Klarinet Archive - Posting 000282.txt from 2004/07

From: "dnleeson" <dnleeson@-----.net>
Subj: RE: [kl] Fennell
Date: Fri, 9 Jul 2004 10:19:46 -0400

I have a Fennell story for you as well.

It was with Fred that I first played the Gran Partitta in 1958, a
work that he recorded as part of the wonderful series with the
Eastman Wind Ensemble. I was never a student at Eastman, but
only went there for a summer workshop during which K. 361 was
played, though I knew him from other circumstances. It was
obvious to me that the great serenade held a special place in his
heart.

After Neal Zaslaw and I completed the edition of the work for the
Neue Mozart Ausgabe in the 1970s, I prepared the first public
performance of it in Paterson, New Jersey. Fred happened to be
in the northern New Jersey area at the time we were rehearsing
the serenade and he came to my house during a Sunday morning
rehearsal that took place in my living room.

Well when he heard the edition for the first time (it was not
even printed yet and we worked from a copy of the score that I
had sent to Barenreiter), he damn near fell off the chair. He had
been used to the traditional editions of the work and the new
edition had hundreds and hundreds of MAJOR differences including
the eliminated measure in the fifth movement of which Tony Pay
and I have had extensive conversations, plus significant note
changes in the slow movement.

But Fennell was not a man to be constrained by what was true
yesterday. During the several breaks of that morning, he asked a
pile of questions about why this or why that. And when the
rehearsal was over, he stayed for even further discussion. I
showed him the manuscript of the work in Mozart's hand which he
had never before seen.

Some years after that he produced his own edition and he took
pains to cite and thank me for having influenced him on matters
of dynamics, notes, etc. He also took out m. 111 of the fifth
movement. He does not give the player's a choice. The measure is
just not there. If you buy his edition, you can't play that
measure. It's gone, which is the way it is supposed to be.
Fred's edition of K. 361 is currently available.

A few years after that I was playing bass clarinet with the New
Sousa Band and, at a concert in Florida, Fred was there. He was,
of course, invited to conduct any march he wanted. And he chose
"Nobles of the Mystic Shrine" which has a jingling Johnny in it.
It brought tha thouse down. No rehearsal. Just BANG!

Dan Leeson
DNLeeson@-----.net

-----Original Message-----
From: Don Yungkurth [mailto:chalumeau@-----.net]
Sent: Friday, July 09, 2004 6:20 AM
To: Klarinet
Subject: [kl] Fennell

With the mention of Frederick Fennell (in recent notes - in
comparison with
Revelli) I thought I would report that a week ago today (July 2,
2004) our
local FM station was celebrating Fennell's 90th birthday by
playing many of
his Eastman Wind Ensemble recordings. This is certainly
appropriate here in
the Rochester, NY, area where he founded the group.

Don Yungkurth

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