[Trombone-l] Calling all musicologists... slightly off topic...

[thetubameister@adelphia.net]

Whew - I'd have bet vital parts of my anatomy on that, but the reasurance is more than a little welcome...

I understand that many schools and others are allowing citations from Wikiopedia.  I've found glaring errors, but for some reason I needed to have this one confirmed.  Someone's made a big deal on the tuba, ophicleide, and "symphonie fantastique" entries about this being a tuba part.

Ah well - these things have a way of getting vetted, I suppose...

J.c.

---- Howard Weiner <h.weiner at online.de> wrote: 
> At 11:49 11.08.2008 -0700, thetubameister at adelphia.net wrote:
> >Okay, I'm suddenly unsure about something I've always been sure of :-)
> >
> >On wikipedia, I read that Berlioz had at some later point rescored 
> >the Symphonie Fantastique for two tubas instead of ophicleides.  I 
> >was aware that he changed an earlier vbersion with a serpent to two 
> >ophicleides, and my understanding was that Berlioz had never used 
> >tube without an ophicleide also present.  I was also pretty darn 
> >sure that he had okayed the _use_ of a tuba for the second 
> >ophicleide part, but not for both.
> >
> >Who's right?  And is the tuba being refered to one of the "french" 
> >high c instruments or some saxhorn variant of the larger pitches...
> 
> Second question first: Unfortunately, I don't what kind of tuba is 
> meant, although I can imagine it was some sort of Saxhorn.
> 
> As to the main question:
> Here an excerpt from the Introduction to "Hector Berlioz New Edition 
> of the Complete Works" vol. 16, Symphonie fantastique,  ed. Nicholas 
> Temperley (1972):
> 
> "Instrumentation
> ...
> Ophicleides -- In the autograph there is only one ophicleide part. 
> ... In [movement] V it is joined at the Dies irae by a serpent in Bb. 
> In ADir [autograph directions for performance: 'A single sheet of 
> 30-stave music paper, with writing by Berlioz on one side.'] Berlioz 
> directed that 'if the church serpent plays out of tune, as most of 
> them do, an ophicleide will be more suitable'. P [printed full score 
> (Paris, 1845)], PO [printed orchestral parts (Paris, 1845)] and APO 
> [autograph additions and corrections in PO] allot the second part to 
> an ophicleide in Bb, and give it music to play in [movement] IV as 
> well as V. The 1st ophicleide is in C in all sources...
>          In AP2 [autograph corrections to printed score of Jan. 
> 1845], P3 [printed score, 1846] the words 'or tuba' were added to the 
> 2nd ophicleide stave, ... In a letter to Hogarth dated 4 May 1853 in 
> which he lists 'auxiliary instruments' required for the symphony, 
> only one ophicleide is mentioned, and no tuba."
> 
> So, J.c., be unsure no more  ;-)
> 
> Howard
> 
> 
> --
> Howard Weiner
> h.weiner at online.de
> http://howard-weiner.de/
> 
> Tosca jumped to a conclusion.  
> 
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