
I go forth in the will of God, my heart and mind are comforted, gentle and still. As God
has promised me, death but becomes sleep to me.” The speaker’s final message is one of
acceptance and comfort. This final chorale brings the death that the first text wished for
35
but because of the messages of the juxtaposed excerpts, death is no longer bitter but
provides a sense of peaceful resolution. None of these texts, taken alone, would tell the
same story. In this passage, as in many analogous passages, Brahms fashions a message
of different intent by combining small bits of diverse text.
We have seen that Brahms, while having a strong Christian background, was not a
practicing member of a single sect; nevertheless, he did feel a strong emotional and
expressive connection with the spiritual in the Bible. Brahms’ particular personal faith
drove him to create sacred music which eschewed a single dogma or belief system. He
sought music that was expressive of his own personal spiritual and philosophical search.
Walter Niemann argued that in Brahms’ sacred music, “the words seem to point
us from the church into the world, while the music points us back from the world and the
concert-hall into the church,”53 and we have seen this universality playing out in his
meticulous selection and juxtaposition of texts. All this confirms my first statement: that
in his sacred music Brahms takes elements from the sacred world (specifically texts) and
employs them in what would conventionally be considered secular contexts.
The second half of Niemann’s pivotal quote leads me to the next area of this
discussion: that it is the music, more than the texts, that brings the listener back into the
church. In other words, the “religious” effect of Brahms’ music does not stem from a
mundane desire to simply create a church-like sound, but rather from a deeply-held,
quasi-‘religious’ desire to be faithful to his musical predecessors, and a reverence for the
great German traditions of sacred music. In other words, one might say that the insights
he found in Bach’s works were linked to insights he found in the sacred tradition.
53
Niemann, 399.
36
Brahms’s interest in earlier musical styles is well documented and requires no
special argument. But I believe it is important to understand the depth of quasi-religious
feeling that Brahms brought to the study of old music. Brahms felt a deep connection to
music from prior centuries. He owned many original manuscripts, first prints, and
complete editions. He was a subscriber to the first Bach complete edition. He also edited
works by Friedemann, P.E. Bach, Handel, Couperin, Mozart, Schubert, Schumann, and
Chopin.54 But his studies were not limited to composers from the Classical or Baroque
periods. He also studied even older styles, from Heinrich Schütz, to Lasso, Palestrina,
and their German contemporaries.55
Thus, a central characteristic of Brahms’ music is that it synthesized hundreds of
years of musical composition, in a personal and vital compositional style. In reference to
his vocal works, Karl Geiringer says, “though employing the elements of an older style,
[Brahms] succeeded in creating works characterized by immediate vitality and great
expressiveness.”56 Brahms was able to integrate the music of the past into a modern
“romantic” style. This seems obvious when we approach his symphonies and chamber
music but it is no less true of Brahms’s vocal music. As we know, Brahms’ vocal music
often sounds like old church music because he is drawing on more ancient traditions. But
we must realize that his sonic resemblance reflects something deeper, more profound, and
more personal than simply a curiosity about older styles. It is instead a tangible, audible
expression of reverence for the sound and also the expressive intensity of the music of the
54
Geiringer, Brahms, 338-339.
55
Gal, 119.
Geiringer, 300.
56
37
past. The antique impression of Brahms’ sacred music reflects the same veneration of the
past with which Brahms composed secular works.
Consideration of specific examples confirms this thesis. I previously discussed
Brahms’ construction of the text of the motet Warum ist das Licht gegeben in order to
present a particular message. Brahms also employed several musical techniques to
reinforce the sense of despair, acceptance, and peaceful resolution conveyed by the
juxtaposition of textual excerpts. The first section returns to the word “warum” four
times, each time set to a whole note and a quarter note that is marked forte with a
decrescendo (ex 7). This section of text is expounding on the suffering of life and the
inability to escape to death, with the emphasized, falling, reiterated “Why?” reinforcing
the sense of unreconciled despair. The first and last “warum” occur at the beginning and
the end of the section, encapsulating the message of the text. The other two separate the
“longing for the grave” phrase from the other two “why is light given” phrases. While
formally these two warum’s separate the A and A’ sections from the B section, they also
38
serve to delineate between the texts which concern suffering in life and those concerning
the longing for death.
