“Lunga e laboriosa fattica” – Attempting to interpret Mozart’s c-minor trio from the String Quartet K. 465/iii

Posted on October 30, 2017 by Wolf-Dieter Seiffert

When the composer’s autograph manuscript of a music work is extant, then we have a unique opportunity of “looking over the creator’s shoulder” as the ideas are being written down. The mysterious creative process is nevertheless revealed only to those who can then question the existing autograph text, going beyond what is purely philological, editorially speaking. It is my firm conviction that here autograph corrections are the ideal way to start. The musico-analytical curiosity that asks of a correction, “Why?”, in qualitative terms, opens a door otherwise forever closed. Continue reading →

Posted in autograph, Monday Postings, Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus, string quartet, String Quartet K 465, Urtext | Tagged | 2 Comments

Viva la música española – Spanish music in Henle Urtext Editions

Posted on October 16, 2017 by Peter Jost

Manuel de Falla, Noches en los jardines de España, title page of the first edition

Emerging in the 19th century in nearly all of Europe were specific national styles inspired by their countries’ own folk music. This development came to Spain only relatively late, and it was French composers, curiously enough, who were initially successful with works atmospherically Spanish – we think of Georges Bizet’s Carmen or Édouard Lalo’s Symphonie espagnole. It was not until about 1880 that the public and critics became aware of equivalent works by native Spaniards, from Pablo de Sarasate via Isaac Albéniz and Enrique Granados to Manuel de Falla.

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Posted in Albéniz, Isaac, Falla, Manuel de, Monday Postings, Noches en los jardines de España, piano + orchestra, Saraste, Pablo de, Spanische Tänze (Sarasate), transcription, Urtext | Tagged , | Leave a comment

“A Little Spring Melody”– finally in Urtext!

Posted on October 2, 2017 by Norbert Müllemann

Many a reader will be thinking, I must be mistaken in the season: Starting the fall with a spring blog?

But my unseasonable posting has a reason. That is to say, an edition was just published in the G. Henle publishing house that contains a small piece most likely known to most of us as “Spring Melody” by the Comedian Harmonists (an arrangement of an original song version, with lyrics by Hans Lengsfelder). But what’s behind this catchy tune, and what does it have to do with the G. Henle publishers? Continue reading →

Posted in arrangement, Dvořák, Antonín, G. Henle Publishers, Humoresques op. 101 (Dvořák), Monday Postings, piano solo, Urtext | Leave a comment

Tempest – Les Adieux – Hammerklavier. Sense and nonsense regarding the names given to Beethoven’s piano sonatas, Part 2

Posted on September 18, 2017 by Norbert Gertsch

In the first part of my blog on the famous popular names for Beethoven’s piano sonatas I took a closer look at ones that were given by the composer himself. In today’s entry, I’d like to examine the popular titles that probably have nothing to do with Beethoven but that are still on everyone’s lips.

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Posted in Beethoven, Ludwig van, genesis, Monday Postings, piano solo, Piano Sonata op. 7 (Beethoven), Piano Sonata op. 90 (Beethoven) | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

‘But it says in the autograph…’ – on a frequently posed question about our Urtext editions

Posted on September 4, 2017 by Annette Oppermann

Are you also one of those manuscript hunters on the Internet? It is, indeed, almost incredible how many music autographs have become freely accessible there these recent years. Whether we visit composers’ pages like Schubert-online or Bach-Digital or ransack the relevant portals of larger (and also smaller!) libraries: From the St. Matthew Passion to Beethoven’s Ninth, we find all sorts of exciting reading matter – stimulating also, of course, comparison with our Urtext editions. Continue reading →

Posted in articulation, autograph, Brahms, Johannes, Monday Postings, Urtext, violin + orchestra, Violin Concerto (Brahms) | Tagged , , , | 4 Comments

Summer break

Posted on July 31, 2017 by publisher

Time flies! Summer has arrived and our blog is taking some time off, too. Continue reading →

Posted in Monday Postings | Leave a comment

B(e) sharp – what would you play in Mozart’s piano variations K. 265?

Posted on July 17, 2017 by Dominik Rahmer

Mozart over and over again: In the last blog two weeks ago, we discussed a small rhythmic problem in his d-minor string quartet, today the focus is on a questionable accidental in one of his best-known piano works. An interesting client enquiry brought to our attention the following spot in Mozart’s Twelve Variations on “Ah, vous dirai-je Maman” K. 265. Continue reading →

Posted in autograph, first edition, Monday Postings, Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus, piano solo | Tagged , , , | 2 Comments

Non-stop “lombardic” rhythm? On a minute text problem in Mozart’s d-minor String Quartet K. 421

Posted on July 3, 2017 by Wolf-Dieter Seiffert

The exceptionally lighthearted D-major Trio of the Menuetto in Mozart’s otherwise so darkly dramatic d-minor String Quartet K. 421 has always been one of my favourite pieces. The first violin, with its “pizzicato” accompaniment by the lower strings, cleverly plays there with reminiscences of folk music: on the one hand, it is quite obviously striking up a yodel, recognisable by the simple triadic melodicism flipping repeatedly from “chest” to “head” voice, just like a real alpine yodler; on the other, the entire movement is almost prototypically pervaded by the so-called “lombardic” rhythm, unmistakeable signs, for instance, of Scottish, Hungarian or Slavic folk music (recognisable in the inverse-dotted, syncopated rhythm): Continue reading →

Posted in Jerusalem String Quartet, Juilliard Quartet, Monday Postings, Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus, rhythm, string quartet, String Quartet K. 421 (W.A. Mozart) | Tagged , , | 5 Comments

“The future lion is already showing its paws” – The revision of Beethoven’s piano variations, volume 1

Posted on June 19, 2017 by Peter Jost

G. Henle publishing house is well known for putting its earlier editions to the test and updating them if necessary. Recently, the blog has reported on the new revised edition of César Franck’s violin sonata. Today, I would like to refer to the forthcoming revision of the first part of Beethoven’s piano variations (HN 1267). Continue reading →

Posted in Beethoven, Ludwig van, Monday Postings, piano solo, revision, Variations WoO 63 (Beethoven), Variations WoO 65 (Beethoven) | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Tempest – Les Adieux – Hammerklavier. Sense and nonsense regarding the names given to Beethoven’s piano sonatas

Posted on June 5, 2017 by Norbert Gertsch

It’s so much easier to say “The Tempest”, “Pathétique” and “À Thérèse” and we can make ourselves understood so much faster than if we reel off a series of numbers – Sonata no. 17 in d minor op. 31 no. 2, or Sonata no. 8 in c minor op. 13 or Sonata no. 24 in F sharp major op. 78. But the question is how authentic are these well-known epithets? And aren’t they sometimes perhaps misleading? A brief round-up in two parts. Continue reading →

Posted in autograph, Beethoven, Ludwig van, Composers, first edition, Monday Postings, piano solo, Piano Sonata op. 106 (Beethoven), Piano Sonata op. 31 nr. 2 (Beethoven), Piano Sonata op. 7 (Beethoven), Piano Sonata op. 81a Les Adieux (Beethoven) | Tagged , , | Leave a comment