Hans Rott

Symphony in E major

The re-discovery of Hans Rott’s Symphony in E major in the late 1980s was considered a minor sensation (in the musicological world, that is). Gustav Mahler, who knew the work pretty well, later hailed Rott in his memoirs as "the founder of the new symphony […], as I understand it." Rott was a student of Anton Bruckner in Vienna, and his teacher’s influence is unmistakable. The symphony is not transmitted in a final fair copy; rather, the autograph has the character of a working manuscript and can even be described as sketchy in several places. Until 2006, the first movement of the symphony had survived only in a copy made by a copyist; the autograph was considered lost. It was not until 2006 that it resurfaced in Bruno Walter’s estate and was identified as a manuscript by Hans Rott. It is being analyzed for the first time for this new Urtext edition.