Brahms employs further text painting in the section, “Let us lift up our heart with
our hands unto God in the heavens.” This is a crucial passage because here Brahms must
transform the melancholy of the first section to the peace of the end. The text is set
canonically between the voices, each entering with a rising line which continues to rise
through “heaven” (ex. 8).
39
This last section is set to a chorale text by Martin Luther and, fittingly, Brahms
harmonizes it with a Bach chorale-like texture (ex. 9), thus alluding to two of his most
profound and revered predecessors in the world of the sacred. The use of the chorale
texture is of course deeply evocative and significant. Even though Brahms was not
writing for the Lutheran liturgy, the text and musical texture of the chorale evoke a long
tradition of German sacred music. However, this section is not written in simply an
imitation of Bach’s chorale style. For example, Baroque chorales would typically end
each musical phrase with a fermata of rest; with a cadence marking a clear period. In
Brahms’ motet, on the other hand, the fermatas occur on non-cadential chords which
provide no such sense of resolution. Fittingly, but quite unpredictably, the only harmonic
point of rest is the final chord as the speaker finally welcomes death. In his appropriation
of Baroque concepts of text-painting, Brahms pays tribute to the history of German
sacred style; but in the details of compositional (and especially harmonic) choice, he is
profoundly his own man.
40
In a similar way, Brahms crafted the op. 110 motets. The third of these motets,
set to a non-scriptural sacred text, addresses the same idea as the op. 74 motet from
above. The text in its entirety may be translated into English as follows:
When in the hour of utmost need
We know not where to look for aid;
When days and nights of anxious thought
Nor help nor counsel yet have brought,
Then this our comfort is alone,
That we may meet before Thy throne
And cry, O faithful God, to Thee
For rescue from our misery.
Ah! hide not for our sins Thy face,
Absolve us through Thy boundless grace,
Be with us in our anguish still,
Free us at last from every ill.
That so with all our hearts we may
To Thee our glad thanksgiving pay,
Then walk obedient to Thy Word
And now and ever praise Thee, Lord.
Brahms’ sensitivity to the text is shown in the subtlety with which he treats each
verse. There are two contrasting sections, for the first (Section A) and second (Section
B) verses respectively. Both sections are then repeated for the third and fourth verses,
with an expanded ending, in a kind of ABA’B’coda form. The internal repetition in this
organization thus connects the texts of the first verse with the third and the second with
the fourth.
The A section (ex. 10) begins with a melody that ascends and descends in eight
even beats, creating a sense of constriction. Following this each voice enters with short
overlapping phrases. These two elements continue to repeat through the end of the
41
section. The restrictive length of the first phrase and the hurried entrances of the second
combine to portray the feeling of hopelessness Brahms drew from the text.
The second thematic division in this motet creates an entirely different set of
connotations. While the A section is polyphonic with each voice making an independent
entrance, the B section features the two choirs in rhythmic unison (ex. 11), first as a
combined choir, then as alternating groups. The block chords mirror the speaker’s
reliance on the unshakeable “trauer Gott”, faithful God. Brahms thus contrasts the hope
and faith of the second verse’s text with the despair found in the first verse.
The third verse brings back the image of sin and anguish from the first verse, but
this time with the crucial, transformative addition of God’s mercy. Brahms brings out the
connection between the two verses by returning to the A theme. In a similar fashion, he
varies the material from the B section for the fourth verse. The fact that Brahms links
each set of verses through nearly identical music points toward the connection between
their themes: the first and third verses each deal with sin and the question of its
absolution; the second and fourth verses both concentrate on showing God as the source
42
of absolution. By constructing this motet in an ABA’B’coda form, Brahms is bringing
out that connection.
In this non-scriptural sacred work, we can see once again the approach Brahms
took toward the evocation and citation of sacred music. In both the previous examples he
demonstrates a readiness to combine separate elements or present an unusual
interpretation in order to create a deeply personal, religious but not doctrinal message.
At the end of his life, Brahms composed a set of four lieder, the Four Serious
Songs, op 121. The songs are set to texts from the Bible, much like those from the
Requiem or the op 74 motets discussed above. In this case, however, Brahms has
dispensed with any conventional religious imagery and given himself entirely to the
contemplation of a deeply psychological topic, namely that of Death. While earlier in his
life Brahms framed his use of Biblical texts in a sacred form, by calling them motet or
requiem, now he entitles these works “serious” when they very well could be called
43
“sacred”.57 These songs represent Brahms writing sacred music as he always had, that is
seeking to express spiritual ideas by drawing on insights gained from a study of sacred
traditions.
