The Bruckner Mass No. 2 in E Minor is a rather unusual work in a number of ways. Although it is quite short, performing in something like half an hour, the chorus is singing all the time. There are no soloists (other than Chris Ortiz introducing the Gloria and Credo with traditional chants, an embellishment not in the score added by Hans Graf), and there are no significant orchestral interludes. In fact, there’s almost no significant orchestra at all, being scored for just 15 instruments (wood winds and brass). It was a mighty funny looking stage with a hundred of us behind such a tiny instrumental ensemble. There are numerous lengthy a cappella sections, and woe to the chorus whose pitch has slipped when the instruments come back in. In fact, we had enough trouble with this so that Graf had Scott discretely play very softly behind us in certain passages on the organ. He was tucked away on the side of the risers and the organ speakers were behind us, playing so softly that most of the time even the men in the back row could not distinguish the sound, but presumably it added a certain stability to the pitch.
This was not a particularly easy work to learn. The harmonies are … a bit odd, and the voice leading is even odder. We got a lecture from a professor before the performance who agreed that the voice leading is a bit clumsy and he suggested that Bruckner was experimenting with new harmonies and hadn’t quite gotten the hang of how to put it together gracefully as yet. We’ve done some of his later works, particularly motets, and although the harmonies are adventurous one doesn’t have those awkward leaps that one does in this mass. Actually, some of those leaps are obviously intended for effect – particularly the section of the eight part Agnus Dei where all four of the men’s parts are jumping tenths up and down at different times. Every time I sang that I had a “What was he thinking?” feeling, but I guess he must have had something in mind because it’s very deliberate.
The tremendous difficulty of this work, however, comes for the women – and particularly the Sopranos. There are a whole lot of pianissimo E’s, F’s and G’s and many of them are very exposed. And there are a number of pianissimo entrances, including the very beginning of the work, which are … well, as a guy I listened to what all the women did in the performances and I was just plain awed. That singing is really, really hard. And, of course, the sopranos have pages of G’s and A’s, both loud and soft. This work is not exactly trivial for the men, but it is mind-bendingly difficult for the women. Our women met the challenge.
So what was the music like? Actually, I was concentrating so hard on getting it right that I didn’t get as much sense as I sometimes do of what the whole thing is about – but it's hard to miss that it has a lot of really impressive effects. Certainly this work had the biggest dynamic range of anything I have ever done – from the merest ethereal whisper to a huge wall of sound, supported by the winds and brass. It’s funny – we’ve done some works in which the chorus was just another instrument in the orchestra. Well, in this one most of the time the orchestra was just another voice in the chorus.
One amazing moment comes in the first section, the eight part Kyrie, which starts with a barely audible single-voice a cappella E, then a bare fifth, the B, added in another voice, and so on with the first the women and then the men layering in. The music builds and builds through about measure 70 to an overwhelming wall of sound, including instruments, which cuts abruptly. That cutoff is … incredible. You can hear the sound echoing away, and then there is that barely audible E entrance again. It’s stunning.
Each section of the mass has a dramatically different character, all of them effective and sometimes intense – although that word doesn’t well describe the sunny Gloria, in which the initial “Et in terra pax …” sounds like it is smiling. The Gloria has the most complex contrapuntal section in the work, a double fugue on the text “Amen”. The subject is surprisingly angular, starting with a half step and then a tritone down, followed by a fourth up. The Credo has tremendous changes in color, from the almost march-like “Patrem omnipotentem” to the lush, drop-dead gorgeous “Et incarnates est”. And, of course, “Et resurrexit” and “Et ascendit” have yet another character. The Sanctus is another extended eight part a cappella treatment, like the Kyrie quite contrapuntal if you pay attention to what’s happening – but the overall effect is not all that polyphonic. I’m not sure exactly how that works, but this is another very difficult section for intonation. And finally, the Benedictus and Agnus Dei are hard to describe. Perhaps “profound” sums it up.
This work is rather seldom performed, for reasons that are probably obvious, and I am very glad that I got a chance to do it. And I am very, very proud to have been part of a performance like that. We did some serious singing.
Here are some comments from other people about this performance. First, part of the Chronicle review by Everett Evans:
With its second half devoted to a well-known work of Brahms’ maturity, the program’s first half offered a lesser-known early work of Bruckner, one that predates his famous symphonies.
One of the many sacred works that occupied the first phase of the composer’s career, Bruckner’s E minor Mass is unusual in its forces: an eight-part mixed chorus accompanied by an array of 15 brass and woodwind instruments.
Also unusual is its blend of the mid-19th century musical language of Bruckner’s time with nods to Palestrina and Renaissance-era polyphony.
The Houston Symphony Chorus, prepared by its director Charles Hausmann, performed its six sections with a rich and balanced sound. The hushed a capella opening lines of the Kyrie, first for women’s voices, then men’s, created an air of mystery.
Whether in that delicately quivering whisper or a majestic wall of sound (as in the Gloria), the choral performance projected the dignity and devotion of Bruckner’s music and achieved some haunting aural effects.
Graf’s conducting kept the rendition reverent but never stilted. The brass and woodwinds played with appropriate restraint and mellow tone, their role chiefly to embellish and punctuate the choral writing, the work’s primary focus.
Sarah Clark says:
My friend who was there tonight said she had tears in her eyes at the end during the Agnus Dei--said it was just beautiful. She has a degree in piano composition and is a great musician (she accompanied a chorus when she lived in California and she would not have hesitated to make critical remarks if she felt they were called for...)