Unsung Composer Opportunity

[MartinH]

Hello all. Sometimes I pick up a baton and conduct orchestras - most recently four performances of The Nutcracker for a ballet company. I've been asked to conduct an overture or something to open a concert in Scottsdale this coming September. I've already warned the manager that I will not be doing anything by Beethoven, Mozart, Dvorak, Brahms, etc. He knows my attraction to the obscure and forgotten composers. Some of the things I've considered:

Raff - overture to Die Parole
Klughardt - Concert Overture op 45

and most interestingly...

Draeseke Academic Festival Overture.

All three are online at IMSLP, although it will mean either reconstructing parts or a score. This is not a problem as my Finale skills are good.  I have recordings of the first two, but know nothing about the Draeseke, and given the enthusiasm for him on this site, this might be a good choice, especially since the orchestration matches exactly what the maximum forces for the concert will be. Does anyone know anything about this alternative Academic Festival Overture? Has anyone heard it? Is it worth pursuing? Or any other recommendations? The orchestration cannot exceed winds in pairs, 4 horns, 2 trumpets, 3 trombones, 1 tuba, 2 percussion, timpani and the usual strings. I'm looking forward to reviving more obscure music in the desert!

[FBerwald]

Bravo MartinH!

[matesic]

Purely out of curiosity I've been trying to cobble the Draeseke overture together (the string parts at least) in Audacity and experiencing some difficulties. There's no evidence that these parts from IMSLP have ever been corrected or even played, and the first desk of cellos have an extra page of music as compared with the rest of the band! Another problem (that would be much easier to solve if we had access to the score) is the mixture of simultaneous time signatures - for example 2/4 against 3/4 and 9/4 against 6/2 - with no indication as to what the beat should be. Good luck Martin! My initial impression is that the piece (of course using some of the same tunes as Brahms) could be worth the effort.

[MartinH]

I've been looking at the parts carefully, and there surely are a lot of inconsistencies and issues to resolve. Too bad the score, even in manuscript, isn't on IMSLP. And I've read much better hand manuscript from copyists!

[Gareth Vaughan]

The rehearsal numbers don't seem to make sense in the cellos, for a start.

[eschiss1]

The same fellow seems to be responsible for much of the Draeseke editing and uploading nowadays, IMSLP user Paternostergäßler...

[matesic]

I see that today cypressdome has kindly uploaded higher definition colour scans of the wind parts plus percussion and violin I to IMSLP. I suspect the rest will soon follow. That certainly improves the readability, and it also helps to have the rehearsal numbers clearly marked in blue. I don't see any reason why these parts shouldn't be used in performance, although Martin will still probably want to create himself a score.

[matesic]

The lower string parts have indeed followed on IMSLP - multiple copies of each which should at least help identify any transcription mistakes. The second part of the cellos appears to have been amended in a different hand, correcting the first part in which the section between rehearsal marks 32 and 35 has been transcribed twice. The copyist was probably working late into the night...

[Gareth Vaughan]

Yes. This seems to be coming along nicely now.

[MartinH]

Wow! Those color parts make a huge difference in readability. Going ahead with this seems much more possible. I wonder why the sudden appearance? Who knows, if I wait long enough maybe a score will appear!

[Mark Thomas]

Well, the scans seem to have originated in a German libarary. In my recent experience of requesting scans from several German libraries of both Raff's published scores and manuscripts, once my copy had been scanned and delivered (and paid for!), the library rapidly made it freely available in its collection of digital resources. So my guess is that someone is either researching Draeseke's music, or is looking to publsh the partitur and parts themselves.

[MartinH]

...and then charge an arm and a leg for the score, parts, rental...

[cypressdome]

Back in 2012 I assisted IMSLP user Paternostergäßler with creating and posting black and white versions of the vocal score and full score (overture only) to Gudrun.  At that time he informed me that he or the Internationale Draeseke Gesellschaft had ordered scans of many of the Draeseke manuscripts in the collection of the Sächsische Landesbibliothek – Staats- und Universitätsbibliothek Dresden (SLUB).  When SLUB made them available online in 2012 I transferred them to IMSLP.  More were posted in 2013 and if I recall correctly SLUB had a web page presentation on Draeseke (it being the centenary of his death) at that time which may have led to SLUB scanning more of his manuscripts.  Anyway, the image files for his Academische Festouvertüre have been on my computer since March of 2012 so I would think that Paternostergäßler/Internationale Draeseke Gesellschaft must have ordered the scans.  When I saw that someone was interested in typesetting it I figured I would upload the over 400mb of color images as they would be far easier to decipher than the black and white version.  It may be worthwhile to contact Paternostergäßler to see if a full score exists of it (SLUB doesn't appear to have one) and if the IDG has created a modern typeset of the overture.  On several of Draeseke's work pages at IMSLP he lists a contact email address of Noten.PNG@AOL.com.

[MartinH]

Thank you very much for that information. I will make contact soon.

[eschiss1]

Re Gudrun,  ÖNB (Austrian National Library) does have a copy of the Kistner vocal score (231 pp. Not digitized, at least as yet, but they do have it.) Ah. The full 375-page _partitur_ of the opera is indeed at SLUB it seems? though again undigitized. (Oh. That may be a manuscript full score.)

Oh, wait, you were referring to the festival overture, blast, I got confused will check again...