Brahms used the sacred idiom because it could more effectively transmit the
philosophical struggles he was putting into music. That later generations can look at his
sacred music and take from it some manner of spiritual satisfaction is simply a
manifestation of Brahms’ universal, religious—but not doctrinal—musical genius.
57
Swafford, Johannes Brahms, 607.
44
CHAPTER IV
SECULAR IDEAS COMBINED WITH SACRED
MUSIC – ANTON BRUCKNER
In this discussion we have examined two composers who had strong roots in the
secular idiom. Both Franz Liszt and Johannes Brahms began to explore the sacred idiom
to in their compositional output after mastering the secular. Bruckner provides a contrast
to this tendency. He learned to compose virtually exclusively through writing sacred
music. Most of his large sacred works were written before 1868, when he moved to
Vienna and began to focus on composing symphonies. These works exhibit the influence
of Renaissance and Baroque counterpoint as well as of Classical period festival masses.
The works in which Bruckner first demonstrated individuality, the three masses in
d minor, e minor, and f minor respectively, were composed in the four years (1864-1868)
prior to his moving to Vienna. During this time he was exposed to the music of his
contemporaries, notably Wagner and Liszt, for the first time. In February 1863,
Bruckner’s teacher, Otto Kitzler, conducted Wagner’s Tannhäuser and took his student to
the performances. While he did not immediately show direct musical influence from
Wagner, the study of Wagner’s music is commonly thought to have “open[ed] the door to
creative freedom.”58 Immediately after his first exposure to progressive music, Bruckner
began work on the mass in d minor, the first work that showed him as a first rank
composer. What differentiates Bruckner from Liszt and Brahms is that, unlike the others,
58
Doernberg, The Life and Symphonies of Anton Bruckner, 45.
45
Bruckner began as a composer of sacred music and only later did he incorporate what he
learned of the secular idiom.
In the following pages I will examine Bruckner’s religious convictions and
demonstrate the way this basic element separated him from the other composers of sacred
music of his time. As further evidence, I will consider Bruckner’s reception by his
contemporaries and how that reception identifies components of his sacred composition.
Finally, I will analyze elements of Bruckner’s three great masses to highlight these
trends.
Bruckner’s religious convictions were similar to Brahms’ in that they were a
private matter to him. He did not often speak of it with others. In fact, his friends and
pupils later asserted that they avoided the subject with him as it was the one most likely
to arouse his anger.59 In comparison to the opacity of Brahms’ beliefs, it is a relatively
simple undertaking to understand Bruckner’s religious beliefs. For him, “religion was as
elemental as the atmosphere in which we breathe.”60 He was a devout and relatively
conventional Roman Catholic, brought up with the precepts and teachings that would be
expected. Bruckner’s faith was integral: contrary to many during his time, he believed in
a God who was not “something mystical and nebulous but a reality.”61
Bruckner’s religious dedication was pragmatic and tangible: throughout his life he
kept a log of his prayers.62 Each time he improvised on the organ, a feat at which he
59
Schönzeler, Bruckner, 137.
60
Doernberg, 5.
61
Schönzeler, 133.
Elisabeth Maier has done extensive research and study of these prayer logs along with Bruckner’s
personal diary and calendar. For more, see her contribution “A Hidden Personality” in Bruckner Studies
edited by Timothy Jackson and Paul Hawkshaw, pages 32-53.
62
46
excelled and for which he was well known, he spent time beforehand in prayer,
attempting to prepare himself through meditation. Bruckner’s students speak of times
when “in the middle of a lesson they suddenly became aware that [Bruckner’s] mind and
spirit were no longer with them: the church bells had rung, and Bruckner was praying.”63
This deep faith had substantial influence upon Bruckner’s musical career. Paul
Hawkshaw calls Bruckner “the most important composer since Johann Sebastian Bach to
spend almost his entire professional life in the employ of the church.”64 Bruckner spent
44 years of his life either as a student or teacher in Catholic schools, or an organist at the
church in Linz. His time in the employ of the church created a connection between his
work and his faith. This connection was such that when he later began composing on a
larger scale, his personality “would not allow [the creation] of separate departments for
private ‘piety’ and the artistic impetus of the composer.”65 Bruckner neither could nor
wished to eschew the sacred when he became an artist. This was a factor in his three
large masses as well as his symphonies. Although they fall outside the scope of this
discussion, Bruckner’s symphonies have been seen as wordless manifestations of his
sacred beliefs. The result of this refusal to disconnect his beliefs from his art is a sacred
idiom which absorbs and makes use of secular techniques.
