George Whitefield Chadwick

[eschiss1]

About a score for Chadwick's first symphony (Belatedly), I wonder if Faucett's book "George Whitefield Chadwick: His Symphonic Works (Composers of North America, No 19)" contains scores of the 3 symphonies or just analyses of them? It does contain the latter. I can't tell. I believe he's published new editions of his first three quartets and some works for orchestra (two of the overtures).

[Josh]

I'm about halfway through a biography on Chadwick that I just got last week, by Bill F. Faucett, and took a break from reading it tonight to look some stuff up online.  Looks like imslp now has Chadwick's Symphony #1 up!  It is, however, a scan of a very old version of the handwritten score.  On the dedication page, that may even be Chadwick's own handwriting!  Not sure.  At the end of the last page, there's what very much does look like his signature, though whether that's him signing a copyist's version to certify it, or whether this is the scan of the actual original, I don't know.  But I would love to know, I definitely would.  It would be really special were this a scan of his original, in my opinion.

Would be difficult - impossible in practical terms - to perform this symphony from this scanned version.  I've looked over it a bit, and even not knowing how to read an orchestral score, I can tell this needs to be put into a more clear version for performance.

Still, I was quite excited to see it, just looked it up on a whim and there it was!  Looks like it was uploaded to the site about 2 years after this thread petered out, in December of 2014.  I'm not sure whether it was gifted, or a charge was made by the NEC to copy it, and a generous individual donated the scan to IMSLP.  However it was done, I think this is fantastic in its own right, and potentially even more fantastic if it ever gets its day in front of recording equipment.  It's clear from this book that Faucett has examined the score and thinks it inferior to Chadwick's later 2 symphonies, but I'd sure love to hear it.

Sorry to dredge up such an old thread, but I was really excited about this accidental "discovery" and wanted to share it.  Also sorry if it was already mentioned in a more recent thread, but I didn't find anything when I looked to make sure before posting here.

[Alan Howe]

Here's a link to the score at IMSLP:
http://imslp.org/wiki/Symphony_No.1%2C_Op.5_(Chadwick%2C_George_Whitefield)

[eschiss1]

and it's true it was digitized @ NEC only a few months (July 2014) before it was uploaded to IMSLP (December 2014), but I don't know if it was a special request or if the IMSLP uploader just noticed that it was available at the NEC website...

I have made the "scanned by" link (@ IMSLP, Symphony No.1 Chadwick) more specific so that it points to the workpage @ NEC and not just to their main page.

[dhibbard]

its worth a shot with Klaus at Naxos... however, as you know, most of the Chadwick was brought over from Delos from prior recordings, after Delos got into financial trouble.   That score is pretty rough.  Would be nice if it was published.

[eschiss1]

And typeset parts created, true.

[Gareth Vaughan]

Though doubtless its original performance was given with the MS parts at NEC. And very possibly using this Full Score, which looks pretty neat to me compared with some I've seen.

[eschiss1]

It was premiered Feb. 23 1882 it seems by the Harvard Musical Association and composed 1877-81. Faucett's "George Whitefield Chadwick: His Symphonic Works" contains an analysis (part of which can be seen in Google Preview) of the first symphony, and a quote from the one contemporary review it received, @ Chapter 3 of Faucett's book (starting page 8.)

[semloh]

It's fascinating to follow this thread, initiated 7 years ago. The expertise, and tenacity, we have here at UC is amazing! 

[dhibbard]

"It was premiered Feb. 23 1882 it seems by the Harvard Musical Association....   "

makes me wonder if the parts are still surviving...probably was all handwritten out by Mr Chadwick.  Wonder if Sibley or Fleisher has any of the scores or parts??

[MartinH]

The parts aren't on the Fleisher site. But I have a friend who graduated from NEC back in the 70's and he swears that every now and then the NEC Orchestra would play the First Symphony out of respect and honor to Chadwick. If so, they have parts. Would love to hear it.

[Gareth Vaughan]

Though doubtless its original performance was given with the MS parts at NEC

I refer to my post above. As I stated, the MS parts are at NEC.

[dhibbard]

makes me wonder if parts of the symphony were used in other published pieces??   not unusual for composers to write music and then recycle fragments into other works or even take a movement out of a symphony and rename it a symphonic poem.

[Alan Howe]

...evidence?

[eschiss1]

For which part? "Night Flight" is just one example of the latter (2nd movement, Barber 2nd Symphony. And in this context remit is kind of irrelevant (unless one insists on examples within a sample set . Opposite example: Todtenfeier —> Mahler 2 ; unnamed movement —> finale of Rubbra 1... planned mvt from Mahler 3 ending up in 4...