# Transcriptions? Or Arrangements?



## Kieran (Aug 24, 2010)

Hi there,

I was listening to K608 last week, which is a mechanical organ work by Mozart _transcribed _by Busoni for two pianos. So is this the same as saying he _arranged _it for two pianos?

Likewise, Liszt's transcriptions of Beethoven's symphs: is this just an arrangement of them for piano?

Would you say there is a more specific art in transcription than there is in arrangements?

Or are they the same, just called by different names?

A confusion arises because I read that Mozart arranged some Handel music for string quartet, but he transcribed some Bach fugues for the same.

Cheers!


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## Manxfeeder (Oct 19, 2010)

Interesting. Wiki says, "Transcription in this sense is sometimes called arrangement, although strictly speaking transcriptions are faithful adaptations, whereas arrangements change significant aspects of the original piece."

I wonder what others think.


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## Kieran (Aug 24, 2010)

Thanks Manx!

So you're saying a _transcription _is an exact copy just moved to another instrument - with differences in key or instrument factored in - but an _arrangement _is a looser affair, more like a different version of the same thing, performed on different instruments?

Or have I misunderstood?

Cheers!


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Here's what music-dictionary.org says:

Arrangement: An adaptation of a musical composition from one medium to another.

Transcription: An arrangement of a piece of music for a voice, instrument, or ensemble other than that for which it was originally written.

Helpful, eh? :lol:


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## Kieran (Aug 24, 2010)

KenOC said:


> Here's what music-dictionary.org says:
> 
> Arrangement: An adaptation of a musical composition from one medium to another.
> 
> ...


Very! 

So Liszt's transcriptions of Beethoven's symphs are actually _just _arrangements, the cheeky so and so...


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Actually I think Manxfeeder's reference to Wiki is about right. I usually think of an "arrangement" as more of a free adaptation. So in that sense Liszt's efforts were transcriptions -- he was a faithful as possible to the originals. Whether others make the same distinction, I have no idea!


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## Ukko (Jun 4, 2010)

Did _Liszt_ call his piano versions of Beethoven's symphonies transcriptions? The Schubert Lieder were pretty straight transcriptions... .


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## Kieran (Aug 24, 2010)

Hilltroll72 said:


> Did _Liszt_ call his piano versions of Beethoven's symphonies transcriptions? The Schubert Lieder were pretty straight transcriptions... .


That's a good question. I always see them on boxsets as such.

------

Thanks again, Ken!


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

Kieran said:


> Very!
> 
> So Liszt's transcriptions of Beethoven's symphs are actually _just _arrangements, the cheeky so and so...


Yes...BUT... there is craft, and some necessary 'composition' to successfully transcribe something written for a group of instruments to sound at all 'right' and sound well. Within the transcription, though, one does not add 'new notes' or change any fundamental part of harmony or the piece. Going to piano from orchestra, some octave doubling in the bass might be more than normal, the classical works often have the cello part, the bass doubling an octave below -- all is about achieving a similar balance of sonority.

Arrangements -- shuffle, cut, re-order, add to, compose new material with the original or to add to the original.

Those Liszt transcriptions of the _Beethoven Symphonies_, piano four hands, were a bread and butter job: Four hand transcriptions of orchestral works being the way people could play, and hear them, in their homes. They are a lot of fun to play, too 

Piano four-hands was a common medium back in the 1800's - so many middle class people having a piano in the home. Dvorak's _Slavonic Dances_ were originally for piano four-hands, and became so popular that the publisher was certain enough of success that they had them orchestrated (I believe not by Dvorak) because that would further increase revenues.

Later, piano rolls for player pianos were often transcriptions of classical repertoire, and they were 'overdubbed' by one pianist to get that fullness of 'four-hand' playing. I recall one of the complete _William Tell Overture_ that may have been more than once over-dubbed, since mechanical playback did not have to account for the physical strategy of four-hands or more getting in each others way.