Bruckner’s religious beliefs directly affect several aspects of his works. Bruckner
believed that his ability to compose came from God. He believed several of his themes
were given to him in dreams. In one such dream, a violist played the main theme of his
63
Schönzeler, 137.
64
Hawkshaw, “Bruckner’s large sacred compositions” in The Cambridge Companion to Bruckner edited by
John Williamson.
65
Doernberg, 6.
47
seventh symphony; in another his former teacher, Ludwig Spohr, requested that he write
down the Te Deum from Spohr’s dictation.66 Clearly, the act of inspiration was a
supernatural occurrence for him. Friedrich Klose, a student of Bruckner’s, said that he
was “a hard worker who had to wrest blessing from his God in fervent, heated prayer.”67
This trend continued to the very end of his life, when he said about meeting God in
judgment: “I will present to him the score of my Te Deum, and he will judge me
mercifully.”68
The most significant factor differentiating Bruckner from other composers of this
period was that he was composing functional sacred music. In other words, his sacred
music was intended for practical use in a worship service of the Catholic Church. Paul
Hawkshaw says that “the masses form a unified group in that they set, with minor
additions and omissions, the Common Latin texts of the Roman Catholic liturgy and were
conceived as service music.”69 This comes out of his upbringing in the Roman Catholic
Church. If Bruckner’s sacred music is sometimes described as backward looking, it is, to
some extent, because he leaves space for liturgical details. While the sacred music of
Liszt attempts to fill each moment with drama, Bruckner’s sacred music often lets the
liturgy speak for itself.
Bruckner’s overt religiosity led to reception problems by the generation from
which he stood out. He was castigated as “a more or less moronic village yokel, or as an
66
Floros, “On unity between Bruckner’s personality and production”, in Perspectives on Bruckner edited
by Crawford Howie, Paul Hawkshaw, and Timothy Jackson, 291.
67
Ibid.
68
Watson, Bruckner, 49.
69
Hawkshaw, 43.
48
ascetic monk, or as a combination of both.”70 He was moreover often mistaken for a
peasant fool because his outward appearance and actions contributed to a peculiar first
impression. He frequently wore a large, somewhat bulky black suit and wide-brimmed
black hat, garb which stood in sharp contrast to fashionable Vienna.71 He spoke in a
direct manner and with an upper Austrian dialect, often inadvertently insulting those
unaccustomed to its rural nature.
This impression was not helped by his diffident manner. Bruckner had great
respect for authority of all kinds and was often so respectful that he was criticized for
excessive modesty. Many years of his life had been spent in subordinate positions and
his behavior reflected that. His written applications include so many phrases of respect
and devotion that he was seen as a sycophant. His piety as well “offered opportunity for
jest to the ‘intellectuals’ of Vienna.”72
Bruckner’s reception in Vienna was particularly harsh, the “Brahmsite” critic
Eduard Hanslick being the most vehement of Bruckner’s detractors. The origins of his
distaste stem from associations with Wagner. When Bruckner first met Wagner he was
impressed and, as he did with all those he saw as better than himself, gave him a
reverential title, “Master”. Yet, by all evidence, Wagner’s influence on his music was
limited to his absorption of Wagner’s idea of harmony. He had no interest in Wagner’s
writings or ideas; he used a piano score without texts when studying his operas, thus
omitting a crucial narrative element. However, despite the modest connection between
70
Schönzeler, 109.
71
Watson, 50.
72
Doernberg, 7.
49
the two, Bruckner was nevertheless placed in the Wagner camp. Hanslick, who had
already declared himself an anti-Wagnerian, set himself to oppose not only his music but
Bruckner himself.
The impact of this treatment on Bruckner should not be minimized. His student
Carl Hruby speaks of this:
At first he [Bruckner] had not taken much notice of critical attacks, but as
he grew older the continual hostility of the press made him more and more
sensitive. By the second year of our acquaintance, he had already changed
markedly. We entered the classroom; Bruckner was sitting at the piano,
lost in thought, and barely responded to our greeting. Suddenly he blurted
out these curious words: ‘Those people … (by which he meant a certain
species of critic) … say that my ideas aren’t consistant…’73
Without a doubt, Bruckner was affected by the comments of those around him.
