Performing Editions of the Leipzig School, 1850-1900 and their Testimony to Nineteenth-Century
Audio Version (to download right-click and 'Save link as...')
- Speaker(s):
- George Kennaway and David Milsom (Leeds/LUCHIP), Chair: John Irving (IMR)
- Event date:
- Thursday 06 May 2010
School of Advanced Study, University of London
- Description
-
Whilst editions of the eighteenth century and before rarely contain more than the simplest performance information, some prominent editors of the second half of the nineteenth-century provided increasingly detailed markings. This material is the focus of the research project based at Cardiff University and the University of Leeds.
Editors based in Leipzig were particularly productive and many of the sets of parts by publishing houses such as C. F. Peters and Breitkopf & Härtel help us to understand performing practices associated with musicians active there, such as Mendelssohn, Reinecke, Grützmacher, David and Joachim.
Our interest in ‘Urtext’ editions might lead us dismiss such editorial content, editors having assumed the role of bogeymen, obscuring the composer’s markings with accretions that obscure their ‘intentions’. This means that this material has not been interrogated even at the most basic level. What are ‘performing editions’ actually for? Do they document the editor’s own performance choices? Do they contain suggestions or something more stringent? Why do some editions bearing a famous editor’s name appear to be virtually unedited, while others are extremely detailed? What conclusions can be drawn from texts which have been edited by many different players? How does the study of these editions fit our conception of the role of the performer? There are several different approaches to these issues, which will be explored by both speakers.
These musical texts clearly contain information, and how to act upon it goes to the heart of widespread assumptions, particularly among performers, about the status of the musical score. In simple terms, most performers consider basic notation (rhythms, notes, perhaps phrasing and dynamics) to be sacrosanct, but hold that matters such as bowings and fingerings are matters for the performer to decide. Nineteenth-century performers could (and often did) adapt many elements of a composition to their wishes. How comfortable are we with this approach, even when it can be demonstrated that performers associated with a given art-work did this at the time of its original conception?
David Milsom and George Kennaway, both researchers on an AHRC project to collate and analyse nineteenth-century string chamber music editions of 1840-1930 will consider these issues, illustrated by a number of performed examples for demonstration and discussion.