Now, Liszt and some of those 'paraphrases' of bits and pieces of popular operas of the time, a lot of free fantasy, 'new' composing went into those, and they are 'arrangements.' (...or as I see below from KenOC, 'a free adaption.')


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

I believe Dvorak did the orchestration of the Slavonic Dances himself. The Liszt Beethoven transcriptions are for solo piano, I believe, although he did make a two-piano transcription of the 9th that is outside of this set.


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## Ukko (Jun 4, 2010)

I didn't know about the 4-hands versions, except for the 9th. The set I have by Biret is 2-hands.


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## Kieran (Aug 24, 2010)

PetrB said:


> Yes...BUT... there is craft, and some necessary 'composition' to successfully transcribe something written for a group of instruments to sound at all 'right' and sound well. Within the transcription, though, one does not add 'new notes' or change any fundamental part of harmony or the piece. Going to piano from orchestra, some octave doubling in the bass might be more than normal, the classical works often have the cello part, the bass doubling an octave below -- all is about achieving a similar balance of sonority.
> 
> Arrangements -- shuffle, cut, re-order, add to, compose new material with the original or to add to the original.
> 
> ...


Thanks PetrB!

If I understand you correctly, a transcription strives to capture the exact same thing but on a different (or single) instrument - "is about achieving a similar balance of sonority" - whereas an arrangement is a different version of a piece of music?

So an arrangement and a transcription are different, with different goals and different effects?

Thanks again, also, for the interesting history too...


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## moody (Nov 5, 2011)

The Beethoven transcriptions are faithful adaptions for solo piano.
However Liszt did make a transcription of the 9th for two pianos thirteen years earlier,Naxos have Leon McCawley and Ashley Wass performing that.
Arrangements however can be fairly crazy and are free fantasies on chosen pieces of music and I love them. Although I feel that my mate Lisztian,who is absent a lot because of love lately,does not really approve of these---but whippersnappers tend to be straight-laced you know.


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## Andreas (Apr 27, 2012)

"Transcribed" seems to imply certain features/limitations of the target instrument that need to be considered.

Whereas "arranged", I find, usually implies an ensemble or orchestra being involved.

Of course there's also "orchestrated", specifally refering to arrangements for orchestra. (In that sense, one could also call Listz's Beethoven transcriptions "deorchestrations", as Gould suggested.)


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## moody (Nov 5, 2011)

Andreas said:


> "Transcribed" seems to imply certain features/limitations of the target instrument that need to be considered.
> 
> Whereas "arranged", I find, usually implies an ensemble or orchestra being involved.
> 
> Of course there's also "orchestrated", specifally refering to arrangements for orchestra. (In that sense, one could also call Listz's Beethoven transcriptions "deorchestrations", as Gould suggested.)


You will find that this has been properly described above.


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

In music, _transcription_ can mean notating a piece or a sound which was previously unnotated, as, for example, an improvised jazz solo. Further examples include ethnomusicological notation of oral traditions of folk music, such as Béla Bartók's and Ralph Vaughan Williams' collections of the national folk music of Hungary and England respectively. The French composer Olivier Messiaen transcribed birdsong in the wild, and incorporated it into many of his compositions, for example his Catalogue d'oiseaux for solo piano. Transcription of this nature involves scale degree recognition and harmonic analysis, both of which the transcriber will need relative or perfect pitch to perform.

_Transcription_ may also mean rewriting a piece of music, either solo or ensemble, for another instrument or other instruments than which it was originally intended. The Beethoven Symphonies by Franz Liszt are a good example. _Transcription_ in this sense is sometimes called _arrangement,_ although strictly speaking transcriptions are faithful adaptations, whereas arrangements change significant aspects of the original piece.

An _arrangement _is the adaptation of a previously written musical composition for presentation. It may differ from the original form by reharmonization, paraphrasing or development of the melodic, harmonic, and rhythmic structure.

(WIK)


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## Kieran (Aug 24, 2010)

Thanks millionrainbows - very succinct and helpful as always...


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