This is further evidenced by the frequency which he allowed his students to revise
his compositions. Bruckner’s sensitivity toward criticism reflected a desire to
make his music appreciated by many; this would impact his sacred music when he
endeavored to satisfy both sets of expectations placed on him.
The simplistic impression of the Viennese critics is not reflective of Bruckner’s
true character, as evidenced by the words of Derek Watson: “He was humble,
straightforward, uncomplicated, unpretentious, and unsophisticated in an outward
manner, and it is in this sense and this sense only, that he can be described as a simple
man.”74 Nevertheless, although the impression is not correct in the strictest sense, the
artists of Vienna were in fact correct in seeing a difference between themselves and
Bruckner. His personality was “diametrically opposed to the conventions of the
73
Quoted in Howie, Perspectives on Anton Bruckner, xviii.
74
Watson, 50.
50
period.”75 He was a representative of the ideals of the church in a time when secular
intentions were quickly moving in another direction. In essence, Bruckner stood apart as
“the only great composer of his century whose entire musical output was determined by
his religious faith.”76
All this is simply to say that Bruckner was living in two worlds. In him we find
living proof that the expectations of the Church and the secular world were at odds in the
late nineteenth century. His religious beliefs were reflected in his behavior and written
out in his music, both the secular and the sacred, and yet lived in a time in which it was
no longer acceptable in artistic society to do so. For the same reasons that Liszt’s first
essays in serious sacred composition were rejected, Bruckner was rejected by his
contemporaries. His student Franz Schalk said:
It was the age of moral and spiritual liberalism, in which intellectualism
and calculation overrode all other human urges and threatened to seize
hold of world power, but also in which Bruckner unexpectedly intruded
with his great symphonies and with his medieval, monasterial concept of
humankind and life.77
Bruckner remained in opposition to the overarching secular philosophical ideals
of his contemporaries both when he worked for the church and afterwards, when he lived
in Vienna. While Brahms wrote sacred music because of the affinity he felt for its
philosophical ideas, for Bruckner “it was not any sort of aesthetic or poetic leaning which
tied him to the music of the church, but rather his indomitable belief in it.”78
75
Floros, 288.
76
Redlich, Bruckner and Mahler, 37.
77
Floros, 289.
78
Ibid.
51
Bruckner wrote sacred music from the position of a church musician who was
exploring elements of secular techniques. Percy Young attributes the effectiveness of his
sacred music as worship music to “its emphasis on liturgical propriety and Austrian
conventions on the one hand and the absorption of contemporary habits of technique on
the other.”79 Bruckner was seeking to reconcile the pressures of creating traditional
church music and his desire to explore his art. The final section of this discussion will
focus primarily on how specific style elements in the music confirm this point.
Ernest Kurth observed that Bruckner’s mature church music “is an extraordinary
amalgam of the modern and the conservative.” He goes on to say that a major
accomplishment of this music was its successful blend of plainchant and Romantic
melodic style.80 Bruckner earned his living during his early career as an organist. His
ability to improvise on a theme (often from plainchant) was what drew him the most
fame. Through this practice of improvisation he became closely familiar with chant
melodies and how to manipulate them to fit into a larger musical scheme. Moreover, this
study shaped his own thematic conception. Bruckner’s use of plainchant was not direct
quotation; rather, he drew upon devices inherent in it.81 In his mature sacred works, the
influence of plainchant is shown in the arc-shaped motive of a second at the beginning of
a phrase, the Phrygian second, the Lydian fourth, the descending fifth, and psalmodic
79
Young, The Choral Tradition, 247.
80
Kurth, Bruckner, 2 vol, 1201.
81
There are a few examples of Bruckner using directly quoted plainchant. See the credo of the early mass
in C. mm. 1 ff., the Miserere sections in the two early settings of Asperges me (ca. 1845), the phrase Gloria
Patri et Filio in the Magnificat (1852), the closing measures of the third setting of Asperges me (ca. 1868)
and of Os justi (1879), and the Choral in Ecce sacerdos (1885).
52
phrases.82 These characteristic turns of phrase often create the effect of ancient music
without actually quoting it.
Although Bruckner composed sacred music throughout his life, the works that
demonstrate the conflict between sacred versus secular expectations most effectively are
the three mature masses, in d minor WAB 26, e minor WAB 27, and f minor WAB 28,
composed during the years 1864 and 1868. The d minor and f minor are similar in design
and represent Bruckner reaching toward secular expectations. The e minor, the middle
work, represents his attempt to write a mass in a much more traditional style and fulfill
sacred expectations. Each of these masses provide insights into his synthesis of sacred
and secular expectations.
