Klarinet Archive - Posting 000025.txt from 2005/10

From: Joseph Wakeling <joseph.wakeling@-----.net>
Subj: Re: [kl] K622
Date: Mon, 03 Oct 2005 16:54:38 -0400

dnleeson wrote:
> I don't think I ever gave agreement to the distinction between an
> Urtext and an Urtext edition. You may well have spoken of this, but it
> did not sink in to me. I don't think there is any serious musicologist
> who would agree with that distinction that you make. Something is not
> "Urtext per se," it is Urtext or it is not Urtext.

No, I recall you didn't agree, and actually I was raising the issue in
the hope that we could get more interesting discussion out of it. ;-)
I'd like some clarification by what you mean by something "being
Urtext", because I suspect we're basing our arguments on different
assumptions. Do you mean by "Urtext" a text of the work that can be
directly associated with the composer?

My own assumption of what "Urtext" means is that it is to some extent an
ideal to aspire to rather than any actual given text. i.e. that Urtext
means the text of the work as the composer conceived it; but any or all
*actual* texts, however near or far to the composer, may contain various
errors and inconsistencies. Thus in most cases we do not actually have
an Urtext itself but rather a collection of textual sources from which
we have to make our minds up, based on this and on other musical
evidence and knowledge, what might be the appropriate thing to play.
And this to my mind is where "Urtext Editions" come in, which is where a
scholar takes and goes over this evidence very carefully to construct a
text which makes musical and historical sense, but which leaves us as
players (through footnotes etc.) a complete enough idea of what the
dilemmas and compromises are to be able to make our own minds up about
these important decisions.

Given this idea there can be a valid "Urtext Edition" of K622 because,
even though the only texts that can be linked directly to Mozart are
early sketches (the basset horn in G sketch), there are various sources
of textual evidence which give us some idea of what is the right
direction to take with this piece. The evidence is much more scant, of
course, than we would like; but it exists.

On the other hand if "Urtext" means a text of the work that can be
directly linked to the player, such as manuscript, first edition (if
overseen by the composer), parts corrected by the composer, etc. etc.,
and "Urtext Edition" means a work based on only these sources, then of
course there can be no Urtext Edition of K622.

But I think that publishers, including Bärenreiter and Henle, don't take
that particular definition of an Urtext Edition. ;-)

-- Joe

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