Review: [untitled]

Author(s): Bruce Gustafson

Source: Music & Letters, Vol. 74, No. 4 (Nov., 1993), pp. 648-650
Published by: Oxford University Press
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/737623 .
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awareness of what was going on musically during
this period away from the major centres of Rome
and Venice.
NOEL O REGAN
The Art of the Unmeasured Prelude for Harp-
sichord: France 1660-1720, 3 vols., ed. Colin
Tilney. (Schott, London &c., 1991, ?60. ISBN
0-946535-16-9.)
'A prelude is nothing more than a preparation
for playing the pieces in a certain key.' Writing in
1684, Nicolas Lebegue saw the unmeasured
prelude for harpsichord as neither profound nor
mystifying. He included preludes only in his 1677
book of suites and not in his second collection a
decade later. By the time Fran,cois Couperin
published preludes in 1716, he abandoned
unmeasured notation altogether because, he
observed, the art of realizing it was all but lost.
How surprised Lebegue would be to see the pre-
sent elaborate edition of 65 suiteless preludes,
with bilingual commentary (English and Ger-
man-no French!), and two or even three print-
ings of each prelude: a modern edition and a fac-
simile of at least one source. This comes as the
ninth publication in recent years devoted ex-
clusively to unmeasured preludes, including a
monograph (Paul Prevost, Le Prelude non
mesure pour clavecin, Baden-Baden & Boux-
willer, 1987). The unmeasured prelude is humble
no longer.
The repertory of French unmeasured preludes
for harpsichord begins with the second genera-
tion of composers of the surviving music, Cham-
bonnieres (b. 1601/2) having left none. The
genre flourished in the second half of the seven-
teenth century as a customary preface to suites as
well as as a pedagogical tool-a beginner's first
piece was an unmeasured prelude. More and
more frequently, preludes were only somewhat
unmeasured', and the genre was moribund by
about 1720. The artistic highpoint came at the
beginning. Some of the sixteen written by Louis
Couperin (1626-61) have no parallel, even among
d'Anglebert's four. Indeed, these are preludes in
name and notation only, since their musical
substance links them much more closely to
Froberger's toccatas than to the French prepara-
tions for playing real pieces. It is because of the
difficulty of discerning the complex ideas of Louis
Couperin's tocades that so much modern ink
has been spilt on the interpretation of the
unmeasured prelude in general, and Tilney is the
fourth editor to tackle those of Louis Couperin
648
in particular: Paul Brunold's edition of the com-
plete works (Monaco, 1936) was revised by
Thurston Dart (1959), and both editors' readings
of the preludes were largely discarded by Davitt
Moroney in his revision (1985). Tilney's under-
standing and presentation of the lines (tenues) are
essentially similar to Moroney's, but the two differ
greatly in details. Yet another version (my own)
has long been promised by Broude Brothers in a
modern edition of the Bauyn manuscript.
Virtually all the other preludes presented here
have also been edited previously, either in the
context of the complete works of the composers or
(for most of the anonymous preludes) in an ap-
pendix to Prevost's monograph. They are by
Lebegue (four, 1677), Jacquet de la Guerre (four,
1687), d'Anglebert (four, 1689), Clerambault
(two, 1702 (not 1704)), Louis Marchand (one,
1702), Le Roux (four, 1705), Rameau (one,
1706), Siret (one, 1719), anonymous (21, c.1680-
1742), La Barre (one, c.1686?), Forqueray
(one, c.1769?). (For 'convenience'-whose is
not clear-the last two are mixed in with the
anonyma.) Tilney does print three preludes from
a privately held manuscript for the first time.
Unfortunately, nine very interesting ones in a
manuscript in the Brussels Conservatoire Library
(MS 27220) came to light too late to receive more
than a sentence of explanation at the end of the
commentary. Tilney's 65 preludes represent
about three-quarters of the known examples.
The first volume consists of 117 pages of fac-
similes, all well reproduced. Each prelude is iden-
tified by modern number, source etc., and the
systems are numbered to co-ordinate with the
modern edition-where the original system-
breaks are also indicated-and critical ap-
paratus. Printing a whole volume of the relevant
facsimiles is certainly an extravagant policy, but
given the ambiguity of the notation it is a
welcome one, and having them bound separately
allows for easy comparison with the modern
edition.