The mass in d minor (1864) was Bruckner’s first mature work. It is fully
orchestrated, with the orchestra playing a major part in communicating the meaning of
the text. In this mass Bruckner laid out some principles which became standard in his
later masses: first, the material from the Kyrie is brought back at the end of the mass
during the ‘dona nobis pacem’, a characteristic of each of the three masses.
Another characteristic of this mass and the f minor is the molding of voices and
orchestra to add a certain amount of theatricality. In the d minor mass Bruckner precedes
the ‘crucifixus’ section with a rising line in the strings, as if to actually lift Christ onto the
cross (ex. 12). Following the enunciation of ‘crucifixus’, Bruckner removes the orchestra
and sets the words ‘passus et sepultus est’ a cappella with a soft interjection by the organ
(or a woodwind choir in the absence of organ). The same theatricality is continued with a
tremendous crescendo in the orchestra to the return of the chorus on the words ‘Et
82
Howie, ‘Traditional and Novel Elements on Bruckner’s Sacred Music’, 557.
53
resurrexit’. While the use of the orchestra and theatricality of this mass demonstrate
Bruckner’s attempts to accommodate modern techniques, it is still clear that he expects
the mass to be used in church. This is evidenced by his choice to leave the opening
words of the Gloria and Credo uncomposed, expecting them to be intoned by the priest.
Although it was the third work to be composed, the f minor mass fits functionally
with the earliest, the d minor. The f minor mass was the closest Bruckner came to
writing in a secular style within a sacred work. Like the d minor, the mass in f minor is
fully orchestrated. In this case, however, there is no longer an intention of performing it
in a church service. Bruckner fully composed the first lines of each movement, leaving
no space for a priest’s intonation. The first performance was given at a concert in Vienna
in 1872. The theatricality of the d minor mass is continued here to an even larger extent,
with each movement increasing in scope.
54
Bruckner also experiments with the use of a single motivic cell as the seed for
development throughout the mass. The descending fourth motive from the opening of the
Kyrie continues as a theme throughout the piece (see ex 13).
This mass is also the closest Bruckner came to employing a symphonic sonataallegro form in such a work. The piece begins in the tonic (f), moves to the dominant in
the Gloria (C), develops the material moving through F in the Sanctus and A-flat in the
Benedictus, and finally returning to f minor for the Agnus Dei. It is significant that
Bruckner was composing this mass at the same time he was beginning to master the
symphony, and the symphonic influence here is clear.
The final mass in this discussion, the e minor, represents Bruckner’s capitulation
to the other group of expectations, those of the conservatives in the Church. As
mentioned in the introduction, the main group representing conservatism in church music
was the Cecilians. Bruckner had connections to and was greatly troubled by the
55
Cecilians, “whose opinions on his works concerned him anxiously”83 In 1868, Bruckner
wrote a Pange lingua which Witt, the founder of the Cecilians, later published, with
several “corrections” of his dissonances. Later, in 1879, Bruckner composed the gradual
Os justi and dedicated it to his friend Traumihler, an ardent Cecilian. Bruckner wrote to
him in July 1879 saying:
I should be very pleased if you found pleasure in the piece [his Os justi].
It is composed without sharp or flat, without the chord of the seventh,
without a six-four chord and without chordal combinations of four and
five simultaneous notes.84
The result is a “completely non-chromatic piece in the Lydian mode, revealing an
uncompromising asperity of polyphonic conception.”85 In other words, a rigorously
traditional treatment: this is the length to which Bruckner was willing to go to satisfy the
conservative expectations of the Church.
The Mass in e minor is another example along the same lines. In contrast to the
other two masses, it is scored only for a wind ensemble, sparingly used. While the
orchestra plays an important role in the other two masses in portraying the drama, in this
work, with a few expections, the orchestra mainly serves to support the voices or to
connect sections of text. The Kyrie opens with an a cappella statement of the text and
adds the orchestra later.
In only a few places does the orchestra carry an independent line, as in the
opening to the Gloria in the bassoon line (ex 14). As in the d minor Mass, here Bruckner
leaves the first line of text for the Gloria and Credo uncomposed, again to be sung by the
83
Hutchings, 49.
