[mb-users] Re: MusicBrainz-users Digest, Vol 53, Issue 17

[Brian Schweitzer]

>
> I am not sure I agree with you on the Roman numerals for the variations:
> You often have this basic structure: Theme, Variation1... Variation12.
> Here, if there is no precedence for numbering, I don't think we should
> use them at all.


Well, I can say on the NMA scores for Mozart, romans are used for
variations, when they are numbered at all (which is most of the time).

And I do not think that we should coerce them more in line with how we
> do movements: If the Theme comes first, it looks silly to me that
> "movement" number two is called "I. Faster".


See Steve Reich.  :D  (Yes, he has used "Faster" as a movement tempo
indication, as well as "Slower".)

And "I. Theme", "II. Variation 1", etc. is not exactly good-looking
> either :)
>
> That being said, just because I cannot come up with good examples of RNs
> in Variations, does not mean there is no, and "Theme", "Variation I",
> etc. is OK (though you may know that I prefer Arabics :)).


Well, you also have such roman numbers in trios (Trio I / Trio II, etc) and
minuets (Minuet I. Allegro & Trio I & Trio II & Minuet II, etc)

(I didn't know that Variations, always, or almost always, are intended

> to be performed as a set, but I agree that would be a good hint that
> these should be formatted more like movements.)


That was kind of my point with regards to No. vs I. for "songs" versus
movements - "6 Songs for Churches No. 1" vs "6 Songs for Churches: I." and
"6 Variations on Smith's Theme No. 1" vs "6 Variations on Smith's Theme:
I."...


> >> As for the fugues and canons, I'm not sure.
> >>
>
> > If we have a set such as "6 Songs" it would only make sense to me if we
> > used "No. 1" in the title if there are multiple sets of "6 Songs".  ie,
> > "6 Songs No. 1" and "6 Songs No. 2" much like "Quartet for Strings No.
> > 1" and "Quartet for Strings No. 2".  If the work is just called "6
> > Songs" then each individual song should use the appropriate "movement"
> > number I., II., III., IV., etc.  I don't think we'd be able to show
> > *both* the number of the set and the number of individual songs in the
> > set without using "No. 1" for the set and "I. " for the individual
> > song.  (I hope I'm making sense here)
>
> It is potentially difficult to make the titles refer correctly to "6
> Songs" (A), or to "6 Songs" (B), and if we don't have the catalogue
> number it seems impossible to me, because the third of each set might
> have the same name. In most cases perhaps this can be sorted out by
> extending the titles ("6 Songs to Poems by Goethe"), if such extending
> is not unreasonable and/or unprecedented. In the extreme cases where it
> can not, ExtraTitleInformationStyle (with parentheses) should be used, I
> think.
>

It's not something that comes up within the entire Mozart catalog - the
closest analog I can think of is the collection of K. 509, K. 536, K 567, K
571, K. 586, K. 600, K. 602, K. 605, K. 606, and K. 611 - all the German
Dances.  In that case, I would tend to agree with leivhe's point of view, if
I understand it correctly...  the catalog number serves to do the
differentiation between the different sets.  The exception would be K. 536
and K. 567, where the works (when originally published) were numbered, so
that K. 536 has Nos. 1-6, and K. 567 has Nos. 7-12.  Now, this exception
also helps to show why I would find "movementizing" such 'song' collections
unpleasing...  Now, instead of those 2 catalog numbers indicating 2 sets of
dances, we would seem to be indicating 2 sets of dance movements - and more
awkward, the second set would appear to then end up "missing" movements
I-VI...


> You may have a cycle of songs (not usually called "Six Songs", but
> something more poetic, as e.g. "Winterreise" (Schubert)). Here the songs
> are thematically related (textually, and musically) in such a way that
> they're often performed all together in sequence, starting with number
> one, and ending with the last one. Often, there will be some kind of
> drama unfolding: Someone falls in love and is happy, the love is not
> requited and Someone turns sad, etc.


Wagner comes to mind.... :)


> For cycles, we should think "movements" and use Roman numerals after the
> colon. (Like Brian said: "Intended to be one work with multiple
> movements")
>
> On the other hand, you may have a collection of songs released simply as
> "Six Songs", "Six Psalms", "Six Saxon Love Songs by VirtuallyUnknownPoet".
>
> For _collections_, unrelated works that are alike enough to be released
> as collections, you may snip out number 3 and 5 and perform them alone
> without the rest, in the reverse ordering. They're thematically not
> related in a way that you would lose any drama that could be had by
> performing them as a cycle.
>

Yes, this is the idea I was (badly...) attempting to get at before.  Just
like you might have a collection of works releases which consists of famous
arias, there are many examples in the database of famous songs (or works
separated from "minuet collections") - often mixed in with such aria
collections.
The same, though, would rarely, if at all (I've not seen one in all of
Mozart) be true for collections of such separated variations - you don't
have just
"6 Variations for Violin & Piano No. 45 in G major, K. 374b/360 "Hélas, j'ai
perdu mon amant": III." appearing absent the other 5 movements.

Brian
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