Read the end first!

Posted on November 10, 2014 by Annette Oppermann

The new Catalogue of Works of Ludwig van Beethoven

Come on now, fess up! Haven’t you sometimes thumbed through the last chapter of a crime thriller or the dramatic denouement of a love story so that you’d know, already in advance, how it ends – even if, of course, this goes totally against the author’s wishes! What is taboo in belles lettres, though, is absolutely permissible in scholarly works. Yes, we might just as well tell all the readers of our brand new Catalogue of Works of Beethoven [HN 2207]: “Go ahead, take a look at the end!”   Continue reading →

Posted in Beethoven, Ludwig van, G. Henle Publishers, Monday Postings | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

The new Catalogue of Works of Ludwig van Beethoven

Posted on October 27, 2014 by Norbert Gertsch

On 1 November 2014 G. Henle Verlag is publishing a massive two-volume book of just under 2,000 pages – a rare and therefore special event for our house that issues almost exclusively music editions. This is a new catalogue of the works of Ludwig van Beethoven, superseding its predecessor of 1955 known as the ‘Kinsky-Halm’, anyhow, already also of around a hefty 900 pages. Continue reading →

Posted in autograph, Beethoven, Ludwig van, first edition, G. Henle Publishers, Monday Postings, Piano Concerto op. 73 (Beethoven), Piano Trios op. 70 (Beethoven), sketches | Tagged , , , | 1 Comment

The year of the flute – special new editions in the Henle catalogue

Posted on October 13, 2014 by Norbert Müllemann

For some time past the G. Henle publishing house has been setting for each calendar year sales-related scheduling priorities to be accompanied by special promotions and advertising materials.
We have proclaimed 2014 the year of the study editions (catalogue and video clips here) and the flute. Continue reading →

Posted in Bach, Carl Philipp Emanuel, facsimile, flute solo, G. Henle Publishers, Monday Postings, ornamentation, piano + flute, Telemann, Georg Philipp, Urtext | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Composing made easy? On Erik Satie’s ‘Nocturnes’

Posted on September 29, 2014 by Peter Jost

It was not without good reason that the label ‘outsider’ stuck to Satie. As of his earliest compositions he was in search of alternatives to the tonal harmony that was still the unquestioned convention when he began his training at the Paris Conservatoire (1879–87). This search runs like a red thread through all of his works, and was certainly absolutely independent of the stylistic orientation of individual works, reaching indeed, as we know, from echoes of the medieval and exotic to the then popular cabaret music. Continue reading →

Posted in autograph, Monday Postings, Nocturnes (Satie), notation, piano solo, Satie, Erik, variant reading | Tagged , , , | 3 Comments

‘It is G! Bravo, and a thousand thanks.’ Günter Henle’s guestbook (and a wrong note in Beethoven)

Posted on September 15, 2014 by Wolf-Dieter Seiffert

The violinist Yehudi Menuhin was without question amongst Günter Henle’s closest artist friends. Henle’s autobiography Three Spheres. A Life in Politics, Business and Music contains numerous amusing descriptions of mutual experiences, of which Henle said that Menuhin was ‘on his instrument probably one the greatest masters ever to have lived’. When both were together specific music-text questions were often also involved. Continue reading →

Posted in autograph, Beethoven, Ludwig van, first edition, G. Henle Publishers, Monday Postings, piano + violin, Urtext, variant reading, Violin Sonata op. 96 (Beethoven), Yehudi Menuhin | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Summer Rest

Posted on August 4, 2014 by publisher

What would music be without rests?

We’re following suit and giving the blog postings a brief rest for the summer.

Please look forward to the next post on 15 September 2014!

G. Henle Verlag

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Franz Xaver comes to Henle: On the 170th anniversary of the death of Franz Xaver Wolfgang Mozart (29 July 2014)

Posted on July 21, 2014 by Norbert Müllemann
Franz Xaver Wolfgang Mozart, 1825 (Source: Wikimedia.org, Licence: PD)

Franz Xaver Wolfgang Mozart, 1825 (Source: Wikimedia.org, Licence: PD)

That Henle is a Mozart publisher should not come as news. Since 2011, however, we are doubly so. Our catalogue offers not only Wolfgang Amadeus Mo­zart’s great works for piano and chamber music as well as solo concertos, but since 2011, also Urtext editions of works by Franz Xaver Wolfgang Mo­zart, youngest son of the celebrated WAM.

Franz Xaver Wolfgang Mozart (1791–1844) was only four months old when his father died. High hopes were had of the offspring and everything was done to enable the progeny to follow in his father’s footsteps. He received an excellent mu­si­cal education and soon enough already called himself simply “W. A. Mozart’s son” – a wrong decision, because it is hardly surprising that this legacy became more of a burden than an opportunity. Continue reading →

Posted in Andreas Staier, autograph, first edition, Flute Rondo (F.X.W. Mozart), G. Henle Publishers, Monday Postings, Mozart, Franz Xaver Wolfgang, piano + flute, piano solo, Urtext | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Where does the key/clef go? About a problematic passage in Schumann’s F-major string quartet

Posted on July 7, 2014 by Peter Jost
Fig. 1, from: Wilhelm Busch, "Eine kalte Geschichte" (1878)

Fig. 1, from: Wilhelm Busch, "Eine kalte Geschichte" (1878)

Fans of the humourist Wilhelm Busch will certainly be reminded of the story of Mas­ter Zwiel who, upon returning from a tav­ern on a cold winter’s night, stands at his front door with key already in hand and vain­ly seeks the keyhole.

 

The story ends tragically: Master Zwiel loses the key and falls while searching for it into a water barrel where he finally freez­es to death.

The finale of Robert Schumann’s string quar­tet in F major, Op. 41 No. 2, is not, in fact, quite so dangerous for violists, but there is a connection with Master Zwiel. For the musician also has in hand a key, as it were, but has to search for the matching keyhole – that is, the correct position for the key. [Translator’s note: The German word Schlüssel means both ‘key’ (as used in music notation and as well as in a lock) and ‘clef’, making sense here of the pun.] Continue reading →

Posted in autograph, first edition, Monday Postings, Schumann, Robert, string quartet, String Quartet op. 41 Nr. 2 (Schumann), variant reading | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Without words, but with a foreword – what’s new on Sergei Rachmaninoff’s “Vocalise”

Posted on June 24, 2014 by Dominik Rahmer

Looking at the topics of the by now more than 70 postings of this blog, most of them deal with questions of musical notation – accidentals, pitch or articulation and dynamics. This is of course not surprising, yet working with musical sources and producing correct and reliable music texts are central in our business. Continue reading →

Posted in first edition, genesis, Monday Postings, piano + voice, Rachmaninoff, Sergei, Vocalise op. 34 Nr. 14 (Rachmaninoff) | Tagged , , , , | 10 Comments

A “new” Mozart work. On the c-minor “Fantasy” (K. 396/385f) in its original setting for violin and piano

Posted on June 9, 2014 by Wolf-Dieter Seiffert

In the year 1821 three distinguished personalities met in Weimar: Goethe, Mendelssohn Bartholdy and Mozart. Mozart, of course, not in person, but in the form of his original manuscript that Goethe owned at the time (and that he identified on page 2 as “Mozart.”): Continue reading →

Posted in autograph, Fantasy K. 396(385f) (W.A. Mozart), Monday Postings, Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus, Noah Bendix-Balgley, piano + violin, Robert D. Levin | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment