Vaughan Williams Tuba Concerto

[Rick Denney]

Joe, why don't you create a list of "pen and ink" edits to the published version, by measure number. People would still have to buy a copy before they could make use of them. That would not be a copyright violation in any form.

Stuff like: "the first three 16th notes of beat X in measure Y should be slurred."

Rick "noting the avoidance of the fair use question because it doesn't 'use' anything" Denney

[Homerun]

Joe, why don't you create a list of "pen and ink" edits to the published version, by measure number. People would still have to buy a copy before they could make use of them. That would not be a copyright violation in any form.

Stuff like: "the first three 16th notes of beat X in measure Y should be slurred."

Rick "noting the avoidance of the fair use question because it doesn't 'use' anything" Denney

1/ It would nearly be a book, as far as all of the "words" are concerned. (Page one is not only the shortest, but the easiest to fix - as well as the easiest to verbally describe.)

2/ I already have all of the corrections for my own use, and others don't seem particularly interested in them.

I am very interested.

[Rick Denney]

Joe, why don't you create a list of "pen and ink" edits to the published version, by measure number. People would still have to buy a copy before they could make use of them. That would not be a copyright violation in any form.

Stuff like: "the first three 16th notes of beat X in measure Y should be slurred."

Rick "noting the avoidance of the fair use question because it doesn't 'use' anything" Denney

1/ It would nearly be a book, as far as all of the "words" are concerned. (Page one is not only the shortest, but the easiest to fix - as well as the easiest to verbally describe.)

2/ I already have all of the corrections for my own use, and others don't seem particularly interested in them.

Well, you are just fishing for begging. You know others are interested--they have expressed that interest in the past.

Put it in a spreadsheet. Measure number in one column, beat in the next column, verbal description in the following column. My description above is probably too wordy. If it's too much work, send me your copy, and I'll do it and then send it back to you. I doubt it would take more than a couple of hours.

Here's a real example, now that I'm not on my iPhone:

M4, B2. Extend slur from B2 to M5.
M6, B2. Extend slur over last three 16th notes.
M7, B1. Extend slur over last three 16th notes.
M9, B1. Replace slur with slur over last three 16th notes.
M10, B1. Add slur over last three 16th notes.
M12, B1. Decrescendo into M13.
M15. Replace slurs with slur over entire phrase through M16, B2.
M26, B1. Mark forte.
M27. Replace slurs with slur over entire phrase through M29, B2.
M27, B2. Last three 16th notes are F, Gb, B(b).
M33, B1. Add tenuto mark over first eighth note.
M33, M34. Add slurs over 16th-note pairs.
M38, M39. Add slurs over 16th-note pairs.
M42, B1. Mark forte.
M55. Remove dolce marking.
M61. Remove phrasing mark.
M67. Remove descrescendo.
M68. Remove piano marking.
M69, B1-2/3. Add decrescendo though end of B2.

That took me ten minutes.

Rick "somebody's gotta do it" Denney

[Ken Herrick]

Joe, why don't you create a list of "pen and ink" edits to the published version, by measure number. People would still have to buy a copy before they could make use of them. That would not be a copyright violation in any form.


Put it in a spreadsheet. Measure number in one column, beat in the next column, verbal description in the following column. My description above is probably too wordy. If it's too much work, send me your copy, and I'll do it and then send it back to you. I doubt it would take more than a couple of hours.

Here's a real example, now that I'm not on my iPhone:

M4, B2. Extend slur from B2 to M5.
M6, B2. Extend slur over last three 16th notes.
M7, B1. Extend slur over last three 16th notes.
M9, B1. Replace slur with slur over last three 16th notes.
M10, B1. Add slur over last three 16th notes.
M12, B1. Decrescendo into M13.
M15. Replace slurs with slur over entire phrase through M16, B2.
M26, B1. Mark forte.
M27. Replace slurs with slur over entire phrase through M29, B2.
M27, B2. Last three 16th notes are F, Gb, B(b).
M33, B1. Add tenuto mark over first eighth note.
M33, M34. Add slurs over 16th-note pairs.
M38, M39. Add slurs over 16th-note pairs.
M42, B1. Mark forte.
M55. Remove dolce marking.
M61. Remove phrasing mark.
M67. Remove descrescendo.
M68. Remove piano marking.
M69, B1-2/3. Add decrescendo though end of B2.

That took me ten minutes.

Rick "somebody's gotta do it" Denney

And.......once it was done, multiple copies could be printed and sold for say $20 a copy or with the printed version for the price of it plus the $20 for the directions on how to 'do it'. Wouldn't blame anybody for making some $$$. I have my card ready to order now - don't even need the steak knives. Would $50 get the lot mailed to me in Illinois? If "YES", your phone will ring.

[PMeuph]

"Wite-out all slur or phrase markings in the entire movement."