84
Redlich, 72.
85
Ibid, 72-73.
56
priest. The e minor Mass is “remarkable for its searching seriousness and for its
equilibrium of highest expression on the one hand and liturgical self-limitation on the
other.”86 This seriousness and liturgical considerations set this mass apart from the other
two.
86
Doernberg, 46.
57
Conflicting expectations explain why Bruckner would for the most part cease
composing large scale church music after these three masses. Peter Palmer postulates
that he “perceived that he was cut out to be an artist rather than a servant of the
Church.”87 However, Bruckner did not stop being a member of the Church, nor did he
stop writing church music. Rather, he saw that the expectations of the Church could best
be satisfied in the form of the Gebrauchskirchenmusik (literally practical church music)
promoted by the Cecilians. To this end, he continued to compose small motets
throughout his Vienna period. Bruckner’s Mass in e minor was performed only three
times during his lifetime. He saw the impossibility of the reconciliation, and decided to
re-invest his Church music composition in other, smaller scale, forms.
87
Palmer, ‘Ludwig Wittgenstein’s remarks on Bruckner’, in Perspectives on Bruckner edited by Crawford
Howie, Paul Hawkshaw, and Timothy Jackson, 357.
58
CHAPTER V
CONCLUSIONS AND FURTHER APPLICATIONS
The proof that the nineteenth century produced experimental mixtures of secular
and sacred music comes in the years just after the end of that century: in 1903, Pope Pius
X issued a motu proprio entitled Tra le sollecitudini. This document was designed to
reform church music by explicitly removing secular elements from it. Pius assigned the
highest place to Gregorian chant, then to Renaissance polyphony, and only thirdly to
modern compositions, providing only that “nothing profane be allowed, nothing that is
reminiscent of secular pieces, nothing based as to its form on the style of secular
composition.”88
The restrictions of the motu proprio of 1903 are powerful evidence of
the efforts many composers had been making toward creating music that bridged the gap
between the expectations of secular and sacred music.
Because of its very nature as both function and entertainment, sacred music has
often been the locus of differing expectations. This study has looked at three specific
composers, Franz Liszt, Johannes Brahms, and Anton Bruckner, and at ways in which
conflicting expectations impacted their composition of sacred music. In each case the
combination of personal religious belief and attempts to bridge the gap between contrary
stylistic expectations created individual sacred music aesthetics.
In the case of Franz Liszt, separate expectations manifested themselves into two
separate careers. On the one hand, there was his life as a traveling virtuoso, characterized
by flamboyant showmanship and little connection to the church. On the other hand, there
88
The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, s.v. “Roman Catholic church music.”
59
was his life in Rome after taking minor orders, where his connection to the church was at
its highest. I have shown the way Liszt’s faith bridged two worlds in his life and
subsequently how he brought techniques from secular music to the sacred idiom.
For Brahms, sacred music was another method through which he could explore
deeply personal philosophical ideas. Brahms’ religious beliefs involved an amalgam of
several doctrines and systems of religious thought, so much so that it transcended
following one set and became un-dogmatic in itself. Because he did not officially follow
one particular doctrine, it was neither possible nor desirable for him to compose in a
traditional religious idiom. Instead, Brahms borrowed from the sacred idiom that which
suited him in his quest to realize a sacred aura in his secular music.
Of these three composers, Anton Bruckner was the one most affected by
conflicting expectations. In fact, he was affected to such an extent that he stopped
writing large scale sacred works shortly after he began exploring artistic freedom. He
attempted to create works that would bridge the gap between the various expectations,
composing three large masses of contrasting styles and purposes. However, since he
essentially abandoned this form, it is reasonable to conclude that he felt these
experiments to have been unsuccessful.
Although this study has been limited to the discussion of these three composers,
the techniques outlined here could yield interesting insights into several other composers.
Because these period expectations would apply to any composer attempting to write
sacred music, a similar analysis of the impact of such expectations on other composers in
the sacred idiom might be equally as enlightening. Composers from the end of the
nineteenth century like Antonin Dvorak (1841-1904), Cesar Franck (1822-1890), and
60
Gabriel Faure (1845-1924) each wrote secular along with sacred works and would be apt
subjects for an analysis of conflicting expectations. Charles Gounod’s (1818-1893)
music would be interesting because of the contrast between his secular career as a theatre
composer and his fifteen masses. From an earlier time period, an intriguing study would
be Carl Maria von Weber (1786-1826) who, in addition to his Romantic operas and
songs, wrote two sacred masses and many smaller pieces
Sacred music is of course not unique in being a catalyst for divided expectations.
