Gathering the Materials
Before getting into the music, the first step of this project is to gather the materials. Sounds boring, but who doesn’t like to buy stuff?! You’ll need to get your hands on (at least) facsimiles of the four handwritten manuscripts. The best way to do this is to buy or borrow Bärenreiter’s incredible facsimile edition (BA5217, or the older BA5216). It contains five facsimiles of the sources (the handwritten sources A, B, C, and D; and the first published edition, E), a modern “performing” edition, and a useful 40-page text volume describing the sources, performance practice, and the suites. It’s an incredibly important tool for this project, and costs around $75. I got my edition as a Christmas present when I was a student!
All seven parts of the Bärenreiter facsimile edition. Probably the most cherished sheet music I own!
While scans of the sources are all available on IMSLP, you’ll be much more efficient if you have the printed edition. Nothing beats being able to lay out the scores side by side and trace through each movement. I’m not a technology-denier—I perform almost 100% from an iPad—but this project would be much more difficult if I tried to do it all digitally.
And then, it’s such a thrill to be able to get be able to get close to the handwriting in these sources. Even though they are just facsimiles and not the real thing, you really get a sense of the shape of notes, slurs, and flavor of the music by getting your nose into the airspace of these pieces. I haven’t been able to replicate that feeling with digital scores.
About the “performing” edition, as the publishers call it. It’s helpful, no doubt, but impossible to perform from. It’s a beautifully presented blank slate for beginning for the project: a modern engraving of only the pitches and rhythms, with the occasional ornament. There are no slurs, so it offers a clear view of the nitty gritty notes. Yet, there isn’t complete agreement on the pitches/rhythms, so they insert floating alternative measures when this occurs. This is great for the scholar, but bad for the performer trying to progress at tempo through the piece. See these floating measures below from the E-flat Prelude.
Floating alternate measure in the so called performing edition.
And of course, for us violists, the music is set in bass clef, so we’ll need to transcribe it anyway. On to the next step: transcription!