Klarinet Archive - Posting 000455.txt from 1996/04

From: "Dan Leeson: LEESON@-----.EDU>
Subj: Jennifer Hefferlin and K. 622 redux
Date: Tue, 16 Apr 1996 10:19:54 -0400

I don't think that Jennifer and I have any disagreement whatsoever, and
even if we did (which we don't), what better work is there to have
a disagreement about? (There's a dangling participle there somewhere,
but I prefer not to spend the time finding and fixing it.)

Jeffifer asked which of the extraordinary number of published editions
is the most authentic. And the answer to that is: none. In the
absence of a reliable source document, nothing in any edition, from
articulation to phrasing to dynamics to notes, has any degree of
reliability.

Let me modify that by saying that I have no information that would
enable me to conclude which edition is the most reliable. For that
I would have to consult with the original, and that, thanks to that
moron Stadler, is lost to us, probably forever (along with the
autograph to K. 581 while we are at it).

I have seen some wonderful players hold certain editions as sacred
(there's that word again) showing me the 1875 edition of Breitkopf
& Hartel as if it were blessed by angels. But, except for some
thoughtful page turns, there is nothing more authentic to the
B&H edition than there is to Simeon Bellison's edition of ca. 1935.

The operative word here is "authentic" not personally preferable.

The B&H edition of 1875 does have big notes, the print is as clear
as a bell, the type fonts gorgeous, etc. But authentic? I have
no way of knowing.

Now the same suggestion is being made about the Barenreiter edition.
But don't be deceived. It is just the editor's idea of what the
work is supposed to be made in the presence of the earliest editions
that he could find and in the strong hope that these early editions
are themselves reasonably authentic. But the fact that an edition
is early does not mean that it is reliable and authentic. The only
thing that an early edition has going for it is that it is early.

When I edited the complete set of Mozart wind serenades for the
Neue Mozart Ausgabe, I was faced with exactly this problem.
With respect to the most important work, the Gran Partitta,
I had, on one hand, 5 editions, all of which could be traced to
the first printed edition of 1803, and on the other hand, I had
the autograph itself as located in the Library of Congress (and
which I had held in my hands on several occasions -- my launderer
know that I had been very excited).

There were in excess of 2,000 differences in the placement and/or
intensity of dynamics alone between the autograph and the regular
editions that everyone was using!

There were countless phrase shape differences and articulation
differences.

There were about 60 changes of notes.

There was a strong question if a certain measure even belonged in
the piece.

And there was even a question if the Gran Partitta was two separate
works instead of one work of 7 movements.

If anyone had been asked around that time "Which edition of the
Gran Partitta is the most reliable and authentic" the answer would
have been "Breitkopf & Hartel, Leipzig." But it wasn't even
close to what the autograph had. So much for the authenticity and
value of supposedly reliable editions.

An interesting question arises to those of you who will, someday,
be editing various editions of music. What is the purpose of
an editor? Is it to put in place his/her thoughts on what the
composer meant by this or that thing, or is to to put in place
what it was that the composer said?

That, of course depends on the composer and how clear s/he was.
It is very easy to take the former position. "I've played this
piece for 35 years. I know how it goes. My edition will tell
everyone how it goes." It takes a great deal of self-restraint
to do the latter. But in the final analysis, what any one player
thinks about how a work should go will be dead in one generation.
The next generation will decide that they "really know" how the
work should go and the previous generation was full of cock-a-doody!

An editor should stay out of the way of the performer and stop trying
to make everyone who ever lived play the work the way he or she likes
it. That's not editing music. That is ego perpetuation.

That is why, Jennifer, I run scared when I hear that someone considers
a piece of music "sacred."

====================================
Dan Leeson, Los Altos, California
(leeson@-----.edu)
====================================