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<\/a>The treble clef in the handwritings of various composers, from left to right: J. S. Bach, Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert, Mendelssohn Bartholdy, Schumann, Brahms, Debussy, Ravel<\/p><\/div>\n
The focus for Urtext editions is, of course, the autograph\u2019s source value. So, a rough rule of thumb is that the older the work being edited, the more important the autograph manuscript. Up to the end of the 18th<\/sup> century only a fraction of works composed were printed during their composers\u2019 lifetimes, and even then often without their authorization. Consequently, copies or prints are, compared with the autograph, frequently flawed, hence representing inferior sources. They contain uncorrected errors or \u2013 even worse \u2013 unauthorized interventions by the copyist or arranger. With the gradual implementation of intellectual-property copyright in the late 18th<\/sup> century, printing ultimately became for composers the preferred form of duplication, also establishing supervision of correct music engraving by way of galley proofs. Along with this, though, came an opportunity for the composer to make new modifications that resulted in downgrading the source value of the autograph (cf. fig. 2).<\/p>\n Galley proofs of Chopin\u2019s Etude, Op. 10 No. 2, with autograph addenda and corrigenda <\/p><\/div>\n Therefore, it is not surprising that for the music of the 19th<\/sup> and 20th<\/sup> centuries the first edition as opposed to the autograph is, with exceptions, the most important source. This is generally so also for the works by Gabriel Faur\u00e9, even when we have to take into account the fact that the publications particularly of the Choudens and Hamelle publishing houses contain numerous errors as a consequence of the composer\u2019s having been only a very superficial proof-reader.<\/p>\n Presenting a special case is the extant autograph for Faur\u00e9\u2019s 1st<\/sup> violin sonata in A major, Op. 13 (Paris, Biblioth\u00e8que nationale de France, shelfmark: Ms. 20298). It had initially begun as a careful fair copy, but then veered off into a much revised, progressively rudimentary working manuscript, to the point that the final movement was left in a draft state. In the more elaborated portions of the manuscript two layers of revision can be distinguished: one that is taken into consideration in the first edition, together with another whose alterations are missing in print. Since Faur\u00e9, through the mediation of his friend Camille Clerc obtained publication of the new work by Breitkopf & H\u00e4rtel even before the first public performance, he had had in October 1876 a now-lost, new fair copy despatched to Leipzig as engraver\u2019s model. The publication appeared in February 1877, several weeks after the premi\u00e8re on 27 January.<\/p>\n To get to the point of the conundrum shown by the autograph\u2019s various stages of evolution, the question of which source was used for the premi\u00e8re must be posed. Faur\u00e9\u2019s manuscript does in fact reveal traces of performance, including a \u2018Volti\u2019 in the final movement (fig. 3), but even for experienced composers, its development appears here so incomplete that the autograph can hardly have served as model from which to play a public performance rather than merely to try out still unfinished passages.<\/p>\n As is known from the correspondence between Faur\u00e9 and Clerc as well as Clerc and Breitkopf & H\u00e4rtel, the publishing house sent the composer at his request a copy of the despatched engraver\u2019s model \u2013 since he no longer had a copy matching the manuscript sent to Leipzig. This no longer extant copy might be taken as having been the model used in the premi\u00e8re. Presumably all changes that arose from the ensuing proofreading in the middle of January 1877 were also entered into it.<\/p>\n All that is puzzling about Faur\u00e9\u2019s manuscript is, to be sure, not in the least solved as such, but it does appear highly likely that the second layer of revision also dates from still before the production of the copy serving as new engraver\u2019s model. Faur\u00e9 himself had, after all, once more reviewed and corrected this copy and, as he wrote in a letter to Clerc, \u2018added only the really essential dynamic markings\u2019. Thus, unlike in the portions of the sonata marked in great detail, that is, in the first movement, Faur\u00e9 undertook entirely deliberately a simplification that evidently also included articulation and performance markings (cf., for example, the later deletion of e espressivo<\/em> to be replaced by con anima<\/em> in the violin part, measure 23 of the 1st<\/sup> movement; dolce<\/em> as well as con anima<\/em> were later also omitted and replaced by a simple p<\/em>).<\/p>\n So, for the Urtext, Faur\u00e9\u2019s autograph, as taken into account in the new Henle edition by Fabian Kolb (HN 980<\/a>), still possesses only a source value limited to erroneous passages in the first edition \u2013 though needless to say, the fascination of these manuscript remains uninfluenced by this fact.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Autograph manuscripts of musical works have an aura all their … Continue reading <\/a><\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n