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Parallels can be drawn between the mature Masses of the 1860s and the joyful C major Te Deum which was one of Bruckner’s favourites among his compositions. He had begun work on a Te Deum in May 1881, almost contemporaneously with the sketches for his seventh symphony, but it was not until September 1883 that he gave it his full attention. The Te Deum calls for soprano, contralto, tenor and bass soloists, four-part choir, organ and orchestra, though the organ is optional. The choral writing is mostly homophonic—chords rather than counterpoint—which makes the eventual launching into the vast, final double fugue (‘In te, Domine, speravi’) the more telling. The string opening appears again in the F minor Mass and the ninth symphony, and the theme of the ‘non confundar’ is integral to the seventh symphony’s Adagio.

There are thematic interconnections between the five movements of the Te Deum. The two outer sections (‘Te Deum laudamus’ and ‘In te, Domine, speravi’) are in a triumphant C major, the central ‘Aeterna fac cum sanctis tuis’ equally joyous in D minor. In second and fourth place are sandwiched the ‘Te ergo, quaesumus’ and ‘Salvum fac populum tuum, Domine’, both in F minor and both employing not only the vocal soloists but also a solo violin, much in the manner of the F minor Mass’s ‘Christe eleison’.

Bruckner completed the Te Deum in March 1884 and it was first performed, accompanied by two pianos, on 2 May 1885. Hans Richter conducted the first performance with orchestra in Vienna on 10 January 1886. Even the normally vicious Hanslick, who never forgave Bruckner’s espousal of Wagner, was uncharacteristically polite.

from notes by Wadham Sutton © 1993