Max Bruch

Max Bruch, a German composer born in Cologne on January 6, 1838, achieved widespread recognition during the nineteenth century chiefly through his choral compositions, though only his concertante pieces maintain a foothold in today’s repertoire. Early on he impressed contemporaries with exceptional technical command and artistic maturity, earning recognition as a leading exponent of the traditional Romantic style until Brahms unveiled his First Symphony. His unwavering resistance to the New German School associated with Wagner and Liszt, followed by his rejection of the “modernists” Strauss, Wolf, and Reger, cemented his image as a conservative—an image that continues to distance listeners who view musical history as an evolutionary progression. Only three works survive regularly in performance: the Violin Concerto No. 1 in G minor, Op. 26, the Scottish Fantasy for violin and orchestra, and the single-movement Kol Nidrei for cello and orchestra. Most of his remaining output—piano pieces, operas, symphonies, and additional orchestral scores—receives infrequent hearings or recordings. In his mature years he earned respect as an educator while holding conducting posts in cities as distant as Liverpool and Breslau.

Bruch received his first piano instruction from his mother, a trained voice teacher and former professional singer. He began composing in childhood, revealing remarkable musical gifts that caught the attention of Ignaz Moscheles. In 1852 he completed both a symphony and a string quartet; the latter earned him a scholarship from the Frankfurt-based Mozart foundation, supporting studies between 1853 and 1857 with piano instructors Ferdinand Breunung and Carl Reinecke and composition lessons from Ferdinand Hiller, who remained a lifelong friend and mentor. In 1858, while beginning to teach in Cologne, he issued his first opus-numbered score, the comic opera Scherz, List und Rache, Op. 1, after Goethe. He relocated to Berlin in 1861, where he cultivated important connections with figures such as von Bülow and Taubert. From 1862 to 1864 he resided in Mannheim, completing the cantata Frithjof and the opera Die Loreley, both greeted warmly by local audiences.

After departing Mannheim, Bruch traveled through Paris and Brussels before assuming the post of music director in Koblenz in 1865. By the time he left that position in 1867 he had finished the Violin Concerto No. 1 in G minor, Op. 26, along with several choral works. Subsequent moves took him to Sondershausen, where Symphonies Nos. 1 and 2 enjoyed success. In 1870 he settled in Berlin; his third opera, Hermione, reached the stage there in 1872 and failed, yet the choral work Odysseus, also completed in 1872, scored a notable triumph. Between 1873 and 1878 he worked independently in Bonn. The Violin Concerto No. 2 received an enthusiastic English premiere in 1878, but met with a cool response when performed in Bonn alongside Brahms’s newly completed First Symphony, which drew extensive critical acclaim. From that point forward Bruch composed in Brahms’s shadow. Nevertheless, between 1878 and 1880 he produced two of his most enduring scores: the Scottish Fantasy for violin and orchestra and Kol Nidrei for cello and orchestra.

In 1880 Bruch became conductor of the Liverpool Philharmonic and, on January 3, 1881, married the seventeen-year-old contralto Clara Tuczek. Three years later he took the directorship of the Breslau Orchesterverein, remaining until the close of the 1890 season and composing major choral pieces including Achilleus (1885) and the cantata Das Feuerkreuz (1889). Appointed professor of composition at the Berlin Akademie in 1891, he held the post until retiring in 1910 yet retained his professorial title until his death in 1920. He regarded his 1893 In Memoriam for violin and orchestra without strings as his finest achievement. In later years his attention turned toward smaller forms, among them the Eight Pieces for clarinet, viola, and piano of 1910. Bruch died on October 20, 1920.