Along with the Stamitz concerto, Hoffmeister‘s Viola Concerto is the most important audition piece for viola players. Yet, it has been handed down in a complicated source tradition, surviving in a single contemporary manuscript covered with many layers of markings. Our piano reduction reconstructs, for the first time, the earliest textual layer in this source, thereby coming as close as possible to Hoffmeister‘s actual intentions. The reconstructed original is accompanied by a detailed critical commentary. Fingering and bowing marks have been added by no less a musician than Kim Kashkashian!
Read more about this edition in the Henle Blog.
Content/Details
- Viola Concerto D major
Audio/video
Preface
The Concerto in D major for viola and orchestra by Franz Anton Hoffmeister (1754–1812) has long been a standard work in its genre. It comes down to us in a single contemporary source, a handwritten set of orchestral parts preserved in the Sächsische Landesbibliothek · Staats- und Universitätsbibliothek Dresden (Mus. 3944-O-5) with the following title on the dustcover: … more
About the composer
Franz Anton Hoffmeister
A German composer and music publisher, whose two careers complemented one another. He therefore composed with an eye toward the market, bearing in mind the current preferences and demands of the interested lay musician. He published, variously, works by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Ludwig van Beethoven, Johann Sebastian Bach, Joseph Haydn, and Ignaz Pleyel. His compositional output comprises all genres, including chamber music, symphonies, piano music, stage works, and vocal music.
| 1754 | Born in Rottenburg am Neckar on October 27 (according to church registers). |
| around 1768 | He studies law in Vienna. |
| 1778 | He is musical director for Count Franz von Szecsenyi and follows him to Hungary. |
| 1784 | Back in Vienna, he founds a music publishing house. He maintains professional and personal contact with Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. |
| 1798 | Sets off on a concert tour with flautist Franz Thurner. In Leipzig he meets Ambrosius Kühnel. |
| 1800 | With Ambrosius Kühnel he founds the Leipzig publishing house Bureau de Musique on December 1. His wife Theresia Hoffmeister takes care of the day-to-day business. |
| 1805 | He leaves the Leipzig publishing house and transfers his residence entirely to Vienna. |
| 1806 | He ends his work at the Viennese publishing house. |
| 1812 | Dies in Vienna on February 9. |
About the authors
Norbert Gertsch (Editor)
Dr. Norbert Gertsch, born in 1967 in Rheinkamp/Moers, studied piano solo at the Mozarteum in Salzburg and read musicology and philosophy at the Paris Lodron University in Salzburg and the Ruperto Carola University Heidelberg on a scholarship from the “Studienstiftung des Deutschen Volkes”. In 1996 he wrote his doctoral thesis on Ludwig van Beethoven’s Missa solemnis (as part of the New Complete Edition) under Ludwig Finscher.
In the following year, he began work at G. Henle Publishers, initially as an editor for electronic publishing. After working on a two-year project (1999–2000) sponsored by the German Research Foundation (DFG) preparing a new Beethoven Catalogue of Works, he became a scholarly editor at G. Henle Publishers. In 2003 he became Editor-in-Chief and in 2009 Deputy Managing Director and Head of Publishing. Gertsch has published many Urtext editions for G. Henle Publishers, including volumes for a new edition of Beethoven’s Piano Sonatas together with Murray Perahia.
Johannes Umbreit (Piano reduction)
Prof. Johannes Umbreit studied the piano at the Musikhochschule in Munich. From 1987 onwards he was a regular accompanist at courses given by Wolfgang Schneiderhan, Thomas Brandis, Ljerko Spiller, Igor Ozim, Olga Woitowa, Ernő Sebestyén, Walter Nothas, F. Andrejevsky, Denis Zsigmondy and Zakhar Bron amongst others. He has appeared in numerous radio and TV broadcasts and plays chamber music with members of the Bavarian State Orchestra, the Munich Philharmonic Orchestra and the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra.
He is on the jury of different international competitions and has been invited to several international music festivals. Umbreit was a teacher for almost ten years at the Musikhochschule in Munich and at the same time a lecturer for chamber music and piano accompaniment at the Richard Strauss Conservatory. Since 2008 he has been a lecturer at the Hochschule für Musik und Theater München. As the long-serving managing director of the Richard-Strauss-Gesellschaft, he was made an honorary member of the board in 2009. In May 2011, the Bavarian Minister of Culture appointed Johannes Umbreit an honorary professor of the Hochschule für Musik und Theater München on the suggestion of its academic senate.
Norbert Gertsch and Julia Ronge have carefully sifted through all available texts to produce this handsome publication and the renowned violist Kim Kashkashian offers fingering and bowing suggestions. Cadenzas and lead-ins are by Robert Levin. Spread over 17 pages, rather than 8 or 10 pages in earlier publications, this Henle edition is clear and spacious and presents a text that is unfettered by nineteenth century philosophy of over-editing. ... Here is another fine achievement from this eminent publishing house.