The arduousness of Bruckner's process of composition and, especially, his habits of revision are legendary; yet even by these standards, the Eighth Symphony had a long and difficult genesis and evolution. It was revised by the composer and exists in two distinct versions (1887 and 1890); the circumstances surrounding its revision were unusually complex; and its path to performance and publication was tortuous. This chapter chronicles the long journey of this symphony from its initial composition in 1884–7, through its rejection by Hermann Levi in October 1887, its recomposition by Bruckner in 1889 and 1890, and its performance and publication in 1892.

The composition of the first version

The Eighth Symphony originated between the summer of 1884 and August 1887, a time when Bruckner's career was reaching high tide. He had recently completed two of his most successful and powerful works, the Seventh Symphony and the Te Deum, both of which were published in 1885. While Bruckner was at work on the Eighth, the Seventh enjoyed a pair of triumphant initial performances in Leipzig on 30 December 1884 and in Munich on 10 March 1885 and several subsequent performances in Cologne, Chicago, Hamburg, New York, Amsterdam, Graz, Berlin, London, Dresden, and Budapest, as well as Vienna. The Te Deum, the Third Symphony (at that time the only other of Bruckner's symphonies available in print), and the String Quintet were also performed several times during these years.