A new Frescobaldi edition

Abstract

The publication of a new edition of Frescobaldi's keyboard works by Bärenreiter, to replace their 1956 series edited by Pierre Pidoux, is a very welcome addition to the limited number currently available. Edited by Christopher Stembridge in collaboration with Kenneth Gilbert, and presented under the Bärenreiter Urtext banner, these volumes are not cheap, but are still probably more accessible to the average performer than the monumental complete edition published by Suvini Zerboni and edited by Etienne Darbellay (Milan, 1975–). At present, the first two volumes in the series are available. Volume I.1 contains a substantial preface, plus the 1615 Recercari et canzoni franzese, while Volume I.2 contains the Toccate e partite … libro primo, also originally from 1615. As with the 1956 series, Bärenreiter has opted for a landscape (oblong) format. This would suggest that organists are the target audience, but given that the first book of toccatas and partitas are more likely to be played by harpsichordists, an open copy is a little awkward for the average music desk on a harpsichord. However, in both volumes page turns are practical, placed in such a way that they are within a couple of notes of a cadence in each toccata, and at the end of sections in the partitas, and in places where there are rests in at least one part in the contrapuntal works. The type is clear and of an appropriate size to be read at an organ; each page has between three and five systems per page, depending on the placement of the page turn. These are practical volumes that could be taken off the shelf by a keyboardist and put to immediate use. However, for those who want more information there is a wealth of it.