LSO/Rattle review – a Brucknerian labour of love

Barbican, London
Simon Rattle has become a very fine and authentic Brucknerian, as this fascinating concert – offering insights into the composer’s fourth symphony – revealed

Bruckner is not the only composer whose music exists in several revisions. But he has few rivals as music’s most compulsive tinkerman. Bruckner’s fourth symphony, in particular, underwent multiple and substantial alterations between its first incarnation in 1874 and its more or less final version in 1881 that is among his most popular works. Some of the most important examples provided the inspiration for this highly imaginative LSO concert under Sir Simon Rattle.

In the first half, Rattle directed the LSO in discarded movements from earlier versions of the symphony: a scherzo that was later dumped in favour of the more familiar “hunting” alternative, and the composer’s second shot at writing the finale, a movement that continued to trouble Bruckner for years. In part two, Rattle then gave the world premiere of a new reworking of the symphony’s final version by Benjamin-Gunnar Cohrs for the Vienna-based Bruckner complete edition and published this year.

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