A bass prof at the school where I was an undergrad had the following policy for all of his students and all the pieces they played.

1. Buy the music
2. Photocopy the solo part and the piano part. (or type them in Finale/Sibelius)
3. Erase all phrasings, bowing, dynamics marks etc...
4.Write some tentative marks in pencil
5. consult with him on those markings (Take his suggestions)
6. have your own version of the piece.

[Rick Denney]

I'm sure Oxford Univ. Press would be delighted.

Here's the problem with expressing errata in words (particularly when there are hundreds of changes): Many would misinterpret the "words", and many others would email asking questions about whether the "words" mean "this" or "that".

I will say this: Were the 2nd mvt's inconsistencies converted to words, the first instruction would need to be

"Wite-out all slur or phrase markings in the entire movement."

Do you want what you know to get out or not?

And if you do, are you willing to admit the possibility of slight errors in the interpretation of the words, versus the huge errors now in the published work?

What's wrong with the instruction you wrote above? It's easy to start by erasing all the existing slur markings. One sentence saves you a whole bottle of computer white-out.

Don't you think that an errata sheet, if published widely with some authoritative provenance, might encourage OUP to put out a "special" version?

Personally, I think marking up the pages people post exposes you to far more risk of legal action than making an errata sheet, because you are participating in the dissemination of graphics that could be used to avoid the purchase of the protected work. An errata sheet will not do that, and is thus immune from an infringement claim.

But, like I said, if you don't want to do it, send it to me and I'll make up the errata sheet. If someone asks the meaning of a marking, I'll say, "the errata statement is what it is. Take your best shot." But I really don't think what I wrote above is any more likely to be misinterpreted than your computer-based hand markings, which don't terminate slurs very precisely in all cases. But they do get the idea across just fine--just as the written errata would.

Rick "what's your goal?" Denney

[Rick Denney]

There IS one other complication: Oxford keeps issuing new editions that seem to wander farther and farther from the original. (Now, it seems, there are a whole mess of high Ab's in one of the cadenzas, as just one example.) If the corrections are in "words", to which Oxford edition do the "words" refer?

The cadenza you can write out as a new part, to replace the cadenza included in whatever printed version. That is an excerpt and is your work (legally) and not in competition with the protected work. It could never keep someone from buying the printed work because it is a short excerpt.

Beyond that, just state to which version it applies. If you send it to me, I'll use mine. But there are ways to generalize it, as well, such as "remove all slurs and replace with slur from x to y." That doesn't presuppose the existing case, unless the number of measures changes. That could only happen in the cadenza. I seem to recall Gene Dowling, perhaps, playing a much different cadenza, and perhaps this is what OUP is now publishing.

I know that cadenzas have changed, and bu all reports Catelinet did not (could not?) play the one RVW originally suggested. Reportedly, RVW depended for judgements of playability on his premiere artists, and if Catelinet chopped up his manuscript version, then RVW probably would have accepted that as the limitation of the instrument. I have a recording made by Catelinet the day after the premiere. He indeed chopped it up, playing in a clipped, military style. Later performers in that and other British orchestras might have played it much more like what RVW wrote (and what RVW wrote for the same melodies when played by other instruments).

I can't help with the piano reduction.

Has anyone written to Michael Kennedy, who is the foremost RVW expert currently living, to determine the whereabouts of the original manuscript for this work? That seems an obvious move, but perhaps too obvious and everyone assumes someone else has done it. Mr. Kennedy might have a lot of influence over the OUP, too. The time to take care of this would have been back in the 90's when Ursula Vaughan Williams was still alive.

Rick "progress, not perfection" Denney

[PMeuph]

Has anyone written to Michael Kennedy, who is the foremost RVW expert currently living, to determine the whereabouts of the original manuscript for this work?

Is it not in the British Museum? I seem to remember that fellow that plays in Chicago mentioning that he went and took a look at it there. Anyone else have memory of same?

It probably is, as the Vaughan Williams legacy is in the British Library. I was not able to find a refernce online to the manuscript score. Sometimes... publishers keep manuscripts or proofs in their archive. So if one were assembling a "critical" edition the first place to call would be the British Library and Oxford University Press.

[TinyTubist97]

While examining the score, I was wondering why it isn't just in the key of Bbm at the beginning. Any ideas?

[Todd S. Malicoate]

While examining the score, I was wondering why it isn't just in the key of Bbm at the beginning. Any ideas?

Because the piece is clearly in f minor. Vaughan Williams uses the Phrygian scale in the opening fanfares, but if you'll look at the next section there are plenty of G naturals in the accompaniment.

[TinyTubist97]

Oh thank you. I haven't learned to recognize most of those things yet because I'm really just beginning my Phrygian, Lydian, Locrian, and Myxolydian scales.