The Bruckner symphony has some core attributes: it's long, it's gorgeous, it surprises you, and just when you think, “this raging part here has got to be the movement's climax”, the piece slackens, pivoting back to a tender, barely recalled mood, before hitting you with an even bigger wallop. You can see why traditionalists might have thought the composer mad in the 19th century. But despite the awesome attention span required, and the occasional dissonance or weird harmonic turn, Bruckner's music has only gained prestige in the modern era (perhaps because conductors feel a need to prove that they can master his music). Furtwängler, Karajan, Barenboim, Solti and many others have sifted through the competing editions of this noted tinkerer's works. (The revisions are so numerous they have a name: “the Bruckner problem”.) Yet despite the complexity of those musicological weeds, his symphonic brand is stable and secure.