Klarinet Archive - Posting 000107.txt from 1994/07

From: Noreen <NOREEN@-----.BITNET>
Subj: Dan and Mozart's Serenade for 13 Instruments K. 361 (370a)
Date: Fri, 15 Jul 1994 23:28:46 -0400

Hi Dan and everyone,

Its been a while since this Serenade came up and, coincidentally, I just
finished responding to one of Dan's earlier notes. Unfortunately time
constraints keep me from keeping as on top of the discussion as I would
like but that's ok. Just wanted to clarify some things since I think a
little confusion may have been generated here in the last round of this
discussion. Saw that Dan posted something new about the "Gran Partitta"
today but I have only read the first few lines so far.

So look forward to rejoining the discussion later (my post follows).

>There has been nothing new added to the history of the Gran Partitta
>since about 1976 when Whitwell and I were published in the Mozart
>Jahrbuch. There is an outstanding question having to do with the
>dating that Alan Tyson has brought up. He notes that the watermark
>of the paper used in the Gran Partitta has appeared in no work
>after 1782 whereas Whitwell and I have assertedthat late 1783 to
>early 1784 is a correct date based on a whole variety of things.

Perhaps Mozart used old paper that he had "stashed" somewhere.
The years are close enough together that this is not totally
out of the question.

(stuff deleted)

>Surely you do not accept as fact that the work was written for
>Munich performance in 1780?

No - despite the watermarks I still tend to agree with the 1783/84
suggestion.

>Surely you do not accept as fact that the work was originally two
>separate works whose movements have come together into a single
>work by magic? That was the fanciful theory of George de Saint
>Foix advanced in 1926 and since discredited.

No I would find that rather odd. Still would be nice to see the
autograph first hand, just out of a matter of personal curiosity and
satisfaction.

>Surely you realize that all editions published from 1801 to 1976
>had thousands of errors, all of which have been corrected in the
>NMA volume.

Well, considering how some of those editions came to be, that is to be
expected. I am still in the beginning stages of studying the NMA volume
so can't comment further on this.

>And if I may comment on the instrumentation you suggest, it is
>indeed unusual. Since you are unable to obtain the instrumentation
>for which the work was written, I can understand that you are
>making substitutions, but my joke on the matter was right to the
>point. A work such as the GP does not exist solely as a bunch of
>tunes, or an architecture of form. The texture of the instruments
>themselves make that piece what it is. By using instruments other
>than that for which the work was written, you deviate to major
>degrees in terms of what is going to come out. The tunes will be
>the same, but little else will.

I don't dispute that the instrumentation is unusual. In fact we are
not attempting to represent it in that light. We simply wanted to take
the opportunity to tackle a very interesting work. I am sure we are all
aware that this will change the texture etc. Clarinets, Bassoons and Horns
(and Contrabass) will still be playing their original parts.

Maybe your joke on the matter was right to the point. What I objected more
to, with respect to it, was that I had posted to you privately. Due to
systems problems and other considerations, I had not yet mentioned the subject
of instrumentation on the Klarinet list. However, I liked your suggestion that
perhaps discussion of the work might be more appropriate off-line. I was
planning to post a summary at some later point.

Therefore your joke seemed somewhat out of context on the public list.
If you had sent it to me as an e-mail I might have taken it as you meant it.
'Nuff said on the matter.

>Do not misunderstand me. I don't care if you do the work with tenor
>sax, but you should not put forward the argument that the changes you
are planning to make will have little impact on the piece. Using
>English horns in place of basset horns impacts the registers in which
>the notes sound because the English horns cannot get down low enough.
>Thus, from time to time, you will have notes an octave out of register
and this impacts what the piece sounds like, to say nothing of the fact
>that the character of the English horn is so different from that of
>a basset horn.

I was not attempting to put forward the argument that the changes we are plannin
will have little impact on the piece - because it certainly will. However, the
English Horn parts will be edited. No tenor saxes involved ;-)

>But you know all this and I only bring it up because it appeared to me
>that you were not giving enough recognition to the severity of the
>changes you were making.

I hadn't really gotten that far into the discussion. Anyway,
I do believe that we (my group) are all aware that making major
substitutions will have other major implications.

>I have no idea how many performances I did of the work where the conductor
>would make arbitrary changes and say, "If Mozart had had a contrabassoon
>he would have used one." But one can add to that that "If Mozart had had
>an accordion he would have used one." The argument holds no value. It signs
>Mozart's name to the conductor's speculations.

>If a conductor does the work with contrabassoon because he or she prefers
>a contrabassoon, that's OK with me. Just don't tell me that Mozart
>would have done it that way. That goes too far.

We are using a *Contrabass* for our performance. Our music director did
not make any arbitrary changes; he simply was accomodating a collective desire
to play this piece and made substitutions that would fit the instruments availab
in our wind section. And here, although somewhat repetitive now, I would
like to emphasize that we are by no means billing this as use of Mozart's
instrumentation or "that this may be what he intended". We are all
highly aware of the fact that it is not.

On another note, I have reread your first article and the post where you mention
that there are certain modern editions to avoid. But I still don't know, at
this point in time, which modern edition would then be most appropriate to
obtain for my own private library.

regards,

Noreen