The second volume presents the pieces in
modern transcription and is the strength of the
publication. Most of the preludes are, as Lebegue
suggested, relatively simple affairs and pose few
problems for the editor. Here, the advantage of
the Tilney edition is to have them immediately at
hand in a clear, reliable text. D'Angelbert's ex-
amples are much more elaborate and exist in
both autograph and printed sources, the first
unmeasured, the second semi-measured. The two
versions are printed conveniently on facing pages
to make comparison easy. Those by Louis
Couperin are long, completely unmeasured (dis-
counting the strictly notated middle sections of
the tripartite ones), and ensnared in a web of
lines ('ties', 'tenues', 'liaisons' or 'slurs'-even the
terminology for the lines is controversial) whose
precise function is often far from obvious to the
modern eye. Close examination of the two sources
of these pieces suggests that the meaning was
sometimes no clearer to the seventeenth-century
scribes. Harpsichordists will be eternally grateful
for the clarity and rationality of Tilney's deci-
sions. As in Moroney's edition, each line clearly
indicates the note that it affects, and the endings
of the lines are considerably less ambiguous. Play-
ing from these pages is a joy. The editorial deci-
sions are perceptive and present a coherent
picture of harmonic and melodic events. The text
is largely accurate, although some minor errors
have survived the proof-reading.
The third volume of the triptych is the com-
mentary, explaining the repertory in eight pages
and justifying the editorial decisions in twelve.
Notes and bibliography follow, and then the
whole English text is repeated in German. Most of
the brief commentary deals with Louis Couperin's
preludes because of their complexity. There is
musicianly common sense in the summary of the
literature and issues attendant upon it. Tilney
cogently explains the terminological arguments
regarding the tenues (as Moroney would have it),
settling wisely on the neutral 'lines', which he
subdivides as simple or complex. Other examples:
'Where scribes or engravers have understood the
music imperfectly or have simply been fanciful, a
decision has to be taken between offering an
unhelpful sort of faithful nonsense or making an
unverifiable departure from the original'. Or: 'It
is vital to be clear that the end of a line, whether
simple or complex, does not necessarily or even
very often, imply that the sound should stop ex-
actly there . . . In fact, the lines show minimum,
not maximum, duration and should ideally reveal
the link between one salient note and the next.
That being the case, lines in this edition have
sometimes been lengthened just enough to bridge
the critical gap.'
This is, then, one harpsichordist's understand-
ing of what might have been intended. Heretalso
is the weakness of the publication, however. If the
goal were to provide a text that performers are to
follow religiously, untroubled by the ambiguities
and uncertainties which are rife in the sources,
the facsimiles and commentary would be super-
fluous. But as the intention is clearly to
encourage harpsichordists to see the options in
order to make informed solutions, a modern text
that masks the issues completely is counter-
649
productive. A rigorous scholarly edition would be
in order, which the second volume really is not.
The lines that have been 'lengthened just enough
. . .' may in fact extend twenty or more notes
where the original covers two (e.g. No. 30, bar 1,
left-hand stave, note 1). In the instance cited,
the meaning of the original is obvious, but the
report of the editorial method is deceptive.
Ornaments have been added, inconsistently
albeit sparingly and in square brackets, intruding
on what is clearly the performer's business. One
shocking policy is that when lines are editorial
they are in no way so indicated on the music
pages. Only the performer who studies the critical
commentary will find out what is editorial and
what is from the source. A spot check revealed
that not all additions are reported.
The volume of facsimiles is inadequately ex-
plained in the commentary. More and more
players are reading directly from 'originals', but
all too often with no understanding of just what
the 'original' represents: how close is it to the
composer, what are the notational conventions,
etc.? Here Tilney slips into the unfortunate habit
of attributing things to the composer that more
likely derive from a scribe working 30 or more
years later; for example, 'In this case, Couperin
adds one of his rare vertical lines, perhaps as an
example of gesture that will serve for the rest of
the preludes; more frequently in the original, the
next left-hand note will be placed under the
previous lines, which delay its sounding until they
have run their course.' To be sure, there zs no
source closer to Couperin than those used here
(the Bauyn and Parville manuscripts), but the
reader is not made sufficiently aware of the
poverty of their texts, which is demonstrable by
reference to other repertories transmitted by the
same sources. In general, there is a tendency to
state interpretations or even intuitions as facts:
'Straight lines in Louis Couperin are of three
kinds . . . Multiple lines have both ends attached
to notes and imply that all harmonically relevant
notes should be held until the final note has been
played.' This does come from the section labelled
'Performance', but it is not as clear as it might
be that we are talking about the editor's intention
in placing the lines, not what Couperin did or
meant-which we do not know.
