[WORKBENCH] Brahms Op. 119, No. 1

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Knut
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Re: Brahms Op. 119, No. 1

Post by Knut »

Thanks once again for your comments and counters, John.
If you've sent me a PM, it doesn't seem to have reached me.
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John Ruggero
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Re: Brahms Op. 119, No. 1

Post by John Ruggero »

You are most welcome, Knut. This is a great project and I am learning a lot from it.

I just sent the PM again. User error.
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Knut
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Re: Brahms Op. 119, No. 1

Post by Knut »

Likewise!
Message received.
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John Ruggero
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Re: Brahms Op. 119, No. 1

Post by John Ruggero »

I have attached an engraving of the Brahms intermezzo, which is in the style of a critical edition. There were three primary sources: the composer’s autograph (MS), a copy for the engraver with corrections by the composer (EC), and the first edition. The Breitkopf & Härtel Complete Works Edition was consulted, but no modern critical edition.

A straight forward engraving of this piece was not possible because of many errors in all three sources. For this reason, the three primary sources were given equal weight in making numerous editorial decisions.

Additions that appear in none of the primary sources appear in brackets. Additions from the MS are enclosed in parentheses. Corrections of the text are enumerated in a “critical report” that appears as a list of errata in this thread and which will be posted as a separate file at some point.

This engraving is a work-in-progress that will be edited in response to suggestions and errors reported.

Application: Finale 2014
Music Font: Maestro (<-accents: Engraver, G Clefs: Ruggero)
Text Font: Times New Roman
Text Expressions: Vortragbezeichnung by Wesselin Karaatanassov
Braces: settings by Wesselin Karaatanassov
The Line and Slur settings have been listed previously in two threads on this forum and reflect recommendations by Knut, OCTO and others members.

Errata continued:

m. 55 precautionary natural missing before the last 16th in the RH.
Attachments
Brahms op 119 no 1 Notatio 1D.pdf
(138.96 KiB) Downloaded 421 times
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Knut
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Re: Brahms Op. 119, No. 1

Post by Knut »

Congratulations, John!
You've created a beautiful score, and your editorial work is excellent.

I notice you haven't marked all editorial corrections. Particularly, slurs and accidentals are not marked consistently with either squared brackets or parenthesis. Although I understand your desire to want to mark the corrections in the score (after all it's standard practice in editorial editions), in this particular case, with with such a large amount of corrections, I find the markings somewhat distracting. This is especially true since two different bracket styles are used simultaneously. Because of this I'm contemplating not marking any corrections in my own score, or at least only using a single bracket style (probably parenthesis since they are the least obtrusive).

I find your margins pretty narrow. Is your page format Letter size? If so, you should be able to increase the side margins a bit without compromising spacing. The top and bottom margins should also be somewhat larger, in my opinion. The need for this is especially evident on p. 2.

As I commented in an earlier post, you should brake the cross beam to avoid obscuring the clef change in m. 33.

Your spacing is generally very good, but all 16th notes are a bit too close to the right barlines, and accidentals too far from the left barlines. The last two groups of 16th notes in the left hand of m. 60 are also spaced too tightly.

You should increase the with of your cross beams for a consistent look.

The openings of the opposing hairpins in mm. 33–34 look too wide to me.
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John Ruggero
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Re: Brahms Op. 119, No. 1

Post by John Ruggero »

Knut, thank you for your compliment, which means a lot to me, and for your very helpful suggestions.

As you said, it is probably best to avoid a lot of fussy brackets in the score, the "corrections" being enumerated in the "critical notes" (in this case, the errata lists) for those who want to delve into those matters. So the printed text is designed to reconcile all the differences behind the scenes without encumbering the score.

However, I thought it important in a critical edition, as opposed to a practical one, to show where I, the editor, have taken it upon myself to add material that is in none of the sources and is thus not absolutely certain, such as the hairpins in 10-11, 55-57 and the slurs in 24 and 32-33. (But I didn't concern myself with a minor editorial additions like precautionary accidentals.) I also thought it important to show markings that exist in the MS but do not appear in the EC or the first edition such as the hairpin in 14-15 and the supplementary dynamics in 39-40. And I thought it important to distinguish between these two types of additions, thus both brackets and parentheses. I considered dotted slurs, but that would have been a third layer.

I guess the problem is that this piece has an inordinate number of editorial errors and omissions, and that leaves 5 on the first page and 7 on the second to be bracketed or parenthesized. But in all honesty, I don't find them disruptive.

