Mahler, Symphony X

Why this transcription?
Seven fully-fledged performing versions of Gustav Mahler’s unfinished Tenth Symphony have now been published, all of which have been commercially recorded at least once. These efforts, together with recent books and articles on the subject, indicate an unabated interested in Mahler’s unfinished Tenth Symphony. This transcription endeavors to provide an insight into the chronology of Mahler’s notation, to help clarify the development of Mahler’s own ideas and thus provide a scholarly grounding upon which future editors may base their editorial (and possibly compositional) decisions. Presented here for the first time in its entirety, it eschews any additions that did not originate from Mahler himself. It is intended as an easily accessible and comprehensible reference work for the music scholar, aspiring conductor or Mahler devotee.
Volumes
The present edition consists of three volumes:
Volume 1 presents chronological transcriptions of the orchestral drafts; occasionally, owing to lack of space in the supplementary Volume 2, Volume 1 also presents segments of the short scores.
Volume 2 is the supplementary volume, which contains the earlier stages of composition, plus chronological graphs of all the known manuscript material.
Volume 3 contains:
• Tables with descriptions of the manuscript pages.
• A detailed commentary about discrepancies among the sources, following the layout of the latest compositional stage (the orchestral draft, unless otherwise noted).
Reading the manuscript
The purpose of this edition is to present Mahler’s notation without editorial bias. The symphony was composed at great speed – the entire body of the manuscript was probably amassed in less than three months – and in the process of moving from preliminary sketches to increasingly elaborate drafts Mahler was not always precise, relying on experience to clarify some passages at a later stage (which would occasionally entail the crafting of necessary and appropriate counterpoint).
The most frequent difficulties in deciphering the manuscripts concern the legibility of the written pitches. Generally there are two types of problems:
• A clearly legible note that is apparently wrong.
• An ambiguously legible note that could be either right or wrong.
This edition does not eliminate seemingly obvious mistakes: it accurately presents what is evident in the manuscript and problematic places are discussed in the ‘Detailed commentary’.
Scholar Edition (three books) is available for € 202,50 (excl. VAT)
The Luxury Edition is available for € 285,00 (excl. VAT)