The bibliography is very complete. It does
reflect a regrettable gap between the principal
work on the edition and its appearance, a period
during which some relevant information became
available. One example suggests that substantive
work was completed before 1987: the important
manuscript in Brussels mentioned above is inven-
toried and discussed in Bruce Gustafson & David
Fuller, A Catalogue of French Harpsichord
Music, 1699-1780 (Oxford, 1990), pages 374-82,
which is listed in the bibliography but evidently
as an unconsulted insertion; Tilney's sentence
explaining the exclusion of the Brussels source
because of its late discovery cites an unpublished
1987 draft of my discussion. Most of the
eighteenth-century sources cited as 'not in Gustaf-
son' are in fact treated in this extension of the
seventeenth-century study that he cites, and one
(Paris, Bibliotheque Nationale, R6s. 2671) is in
the older study (inventory, No. 52) as well as the
newer one. This source and Bibliotheque Na-
tionale 40 y 1, which transmits the Forqueray
prelude, are considerably later than Tilney im-
agines: the former from after 1742 and the latter
from after 1769, though of course the composi-
tion of the preludes may have been earlier. Still,
what a shame to ignore the nine seventeenth-
century preludes that remain unedited and un-
discussed (Prevost was unaware of them), while
including two from well beyond the terminus an-
nounced in the title!
Musicological quibbling aside, this boxed set of
volumes is an important contribution to our
understanding of the musical sense and structure
of unmeasured preludes for harpsichord. It is a
brilliant master-class with Colin Tilney, a
knowledgeable, experienced and perceptive
harpsichordist. The publishers have generally
served the project well, with elegant engraving,
clear facsimiles and generous presentation of the
verbal matter. Lamentably, footnotes to the last
have been buried between the critical apparatus
and the bibliography. If they are worth printing,
which they are, why aren't they on the page to
which they apply?
BRUCEGUSTAFSON
Keyboard Transcriptionsfrom the Bach Circle,
ed. Russell Stinson. 'Recent Researches in the
Music of the Baroque Era', lxix. (A-R Edi-
tions, Madison, 1992, $47.95. ISBN 0-89579-
269-9.)
This edition contains five organ trios and nine
concerto transcriptions, one for organ and eight
for harpsichord. Three of the organ trios were
transcribed, perhaps by Johann Peter Kellner,
from the lost chamber work that Bach adapted to
form the two-flute sonata BWV 1039 and the
gamba sonata BWV 1027 (see Stinson's 'Three
Organ-Trio Transcriptions from the Bach
Circle', Bach Studies, ed. Don 0. Franklin, Cam-
bridge, 1989, pp. 125-59). To these Stinson has
650
added an organ-trio version of the Sinfonia in D
minor, BWV 790, made either by Kellner or by
his pupil Leonhard Frischmuth, and an organ
version of an otherwise unknown Locatelli piece,
owned and possibly transcribed by Johann
Nicolaus Mempell, who was clearly associated in
some way with Kellner.
The concerto transcriptions begin with
Vivaldi's Op. 3 No. 5, in a keyboard version prob-
ably made by Johann Adolph Scheibe during his
Leipzig years, that is, before his notorious
criticism of Bach of 1737 (see Stinson's 'The
"Critischer Musikus" as Keyboard Transcriber?
Scheibe, Bach and Vivaldi', Journal of
Musicological Research, ix (1990), 255-71). Two
Telemann concertos follow: a violin concerto in B
flat, of which a set of parts survives in Darmstadt,
transcribed for organ either by Johann Gottfried
Walther or by a pupil of his with remarkably
similar handwriting; and a harpsichord version in
G of a lost concerto, perhaps made by Johann
Benjamin Tzschirich, a Leipzig contemporary of
Bach's. Stinson's edition ends with a set of six
Tartini violin concertos, transcribed for harp-
sichord by Frischmuth and published in Amster-
dam, where he later resided, about 1760.
It is fitting that this edition should begin and
end with Kellner-circle transcriptions, for Russell
Stinson is well known among Bach scholars
for his valuable work on the Kellner Bach
manuscripts-the subject of his doctoral disserta-
tion at the University of Chicago, subsequently
published as The Bach Manuscripts of Johann
Peter Kellner and his Circle (Durham, NC, &
London, 1989; reviewed in Music & Letters,
lxxii (1991), 440-41); in addition, an article of
Stinson's entitled 'Ein Sammelband aus Johann
Peter Kellners Besitz: neue Forschungen zur
Berliner Handschrift P 804' appears in the 1992
issue of the Bach-Jahrbuch. However, it is worth
noting that over half the contents of the edition
under review arose from following up footnotes
to Hans-Joachim Schulze's essay on Bach's own
concerto transcriptions (BWV 592-6 & 972-87)
in his seminal Studien zur Bach-Uberlieferung
im 18. Jahrhundert (Leipzig & Dresden, 1984),
a book that has proved extraordinarily fertile in
generating new ideas from other scholars.
Stinson's edition will be welcomed as providing
valuable illustrations of the enduring appeal of
keyboard transcription, whether based on Ger-
man or Italian models, to German organists and
clavier players of the wider Bach circle. It will
also be welcomed as providing useful additions to
the repertory of modern organists and harp-
sichordists (only the fourth movement of the work