I think that you are absolutely right that the final notes of several measures push too hard against the barlines, and I will make that my first correction. I may have worked too hard to avoid crowding the interior of these measures. However, many editions of piano music that I just checked, seem to suffer from the same ailment: fast notes pushed against the bar lines. I also checked the measures against the measure tool note handles and the last notes are generally in the correct position, so my default settings must be off. As far as the accidentals, these are also just set to the Finale default. These are settings that I have never investigated, and it might be very helpful to have a discussion of this.

I totally agree with you about the side margins as well as the top and bottom margins on page 2. I normally engrave music for letter size printing, which requires 1/2 in. left and right margins and small top and bottom margins to get a normal amount of music on the page. In this case, however, I used a 9 in. x 12 in. page, with which I am inexperienced, and I left 1/2 inch side margins and continued on with my usual tolerance for tight top and bottom margins to give myself more breathing room. I clearly need to adopt consistent bottom margins, at least, if I am going to work on a larger size page. I will experiment with reducing both pages a little, possibly in combination with increasing the margins. If that doesn't work, I will increase the page size to the old Durand proportions. (Just kidding.)

Somehow, I missed your comment about the broken cross-beam. I am anxious to try it; it sounds like a great idea! And do you mean no narrowing at all for the cross-beams, or just less?

I also need to create a small F clef that will touch the top line. i was forced to use the Finale ones. But that will take time.

I purposely used very wide hairpins in M. 33-34 because of their appearance in the MS. I also did it to a lesser extent in 21-22. Brahms seems to use these markings very expressively in the MS. m. 33-34 is a very poignant moment and requires broad (= wide) feeling.

I am learning more and more about serious engraving through this exercise. Thanks so much for your help, Knut.
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Knut
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Re: Brahms Op. 119, No. 1

Post by Knut »

John Ruggero wrote:Knut, thank you for your compliment, which means a lot to me, and for your very helpful suggestions.

As you said, it is probably best to avoid a lot of fussy brackets in the score, the "corrections" being enumerated in the "critical notes" (in this case, the errata lists) for those who want to delve into those matters. So the printed text is designed to reconcile all the differences behind the scenes without encumbering the score.

However, I thought it important in a critical edition, as opposed to a practical one, to show where I, the editor, have taken it upon myself to add material that is in none of the sources and is thus not absolutely certain, such as the hairpins in 10-11, 55-57 and the slurs in 24 and 32-33. (But I didn't concern myself with a minor editorial additions like precautionary accidentals.) I also thought it important to show markings that exist in the MS but do not appear in the EC or the first edition such as the hairpin in 14-15 and the supplementary dynamics in 39-40. And I thought it important to distinguish between these two types of additions, thus both brackets and parentheses. I considered dotted slurs, but that would have been a third layer.
You're very welcome, John.

Aside from the cautionary accidentals, there are a few slurs that you've neglected to mark as well. Is this because you consider these editions to be too minor?

Also, distinguishing between the edits based on the sources from those of your own volition seems unnecessary to me, just as long as the basis for each edit is covered in the accompanying commentary.
John Ruggero wrote:I totally agree with you about the side margins as well as the top and bottom margins on page 2. I normally engrave music for letter size printing, which requires 1/2 in. left and right margins and small top and bottom margins to get a normal amount of music on the page. In this case, however, I used a 9 in. x 12 in. page, with which I am inexperienced, and I left 1/2 inch side margins and continued on with my usual tolerance for tight top and bottom margins to give myself more breathing room. I clearly need to adopt consistent bottom margins, at least, if I am going to work on a larger size page. I will experiment with reducing both pages a little, possibly in combination with increasing the margins. If that doesn't work, I will increase the page size to the old Durand proportions. (Just kidding.)
This brings up an important question if this piece is to be used for a scoring application comparison: Which page size should we choose? I've used A4 in my own engraving, simply because this is the size I'm most used to working with. 9x12 is a much better format for music, but will result in downscaling if printed on A4 paper.
John Ruggero wrote: And do you mean no narrowing at all for the cross-beams, or just less?
I mean no narrowing. All beams should appear to have the same width, which in Finale means that the width will need to be widened as the beam slope increases.
John Ruggero wrote:I purposely used very wide hairpins in M. 33-34 because of their appearance in the MS. I also did it to a lesser extent in 21-22. Brahms seems to use these markings very expressively in the MS. m. 33-34 is a very poignant moment and requires broad (= wide) feeling.
This is exclusively an aesthetic issue for me. Hairpin openings aren't meant to convey any particular amount of flux. Usually the engraver uses a limited maximum opening for cases where the available vertical space is not an issue. The opening can be decreased, however, to fit with more tightly spaced music, or if a hairpin is particularly short.

