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Beethoven was not the first composer to be attracted to this story; in fact, three others had written operas based on the same play before him. Nor was Beethoven’s version successful from the start: the first production (1805) had only three performances, a revised version the following year only two. The upheavals of the Napoleonic wars, coupled with theatrical intrigues and insufficient rehearsal time, conspired to doom these productions. (At this point, the name of the opera was still Leonore.) The opera was then put aside for eight years and then revised again in 1814, now under the new title Fidelio. This time, the premiere was an unqualified success.

For each of these productions, Beethoven wrote a different overture. The 1805 version was introduced by what we now know as Leonore Overture No. 2, the 1806 revival by Leonore Overture No. 3. (Leonore Overture No. 1 was written in 1807 for another production that never materialized.) The three Leonore overtures share some musical materials in common; the Fidelio overture of 1814, on the other hand, is completely new music.

The main ideas of the Fidelio overture, presented right at the beginning, are a fanfare-like melody played by the whole orchestra and a slow-moving theme for a pair of horns answered by the clarinets. Elements of one or another are almost constantly present in this tightly constructed, spirited overture.

Instrumentation: two flutes, two oboes, two clarinets, two bassoons, four horns, two trumpets, trombone, bass trombone, timpani, strings.

The F-major Romance, which is performed more often than its companion, has an identical formal outline (rondo theme – episode 1 – rondo – episode 2 – rondo), but the segments are longer, the violin writing more demanding, and the tone, especially in the minor-mode episode, more impassioned, almost proto-Romantic. All the more interesting to note, therefore, that it is the earlier of the two rondos. 

Scholars have even speculated that the F-major Romance could have originated in Bonn before Beethoven’s move to Vienna in 1792.  (In those years, Beethoven played viola in the Bonn court orchestra and so had first-hand experience as a string player.)  In his important Beethoven monograph, British musicologist Barry Cooper writes, ‟It could well be the missing slow movement of the fragmentary Violin Concerto in C,” a work dating from Bonn of which only part of the first movement has survived. If it is indeed true that the origins of this Romance go back that far in Beethoven’s life, the composer must have revised it thoroughly before the first Viennese performance.

Instrumentation: solo violin, flute, two oboes, two bassoons, two horns, strings.

“[The music is] often dark to the pitch of blackness, and rent with such anguish as he had until now almost succeeded in keeping out of his music. There is tragedy in the first movement of the Eighth….the Fifth is a mighty battleground, but it is like some great classical fresco, and if we turn to the strange and compelling tonal conflicts of the last movement of the Sixth, we do not have the feeling that the composer is himself terrified by his own fantasies.  But in the Ninth we sometimes receive this impression….in parts of the first movement and large tracts of the tormented Adagio.”

Nor did Simpson believe that the last movement, had it been completed, would have exorcised that anguish.  He found it even in the sketches to the finale, and claimed that Bruckner had not solved the enormous structural problems of this, the most monumental of his symphonies, at the time of his death.

Bruckner’s anguish may have had something to do with his nagging feelings of insecurity as a composer.  These feelings had been fueled by four entire years (1887–1891) spent largely with the revision of his First, Second, Third, and Eighth Symphonies at the instigation of well-meaning but misguided disciples. The result was not only the vexing problem of multiple versions (where the later revisions do not necessarily represent improvements) but also a loss of precious time. It has been argued that, had Bruckner not spent four years of his life revising his earlier works, he probably would have been able to finish his Ninth.

As it stands, the gigantic torso serves, in its very incompleteness, as a stern reminder of the fragility of the human condition. This message is borne out by the three completed movements–the tensely dramatic, “solemn-mysterious” opening, the eerie Scherzo, and, to repeat Simpson’s adjective, the “tormented” Adagio.

The work opens similarly to several other Bruckner symphonies–long measures of tremolos (rapid, “trembling” repeats of the same notes) and brief motivic fragments, inspired by the opening of Beethoven’s Ninth.  The relationship is further reinforced by the shared key of D minor.  As elsewhere, Bruckner makes short motives grow to tremendous climaxes, introduces a lyrical second and an austere third theme. Yet despite the presence of this and other trappings of sonata form, the 20-minute movement does not easily fit the classical scheme in which the development represents increasing complexity, and the recapitulation brings resolution. The real form, as Simpson pointed out, can instead be described as a massive and complex statement followed by an extensive counterstatement based on the same materials and, finally, a brief yet grandiose coda.

The Scherzo is unique among Bruckner’s scherzos in the bold dissonances and tonal ambiguities employed.  Far from being a “joke” (the original meaning of the word Scherzo), it is, in the words of one commentator, “frenzied almost throughout, and by turns brutal and fantastic.” Bruckner’s Trios (or scherzo middle sections) are usually slower than the main sections; this one is much faster, set in the remote key of F-sharp major, and characterized by an agility reminiscent of Mendelssohn yet with a dark, unsettling twist to it.  In keeping with tradition, the turbulent Scherzo is repeated in its entirety.

The E-major Adagio, nearly half an hour in length, is built upon two contrasting groups of themes.  The first one is developed into the most chromatic and tonally unstable music Bruckner ever wrote: suspenseful tremolos and tortuous modulations, capped by a striking quote from Wagner’s Parsifal, create an atmosphere full of dramatic tension. This contrasts with a cantabile (singing) melody in the violins that is much more traditional in the way it establishes a firm tonal footing before moving on. The first thematic group, and part of the second, are repeated; but the climax of the movement arises from the other part of the second group (not previously recapitulated), soaring to unprecedented heights of expression. Originally calm and lyrical, this melody becomes tense and menacing, before it melts into the ethereal coda (which incorporates quotes from Bruckner’s Eighth and Seventh Symphonies).

Over the years, there have been several attempts to complete the finale of the Ninth, which survives only in sketches. While these completions give us at least an approximate idea of what Bruckner may have had in mind, it can be argued that the work is most effective in its unfinished form, ending with that otherworldly, seemingly endless E-major chord in the brass.

Instrumentation: three flutes, three oboes, three clarinets, three bassoons, eight horns (fifth, sixth, seventh, and eighth double Wagner tuba), three trumpets, three trombones, tuba, timpani, strings.