Melartinin neljäs sinfonia op. 80.

Musiikkifilologinen tutkimus käsikirjoitusaineistosta.

Abstrakti

The purpose of this article is to investigate the composing and performance history of Melartin’s Fourth Symphony (E major, Op. 80), completed in early 1913, and to study in particular the composer’s sketches, scores, ­instrumental parts, copies of the scores and instrumental parts, chronology, and complex phases of the autographs and copies. The research will also assess the prerequisites of making a critical edition of this symphony.

This research approach is important because of the many temporal layers of the score and gaps within the manuscript materials. For example, no autograph of the score has survived for the third movement. Of the first, second and last movements, only copies made by the composer himself exist, apparently written in 1916 based on the instrumental parts of the premiere. The manuscript material also includes the score of the third movement and the instrumental parts of the entire symphony transcribed 1921−1922 by Albert Harzer, the solo flautist of the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra.

Based on a music philological examination, it can be concluded that the autograph score of the premiere in the year 1913 with its corrections by the composer six months later would be the one he himself would have considered correct for the publication of the work. One of the key conclusions of the study is that the only surviving score of the symphony, and especially the end of its last movement, should not be the starting point for a critical edition. Instead, the instrumental parts copied by Albert Harzer are crucial in clarifying how the options offered by the different layers should be presented in a possible critical edition of the symphony.