Théodore Thurner (1833-1907) Piano Concerto missing/duplicated pages

[eschiss1]

A review I've located of a performance of Thurner's concerto stipulates that the dedicatee was Etienne Martin. Hrm. My mistake. Looking at the article, it's a review of Thurner's musical output. Translating a bit: "The first concerto, in G minor, was performed for the first time by Thurner in 1872..."

[eschiss1]

Ah, it's the same Vincens article, just found over Google Books instead.

[Darrel Hoffman]

Oooh, I adore pieces that have the brass go "pavillion(s) en l'air". (p.83 of the Thurner ,  also happens toward the end of the first movement development of Nicolai Myaskovsky's symphony no.11 in B-flat minor.)

I was curious as to what that phrase even meant and how to properly interpret it.  The fact that it's accompanied by an "fff" pretty much did the trick I think.  Thurner was evidently not shy about using the far ends of the dynamic range - there were a lot more "fff"s and "ppp"s than I'm used to seeing in a score, often very close together.  One of the things that made interpreting this piece a bit more challenging than some I've done.

[Darrel Hoffman]

There is a lecture (in French) about his life and work by one Charles Vincens from 1906 in 'Mémoires de l'Académie des sciences, belles-lettres et arts de Marseille' that can be accessed via Gallica at the French National Library.

Any chance that article has been digitized anywhere?  I can sort of read French, but not well, and the text on that page is not selectable so I can't translate it.  I usually include a link to a bio article on my videos, generally Wikipedia since that's easiest, but this guy doesn't have an wiki page in any language as far as I can tell.

[Wheesht]

Well, you could try the button on the right for downloading/printing and then use OCR to make the text selectable.

[Darrel Hoffman]

Hmm, I suppose, though I'd have to find some OCR software, preferably one equipped with a French dictionary, as the good ones don't just read the letters, but use a dictionary to resolve any questionable scans. 

Problem is, even if I did that, then only I would have it.  I'd like something I could link from the video page so that others can read it.  Maybe I'll just link directly to the the Gallica page and let the viewers decide if they want to go to the trouble.  I know there are at least a few native French speakers in my audience.

[eschiss1]

You can also try the same from the Google link I mentioned, which may provide the link in more formats than Gallica, though its Epub/OCR download is not wonderful (or maybe I'm thinking about the Archive.org mirrors of some Google books.)

[Darrel Hoffman]

Hmm, the PDF download worked, the Epub version was unreadable.  (As in the file was corrupted, not that it was illegible.)  You'd still have to copy/paste the text into Google Translate or equivalent if you want it in something other than French, as the browser doesn't offer translation directly from a PDF.  (At least mine doesn't.)  I'll update to use that link, with instructions for those who wish to translate to their language of choice (I assume that's not always English.)

[eschiss1]

If I have time later this year I can at least try transcribing the French directly and even perhaps testing my decades-old French to translate it. (As it is I should be doing other things- But I'll be done with those later this month.)

[Darrel Hoffman]

If you want, but I don't really need it.  I can translate it myself from the PDF, and I'm in a similar boat regarding decades-old French.  I just wanted something I could link people to from the video description.

Ideally, somebody should write a wiki article, in English or French or whatever (I often use other language wikis when an English one isn't available).  That lecture would be a good source to cite for it.

But it's not a rush or anything.  I've linked the article in the description, both the Gallica and Google Books versions, so anyone who wants to know more can do their own research.

Myself, I might like to know if his first 2 concertos can be found, or any later ones if they exist, but beyond that, I've got other composers to work on.

[eschiss1]

Have you found the orchestral parts to any of Emile Prudent's concertos, say?

[Darrel Hoffman]

I in fact posted my rendition of Prudent's first concerto just a month ago:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OTeGqIx88As
(Trying to figure out if you knew that already?  Some people use different nicknames on YouTube than here.)

I could not find orchestral parts for his second, just a solo reduction.  I was not aware there were more than two but I haven't looked that deeply into it.

For the most part I just use what I can find on IMSLP.  Most of the other sources I've looked at have a very small niche selection available, or they're hiding behind pay-walls, or they're loan libraries that probably only deal with actual orchestras (I prefer digital to paper copies anyhow as I need to make lots of notes as part of my process and you can't really do that with loaned manuscripts.)

[eschiss1]

I forgot to check, sorry!! I guess there's Opp.34 and 48, and a morceau de concert Op.67, and there might be other works with orchestra besides. All BNF lists for any of them, I think, is the piano parts, though there might be orchestral parts elsewhere.

[Darrel Hoffman]

Ah, just a coincidence that you mentioned something I did very recently then.  I had a brief conversation with someone about not being able to find the parts for the 2nd concerto, wasn't sure if you were the same person or not.  But the full parts are available on IMSLP for the Op.34 at least, which is what I used:
https://imslp.org/wiki/Concerto-symphonie%2C_Op.34_(Prudent%2C_%C3%89mile).

Just the solo part for the Opp.48 and 67.