Unsung Composers

The Music => Composers & Music => Topic started by: giles.enders on Wednesday 16 March 2011, 13:00

Title: Ingeborg Starck 1840-1913
Post by: giles.enders on Wednesday 16 March 2011, 13:00
Does anyone know if the score of Ingeborg Starck's piano concerto in F sharp minor is still extant?
Title: Re: Ingeborg Starck 1840-1913
Post by: jimmattt on Wednesday 16 March 2011, 17:22
I think Bo at Sterling Records is looking for it, maybe he has had some luck, seems you are in contact with him? An orchestral march by her was apparently published by a Berlin publisher Bote & Bock, maybe it was published by them, too, and that is the full extent of my knowledge, don't know if the company even exists anymore. I hope the concerto is extant and can be revived. Is there a big library cache of her husband's work or papers?
Title: Re: Ingeborg Starck 1840-1913
Post by: Gareth Vaughan on Wednesday 16 March 2011, 20:37
Bote and Bock are certainly still in business, but I don't think they list anything by Ingeborg von Bronsart - though. of course, there may be stuff in their archives I (if they can be bothered to look).
Title: Re: Ingeborg Starck 1840-1913
Post by: eschiss1 on Thursday 17 March 2011, 05:03
hrm.

There is some material here and there that might (... or might not.) be useful, don't know.

Apparently Bronsart/Starck's name appears significantly in the Sylvia Glickman; Martha Furman Schleifer book Women composers : music through the ages. Volume 7, Composers born 1800-1899 : vocal music from 2003.  Focuses on vocal music, but may for all I know touch on other archival matters too.

The Musik-Akademie der Stadt Basel does have a work by Ingeborg Bronsart in their library (4 piano works published by Schott in 1874). (By 1899 she was still composing and had reached opus 23, according to hofmeister.rhul.ac.uk transcriptions, btw. How many of these works survive anywhere is, I agree, a good question. An opera on Jery und Bately - same subject as had occupied or amused Rietz for his Singspiel - was written around 1873 or so (de-wikipedia lists 3 others too, and opus no.s up to 25; and I see they list the piano concerto as lost, which is not a hopeful sign, though of course not a conclusive one. they give the key as F minor, btw, though it's hard to say, if the work is wholly lost- is the solo part or piano reduction or something still extant at least? Or is the key, as with some works, based on contemporary accounts- in which case I'd put a (?) next to it when even very musical people could often and still do often get a new work's key wrong by a factor of a major or minor third especially or by minor/major... - and let's leave alone listings in places like Hofmeister, where the sheer number of listings makes it most forgiveable of course...)
Title: Re: Ingeborg Starck 1840-1913
Post by: eschiss1 on Thursday 17 March 2011, 05:09
actually, one work of hers at least certainly still exists, and has been scanned in by BSB :)
Title: Re: Ingeborg Starck 1840-1913
Post by: giles.enders on Thursday 17 March 2011, 13:25
It was me who suggested finding the Ingeborg Starck concerto to Sterling.  I thought it would be an ideal coupling with Bronsart
Title: Re: Ingeborg Starck 1840-1913
Post by: Francis Pott on Friday 06 May 2011, 21:36
I must admit I'd wondered before now whether the Piano Concerto in F# minor ascribed to Bronsart himself could actually have been the one also attributed to his wife - even though the published score and the old Michael Ponti Vox/Turnabout recording both say that actually she was the dedicatee of his. By the way, I have an ancient full score of it somewhere (too buried to unearth at the moment) and I have a feeling that it refers to him as 'Hans Bronsart von Schellendorf' rather than the less plausible 'Hans von Bronsart'. I do also have a score of a Capriccio alla Tarantella for piano solo by Ingeborg, - yet again in F# minor (this key really seems to have got them going - though I also have a B flat minor Polonaise by him). The New Grove Dictionary of Women Composers (MacMillan, 1994/5/6) also goes for 'Hans Bronsart von Schellendorf' in its biog. of Ingeborg, and for her lists a substantial output, including her Concerto, which it dates as pre-1863. Nobody seems to know exactly when his Concerto was written, although Hans von Bulow seems to have been playing it in the late 1870s... I still have this nagging suspicion that he could have put his name to hers just to get it published (shades of Mendelssohn and Fanny Hensel with one or two 'Songs without Words' - not to mention their title supposedly being her idea too).

Am I cooking up a mystery for no good reason? I don't know much about them but 'his' Concerto on Vox is a lot of fun and agreeably coupled with the 2nd Concerto of d'Albert. I'd be interested to hear from someone more authoritative on this.
Title: Re: Ingeborg Starck 1840-1913
Post by: masterclassicalmusic on Saturday 07 May 2011, 03:58
des anyone have her recording?
Title: Re: Ingeborg Starck 1840-1913
Post by: giles.enders on Tuesday 10 May 2011, 11:09
Ingeborg Stark's piano concerto was written circa 1862.  I do have notes somewhere on where it was written, which would give a clue to precisely when.  I'm not at home for a while so that will have to wait.  The key was F sharp minor .  Bronsart's piano concerto written in 1873 is in the same key.  There is an entry in New Grove which suggests that Bronsart wrote two piano concertos, which I assume is a mistake.  I would like to know who wrote that entry and what their source was.
Title: Re: Ingeborg Starck 1840-1913
Post by: Gareth Vaughan on Tuesday 10 May 2011, 11:16
There is an entry in New Grove which suggests that Bronsart wrote two piano concertos, which I assume is a mistake.
It is, indeed, a mistake. One which I have already pointed out to Grove. Another egregious error in (I think) the same edition is that Felix Dreyschock was Alexander Dreyschock's son! Alexander didn't have a son - Felix was his nephew.
Title: Re: Ingeborg Starck 1840-1913
Post by: reineckeforever on Saturday 20 August 2011, 17:38
an other source about the PC 2 by hans Bronsart von Schellendorf is an italian Book:
Il Concerto per Pianoforte e Orchestra by the italian pianist and musicologist Piero Rattalino. I'm spending my holydays but can give better informations when I'll come back to home.
Rattalino talks about a Second Piano concerto, Wagnerian in style...I think i can do something for contact him.
Bye, Andrea
Title: Re: Ingeborg Starck 1840-1913
Post by: JohnBL on Thursday 08 September 2011, 18:27
I don't know anything about the Starck Concerto but have long enjoyed and treasured theBronsart/d'Albert Ponti recording and looking out for recordings of anything else by Bronsart.  Maybe he was a one-hit wonder but if he wrote anything else of comparable quality I would certainly love to hear it!
Title: Re: Ingeborg Starck 1840-1913
Post by: britishcomposer on Thursday 08 September 2011, 18:33
How about Bronsart's early Piano Trio op. 1? I think it very fine.
Title: Re: Ingeborg Starck 1840-1913
Post by: jerfilm on Thursday 08 September 2011, 19:46
Is there a recording somewhere of the Piano Trio??

Jerry
Title: Re: Ingeborg Starck 1840-1913
Post by: Mark Thomas on Thursday 08 September 2011, 22:00
I have one from an LP and, if no one else pips me to the post, I'll happily upload it in a few days when I return from a short trip away. The Trio is indeed a very fine piece.
Title: Re: Ingeborg Starck 1840-1913
Post by: eschiss1 on Sunday 16 October 2011, 06:17
BTW LoC (yes, I know I am harping on them- apologies truly) while not seeming to have her piano concerto has material, I hope substantial material and need I know to check, for quite a few of her operas. This also intrigues (well, me) despite the considerable difficulties.