Moór, Westminster Library & Sym.3

[Reverie]

A couple of months ago I was down in London visiting my daughter and took the time to visit Westminster Library. It's one of those places you'd never notice if you weren't actually looking for it. It's just slightly away from the mayhem of Leicester Square.

I was following in the footsteps of Mr Gareth Vaughan, a poster on this site. (I hope he reads this!) He, like myself was on a quest for music by one Emmanuel Moor. I think Mr Vaughan made his visit about 12 years or so ago. He made reference to finding symphonic scores in a basement.

I had contacted the library prior to my visit only to be told the Moor Archive was now housed in a separate building, off site. They could bring me only a few items - the librarian suggested symphonies 3, 5 & 8. Number 7 was in the main catalogue.

No 3 in D minor had the published score (conductors score) 

No 5 in A minor was handwritten with crossing outs/additions etc..

No 7 in C was just the orchestral parts but to my annoyance MINUS the 1st violin part.

No 8 in A minor was the full score and handwritten.

I managed to take more than a few photos. A large memory stick came in handy.

I still haven't had time to look over a lot of the music but No 3 in D minor has occupied me initially as has No 6 in E minor which is on IMSLP.

For those wishing to hear some orchestral music from this very much neglected composer I offer you a few extracts from the 3rd Symphony.

EDIT: (See post below for full symphony)

1. Allegro poco agitato
2. Andante sostenuto
3. Scherzo - molto allegro
4. Maestoso - allegro

[eschiss1]

Unfortunately some libraries list the Kossuth symphony published by Simrock in 1895 as "Op.67" (the 7th symphony published by Siegel in 1906) still rather than as WoO 153, though afaik they only have key (and symphony-ness, and maybe number of movements, and stuff) in common. Hopefully the no.7 in the main catalogue -is- actually no.7, and if so, it's rather a rare ducky. The Szechenyi library doesn't seem to have much by Moór, that I can tell, for instance...

[Reverie]

And here is the complete Symphony No.3:

LINK:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SPIt-5sTQ-Q

[Alan Howe]

A quick recap on the symphonies might be in order:

No.1 in E minor, no opus no. (1893) - MS
No.2 in C major 'In Memoriam Ludwig Kossuth', no opus no. (1895) - Simrock
No.3 in D minor, Op.44B (1895) - pub. Rozsavölgyi
No.4 in B flat, no opus no. (1898) - Schmid
No.5 in A minor, Op.53B (1901) - unpub.
No.6 in E minor, Op.65 (1906) - pub. Siegel
No.7 in C major, Op.67 (1906) - pub. Siegel
Pensées Symphoniques, Op.75 (1908) - pub. Mathot
No.8 in A minor, Op.92 (1910) - unpub.

Please could friends check that this listing which I posted a while back is still accurate? Corrections/additions welcome!

[tpaloj]

What a powerful and ingenious symphony. It sounds like you had a fantastic trip in the archives as well. Thank you as ever for your tireless work Martin, this rendition sounds great!

If the published full score to the 7th can be found, it would be easy to extract and create a new 1st violin part to replace the missing one for the set.

Alan, thank you for the list. Do you also have info which of Moór's symphonies have so far been recorded?

[Ilja]

Tuomas, To my knowledge only the 2nd "Kossuth" C major symphony has so far been recorded, but never commercially released. It's in the Downloads board and on YouTube, though.

[eschiss1]

Did they have a list of other Moòr works in their archives that were not symphonies, btw?

[Alan Howe]

There are no commercial recordings of the symphonies - that I'm aware of, that is.

[Alan Howe]

By the way, back in November 2019 Mark Thomas sleuthed out these details about the recording of Symphony No.2:

<<I think the recording is of a performance on 31 October 2011 at the Béla Bartók National Concert Hall in Budapest: the Budapest Philharmonic Society Orchestra conducted by János Kovács.>>

Here's the link I found:
https://www.jegy.hu/program/budapesti-filharmoniai-tarsasag-zenekara-30169#programInfoTabAnchor
And this is a Google translation of the text concerning Symphony No.2...

<<Emánuel Moór dedicated the third of his eight symphonies, completed in 1895, to the memory of Kossuth. Its performance is one of the most significant concert hall events in Hungary in recent years, a true symphonic discovery.>>

...which is odd, because it's described as his 3rd symphony (in Hungarian: harmadikat = third)! So is this an error or is there confusion as to the exact order in which Nos. 2 and 3 were composed (both evidently date from 1895)?

[Gareth Vaughan]

Eric, you can find a list of available scores here: https://elibrary.westminster.gov.uk/client/en_GB/wcc/search/advanced?

However, I visited the archive when it was housed (untidily) in the basement of the Westminster Music Library and I know for a fact that there is more material than is currently listed.

[Gareth Vaughan]

Incidentally, when I visited the Moor Archive it was housed in the basement of the Victoria Library (160 Buckingham Palace Rd, London SW1W 9TR - near Victoria Coach Station) and for all I know may still be there. Perhaps that was what they meant by stating it was housed "off site", because Westminster Reference Library itself is in St Martin's Street, as Reverie correctly says, just off Leicester Square.

[Ilja]

[...]

<<Emánuel Moór dedicated the third of his eight symphonies, completed in 1895, to the memory of Kossuth. Its performance is one of the most significant concert hall events in Hungary in recent years, a true symphonic discovery.>>

...which is odd, because it's described as his 3rd symphony (in Hungarian: harmadikat = third)! So is this an error or is there confusion as to the exact order in which Nos. 2 and 3 were composed (both evidently date from 1895)?

Might this be due to the order in which they were premiered? From Martin's video and the IMSLP score of the C Major "Kossuth" symphony I can see that the composer numbered neither (which was admittedly also not usual at the time).

[eschiss1]

Not -that- unusual to not number some of their symphonies in 1895, less usual to number some and not others and implicitly include the unnumbered ones in the sequence (even if the numbering of no.4 doesn't tell you which of the preceding 2 is 2 or 3; Shostakovich (in the 1920s) not officially calling his To October a symphony until decades later but numbering his next symphony 3 rather than 2 is a weirder case, eg)

[eschiss1]

GV- thanks!

[eschiss1]

Ooh, and Winchester has digitized material of some composers.
Must look into when not at work later. Yay and thanks again!