First of all, a compatible driver needs to be installed to get support for SPIR. APP SDK provides necessary header files, libraries etc. that you require to build an OpenCL program. It also provides a CPU runtime, but not any GPU package. That's why, you need to install the compatible driver first to run your application on GPU devices.
Now coming to your question about replacing clBuildProgram with clCompileProgram and clLinkProgram. Yes, you can split the steps provided all the inputs and flags are set correctly. For example, set the flag "-x spir" to clCompileProgram, not to clLinkProgram.
Regards,