“Music is life and as such is
inextinguishable.”—Carl Nielsen
This is the web page of the book Anton Bruckner, Eleven Symphonies, known also as the Bruckner Red Book, by William Carragan, contributing editor, Anton Bruckner Collected Edition, and Vice-President, Bruckner Society of America. The book is about to reach the final pre-printing stage and an index is being compiled. We have already selected a printer, and we expect to have the printed copies available in February 2020. Here you will find timely notifications of that progress.
Eleven Symphonies
Bruckner scholars and enthusiasts have been aware at least from the 1930s that there are in the Austrian National Library and elsewhere manuscript sources for Bruckner’s symphonies and masses that differ rather widely from the publications of these works made during his lifetime.
The Eighth Symphony was completed in its first version in 1887, and Bruckner sent it to the conductor Hermann Levi who had already presented the Seventh to great success. But Levi felt he could not understand it and thus could not conduct it, and wrote to Joseph Schalk asking him to break the news to Bruckner.
” Before one can criticize, one needs to know the facts, and it turns out that every version of each symphony has something wonderful and unique to offer. “—William Carragan