Even in the absence of true sacred themes, composers in the nineteenth century had a
deep affinity toward the spiritual in music. The perfect example of this is Wagner, whose
music created an aura of reverence similar to that of a religion. Such composers wanted a
sense of the spiritual in their music but they were not willing to defer to the expectations
specifically tied to period sacred music. Their response was simply to create a sense of
the spiritual through other means. A study of such composers would prove very
enlightening.
Many composers faced similar conflicts when trying to fit into the German
symphonic model. The approach I have demonstrated in this study could be applied to
composers writing modern music for audiences who expected music like that of the past.
Such conflicting expectations had ramifications for both German composers in the early
twentieth century like Schönberg as well as composers outside the German tradition like
Debussy. Again a study of the methods these composers used to react to these
expectations might respond to techniques described here.
Music is not written in a vacuum. In all cultural contexts, and particularly that of
the late nineteenth century, the weight of the past greatly influenced musical composition.
61
The analysis of composer’s response to contrasting expectations provides later
generations another way to understand the impact of culture on music.
62
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Williams, Adrian. Portrait of Liszt: By Himself and His Contemporaries. Oxford:
Clarendon Press, 1990.
Chapter 3
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Adler, Guido, and W. Oliver Strunk. “Johannes Brahms: His Achievement, His
Personality, His Position.” The Musical Quarterly 19, no. 2 (1933): 113-142.
Bell, A. Craig. Brahms: The Vocal Music. Madison: Fairleigh Dickinson Press, 1996.
Beller-McKenna, Daniel. Brahms and the German Spirit. Harvard: Harvard Press, 2004.
_________. “The Great ‘Warum’: Job, Christ, and Bach in a Brahms Motet.” 19th
Century Music 19, no. 3 (1996): 231-251.
_________. “How ‘deutsch’ a Requiem? Absolute Music, Universality, and the
Reception of Brahms’ ‘Ein deutsches Requiem’ op. 45.” 19th Century Music 22,
no. 1 (Summer 1998): 3-19.
Gal, Hans. Johannes Brahms: His Work and Personality. trans. Joseph Stein. New York:
Knopf, 1963.
Geiringer, Karl. “Brahms as Musicologist.” The Musical Quarterly 69, no. 4 (Autumn
1983): 463-470.
_________. Brahms: His Life and Work. 2nd ed. London: George Allen and Unwin, 1948.
Musgrave, Michael. “Brahms the Progressive.” The Musical Times 124, no. 1683 (1983):
291-294.
Niemann, Walter. Brahms. trans. Catherine Alison Phillips. New York: Knopf, 1929.
Notley, Margaret. “Brahms as Liberal: Genre, Style and Politics in Late NineteenthCentury Vienna.” 19th Century Music 17, no. 2 (1993): 107-123.
Swafford, Jan. Johannes Brahms: A Biography. New York: Knopf, 1997.
Chapter 4
Botstein, Leon. “Music and Ideology: Thoughts on Bruckner.” The Musical Quarterly 80,
no. 1 (1996): 1-11.
Doernberg, Erwin. The Life and Symphonies of Anton Bruckner. London: Barrie and
Rockliff, 1960.
Fairfax, Brian. “Unknown Bruckner.” The Musical Times 105, no 1455 (1964): 351-352.
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Howie, Crawford. “Traditional and Novel Elements in Bruckner’s Sacred Music.” The
Musical Quarterly 67, no. 4 (1981): 544-567.
Howie, Crawford, Paul Hawkshaw, and Timothy Jackson, eds. Perspectives on Anton
Bruckner. Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2001.
Jackson, Timothy L., and Paul Hawkshaw, eds. Bruckner Studies. Cambridge: Cambridge
Press, 1997.
Redlich, H.F. Bruckner and Mahler. London: J.M. Dent and Sons, 1955.
Schönzeler, Hans-Hubert. Bruckner. New York, Grossman Publishers, 1970.
Simpson, Robert. The Essence of Bruckner: an essay towards the understanding of his
music. London: Gollancz, 1967.
Watson, Derek. Bruckner. London: J.M. Dent and Sons, 1975.
Williamson, John, ed. The Cambridge Companion to Bruckner. Cambridge: Cambridge
Press, 2004.
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