Two Editions of Ravel's Piano Trio

Abstract

Maurice Ravel. Trio pour piano, violon et violoncelle. Edite par = Edited by = Herausgegeben von Juliette Appold. Kassel: Barenreiter, 2009. [Introd. Ger., Eng., Fre., p. iii-xx; score, p. 1-42 and 2 parts (violon and violoncelle); appendix, p. 43-44; plates, p. 45-46; crit. commentary, p. 47-52. ISMN 979-0-006-53819-5; pub. no. BA 9418. [euro]27.95.] Maurice Ravel. Klaviertrio = Piano Trio. Herausgegeben von = Edited by Peter Jost. Fingersatz der Klavierstimme von = Fingering of piano part by Pascal Roge. Munich: G. Henle, 2012. [Preface Ger., Eng., Fre., p. iii-vii; analytical note by Maurice Ger., Eng., Fre., p. viii-ix; score, p. 1-45 and.2 parts (violin and violoncello); Bemerkungen = Comments, p. 46-53; Ubersetzung der Vortrags- und Tempobezeichnungen = Translation of Expression and Tempo Marks, p. 54. ISMN 979-0-20180972-4; pub. no. HN 972. [euro]25.1 In the early 1990s, when works briefly emerged from copyright, the first critical editions of his piano music (from Edition Peters.) opened with a brief discussion by their editor, Roger Nichols, of the delicate relationship between manuscripts and editions. Nichols's first two paragraphs end respectively: apparently laudable desire to go back to what the composer originally wrote needs therefore to be tempered with a certain amount of common sense. and in the course of conversations with a number of composers of our own time, I am given overwhelmingly to understand that they would actually be angry if future editors ignored their carefully prepared printed scores and went hack automatically to their original autographs for a so-called true reading (Roger Nichols, Ravel's Piano Music--A New Edition, Maurice Ravel, Gaspard de la nail [London: Edition Peters, 19911, 3). This general philosophy has long informed critical editing, to the point that the term urtext (original text) has tacitly come to encompass the composer's Fassung letzter Hand. The recent reemergence of music from a further stint copyright has now prompted editions of his Piano Trio from Barenreiter and Henle, both of which favor manuscript fair copy of 1914 over the first edition of 1915. Completed September 1914 St-Jean-de-Luz, the manuscript. shows notable variants from the first edition (published 1w Durand June 1915, several months after the work's concert premiere on 28 January), particularly the Pantoum second movement where it presents some different instrumental textures and one less measure on its last page. As this was the manuscript submitted by to his publisher Durand, the first edition's variants evidently result from intermediate emendation. Henle's and Barenreiter's editors explain their decision as having been prompted by one reported document and a pair of published ones: a set of instructions now lost. drawn up by as he was preparing to enlist the armed services early autumn 1914, reportedly containing details of exactly how to print his newly completed Trio the event of his unavailability or demise; and the memoirs of friend Alfredo Casella (i he pianist at the Trio's premiere), who recalled, decades later, that entrusted me with the correction of the proofs, as he himself was at war (as quoted the Henle edition, p. v; original Alfredo Casella: Gli anni di Parigi: Dai documenti, ed. Roberto Calabretto [Florence: Leo S. Olschki, 1997], 87). The Barenreiter edition quotes a slightly variant memoir: Ravel was very grateful to me [for the Trio's first performance] and wished me to correct the proofs of the work (p. ix; cited from Music My Time: The Memoirs of Alfredo Casella, trans. and ed. Spencer Norton [Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1955], 122). On that basis, both editions conclude that the first edition's variants from the autograph manuscript cannot reliably be regarded as authentic. The obvious implication is noted the Barenreiter introduction: Whether Casella ultimately adhered to notes correcting the proofs or made changes of his own can no longer be determined today (pp. …