Bruckner Symphony No 3 album review – Anima Eterna’s period instruments bring visceral drama

According to legend, in the summer of 1873 Anton Bruckner travelled to Bayreuth intending to dedicate one of a pair of scores to his hero, Wagner. Apparently, the two composers got legless and by the time Bruckner arrived back home, he could no longer remember which symphony the master preferred. In a flap, he put pen to paper: “Symphony in D Minor, where the trumpet begins the theme?” he fished. “Yes! Best wishes! Richard Wagner,” was the reply.

Anton Bruckner: Symphony No 3 in D Minor Photograph: Harmonia Mundi

With its mighty peaks and faint reminiscences of the operas, the Wagnerian aesthetic looms large over the Third Symphony in D minor, especially in its more radical original version, presented here by period instrument specialists Anima Eterna. Gut strings and original woodwind and brass are more pungent than their modern counterparts, but they sometimes struggle to summon the weight necessary for Bruckner. Not here. Pablo Heras-Casado conducts one of the most explosive and visceral accounts on record with his Belgian orchestra laying into the score with bone-crushing intensity.

Compared with Roger Norrington, who opted for period instrument lite, and François-Xavier Roth’s foot-on-the-gas approach, Heras-Casado is more measured but no less vital. The results are almost operatic: his long-breathed Adagio comes across as an achingly lyrical aria; the furious Scherzo a frenetic micro-drama. The finale swings from rugged turmoil to broad good humour at the flick of a switch. Harmonia Mundi’s recording is strikingly immediate, revealing plenty of instrumental detail without stinting the music’s sonic amplitude.

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