I can't say for sure, but I haven't found any evidence of an extraordinarily expressive use of hairpins in any of the Brahms 1st editions I've consulted. If this really was an aspect he was intent on conveying, I think such variations would be more evident in his publications. My guess is that their variation in his manuscripts is mainly a result of swift handwriting, and even if they were the result of more conscious efforts, there seems to be no tradition in music engraving of conveying them.

This is indeed a learning experience, particularly with regard to the edits in my case. Thank you for those.
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John Ruggero
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Re: Brahms Op. 119, No. 1

Post by John Ruggero »

Knut said:
Aside from the cautionary accidentals, there are a few slurs that you've neglected to mark as well. Is this because you consider these editions to be too minor?
I think that you may be referring to the slurs that accompany the pattern in measure 5 throughout the piece and also the missing slurs in the EC and first edition starting at measure 45. These constitute a special case, because they are so haphazard that they indicate a lack of care by all concerned rather than any possible preference on the part of the composer. In this case, we are simply doing what should have occurred in the first place and this does not need to be indicated to the player in the musical text. The critical report will be sufficient.

The slurs m. 29-20 and m 31-32 and the missing intensity marks are similar, yet not as clear-cut. I felt that their omission should be pointed out. I can understand the opposite view.

The slur in 24 is conjectural and this must be pointed out. The dynamic indications from the MS in 14-15 and 39-40 are informative and this also must be shown in some way.

This leaves the substitution of the MS piu PP for the EC piu P and the dashed lines in 65. In both cases, the composer's markings are so much more logical and informative to the player than what happens in the EC, that an arbitrary decision or error on the part of the copyist seems probable. However, I can understand indicating these as well, although I am less concerned about them and didn't do so to avoid encumbering the musical text. They also will be discussed in the critical report.

That was the reasoning behind my decisions. As you know, there are various ways of showing variants in critical editions: dynamic markings in smaller type, dynamic markings in a different font (New Mozart Edition), dashed slurs, footnotes etc. I will now investigate the various critical editions to see what would really be best in the case of this first offering from the Notatio New Brahms Edition!

As far as the hairpins, I was referring to the MS rather than the first edition. It is clear to me that the width of the hairpins varies with the degree of emphasis in the MS. All the strongest moments have the largest hairpins. How could they not? The composer is notating a deeply emotional swell by hand. Given the space, would the composer write narrow little hairpins? I think that this needs to be shown in some way, while staying within the bounds of what is reasonable and in good taste. M. 16 is another place where I opened the hairpin a little to show stronger emphasis. But I think that you are right that the hairpins in 33-34 are over the top, and I will correct that.

I believe that while all the traditions of music notation and engraving must always be taken into account, the expression of the composer's intent takes precedence and one the greatest things about computer engraving is our new ability to express things in engraving that have never been expressed before.

I would vote for 9 x 12 format, which is a standard and given the fact that our examples are virtual rather than printed. But maybe everyone should do their own thing?

The margins on music in 9 x12 format seems to vary from about 5/8 to 7/8 of an inch. It is not clear to me if the brace is taken into account. Finale disregards them. It is also unclear to me whether the R inside margin should be different from the L inside margin given the brace. In any case, I expanded my margins to 5/8 of an inch on both sides and applied a 2% reduction to the page. No overcrowding has resulted, and I will now start editing with your suggestions in mind.

To maintain independence, I am still withholding a viewing of your own engraving until I have finished this round of editing in spite of my great eagerness to see it.
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OCTO
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Re: Brahms Op. 119, No. 1

Post by OCTO »

John Ruggero wrote:I have attached an engraving of the Brahms intermezzo, which is in the style of a critical edition.
Beautifully done, John!
Your and Knut's edition is very close each other for my eyes...

Some thoughts:
1. I would like to avoid Maestro, particularly flags and rests.
2. Sizes and margines: somehow Knut's version is more "relaxed". There is plenty of room around and the size is a bit smaller, what makes sense for such dense music.

Overall, well done!!!
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John Ruggero
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Re: Brahms Op. 119, No. 1

Post by John Ruggero »

Thank for your compliment, OCTO, which I greatly appreciate! I will give your comments much thought as I have to Knut's, which have already helped me.
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