Ecce sacerdos magnus (Behold a great priest), WAB 13, is an 1885 sacred motet by the Austrian composer Anton Bruckner. It is a musical setting of the antiphon of the same title.
History
This work was composed at the request of Johann Burgstaller, to be performed at the Linz Cathedral on the 100th anniversary of the founding of the diocese. It was completed by 28 April 1885 and sent to Burgstaller in mid-May.[1][2] However, the work was not performed at that event, nor at any other event in Bruckner's lifetime.
The work, the manuscrit of which is archived at the Wiener Männer-Sangverein,[3] was edited by Viktor Keldorfer (Universal Edition) in 1911.[2] It was premiered on 21 November 1921 by the Vöcklabruck women's choral society.[4]
The motet is issued in Band XXI/33 of the Gesamtausgabe.[5]
Benedictionem omnium (bars 40-63). As in Mass No. 1 and the Adagio of most of Bruckner's symphonies, this third part contains Bruckner's typical ascending scales.[6]
Ideo jure jurando (bars 64-80): first repeat of bars 23-39.
Ideo jure jurando (bars 90-106): second repeat of bars 23–39.
The antiphon, which was intended as processional music for the entrance of the bishop into the cathedral, was thus designed to be "majestic" and "ceremonial" in character. The work's "most enthralling feature" is "the antiphonal writing of Gabrielian grandeur" in bars 64–66.[1] Kinder calls the piece "one of Bruckner's crowning achievements in the small forms" and "a work of almost barbaric intensity".[4]
The trombones, which usually double the low voices, occasionally adopt independent lines. The ritornello on the words "Ideo jurejurando" is expanded and contrasted with episodes "that seem to trace the evolution of church music" in their varied use of texture. In contrast, the harmonic structure is more reflective of Bruckner's own compositional style. The piece includes several references to Bruckner's 1854 Libera me, particularly in the harmonic writing.[4]
Selected discography
Bruckner's Ecce sacerdos magnus was recorded at first in 1966 by Eugen Jochum with the choir of the Bayerischen Rundfunk (LP: DG 139134/5).
A selection of the about 30 recordings:
George Guest, St. John's College Choir Cambridge, The World of St. John's 1958–1977 - LP: Argo ZRG 760, 1973
Anton Bruckner - Sämtliche Werke, Band XXI: Kleine Kirchenmusikwerke, Musikwissenschaftlicher Verlag der Internationalen Bruckner-Gesellschaft, Hans Bauernfeind and Leopold Nowak (Editor), Vienna, 1984/2001
Keith William Kinder, The Wind and Wind-Chorus Music of Anton Bruckner, Greenwood Press, Westport, Connecticut, 2000. ISBN978-0-313-30834-5
Cornelis van Zwol, Anton Bruckner 1824-1896 - Leven en werken, uitg. Thoth, Bussum, Netherlands, 2012. ISBN978-90-6868-590-9
