# Unpublished, supressed and 'in hybernation'...



## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

Its interesting how, with some works, you get *a time lag between their composition and dissemination *(by which I mean first publication, premiere, recording, etc.).

So this is a thread to discuss this and the implications of it.

One I can think of are Debussy's only piano trio, written when he was about 20 (c. 1880) but not recorded until the 1980's. Its a delightful piece of salon-type music, definitely Romantic in style and very much unlike the mature Debussy we know and love.

Another is Schoenberg's _Brettl-lieder_, or _Cabaret Songs_, composed around 1903 when he was working in a cabaret in Berlin as a conductor. Its interesting to think what would happened had he stayed in Berlin, but his stint there was short, he got a teaching job in Vienna and the rest is history, as they say. The _Cabaret Songs_ where not published until the 1970's.

These works show another facet of a composer's art. In some respects not fully grown but still important to the overall picture of their output.

I also include works that where performed in the composer's lifetime but went into a* long period of obscurity (or hybernation)* after. Such a work is Vivaldi's _Four Seasons_, which kind of disappeared from the time of his death until the early 20th century (roughly the 1930's). Its wierd since this is his most popular work, one of the most famous works of the Baroque period and of classical music in general. J.S. Bach was like this as well, with the 'dip' he had as regards the listening public's familiarity with his music/name for roughly 100 years until the mid 19th century and later 'back to Bach' type revivals.

Another issue are *works that are supressed by the composer *and not performed until after his death. Some quite popular works exist in this bracket, eg. Saint-Saens' _Carinval of the Animals_, composed in the 1880's for private performance but not given a public airing until the 1920's. So too less known works like Grieg's only symphony, which was an early work and also a middle period work by Verdi, his only string quartet. & what about Rossini's _Sins of Old Age _that where never meant for publication and yet show some interesting innovations that did not come to the fore until later (eg. anticipation of things like what Satie was to do).

*So just asking if you know works like this. Are any such works favourites of yours? Do these pieces have things in common with their other things or are they very different. Just seeking a broad discussion about these issues.*


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Bizet's Symphony in C, a great favorite today, was written in 1855-56. It was filed away and ignored by the composer and forgotten by everybody else. The manuscript was discovered in 1933 and it was premiered in 1935.

Another is Haydn's Cello Concerto #1 in C, composed in 1761-65. The score was lost for 200 years and discovered only in 1961, 200 years later. Today, it's firmly in the repertoire (and a great piece BTW!)


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

Some of Enescu's piano trios were recently discovered, and were not recorded until 2012:

http://www.arkivmusic.com/classical/album.jsp?album_id=731735


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## Sudonim (Feb 28, 2013)

I know I could look this up, but I'll just post: 

Weren't Bach's six cello suites pretty much "in hibernation" for a long time, until Casals unearthed them and recorded them in the 1930s?


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## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

Sudonim said:


> I know I could look this up, but I'll just post:
> 
> Weren't Bach's six cello suites pretty much "in hibernation" for a long time, until Casals unearthed them and recorded them in the 1930s?


Yes, the story is that Casals found scores of it in a sheet music shop when he was young (late 19th century). Took him ages (maybe a decade or more) to learn to play them. & the provenance of these works is now disputed. An academic called Martin Jarvis has written a book questioning whether they are actually by Bach. He says they are more likely by his second wife Anna Magdalena, based on forensic study of the original manuscripts.

I talked about it in the opening post of this thread I made, and was attacked for it by a minority of people, but I will not comment on that (my minders are always around the corner ready to pounce again!).

http://www.talkclassical.com/21284-attributions-completions-hoaxes-other.html

*Re Bizet's Symphony in C*, its one of my favourite works of that period, and to me is like a bridge between the Classical era of Haydn, Mozart etc. and the Neo-Classicism that came in the early 20th century. Of course Saint-Saens was doing this sort of thing too. I wonder if it hadn't been supressed/temporarily lost if this work would have been a kind of 'game changer?' In terms of it going against the grain of the bigness and bombast of symphonies by Liszt and Berlioz of that time? Dunno but as I said Saint- Saens was doing this sort of thing too, as well as Gounod. Going way back, Mendelssohn is seen as a Classicist leaning Romantic, soo too of course Brahms.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Sid James said:


> *Re Bizet's Symphony in C*, its one of my favourite works of that period...Saint- Saens was doing this sort of thing too, as well as Gounod.


I've read that Bizet filed it away and ignored it because he thought it was too much like Gounod's work.


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## waldvogel (Jul 10, 2011)

Schumann's Violin Concerto was left unperformed for almost 100 years. It was one of the last works that Schumann composed before his final insanity. Joseph Joachim (who had the score but had never performed the concerto),Clara and Brahms apparently looked at the score and thought that it was a sign of his illness. Joachim wanted to wait until the 100th anniversary of Schumann's death before the concerto would be played. That would have meant 1956. 

The concerto was unearthed in a seance (!) in 1933, in which the voice of Robert Schumann (who else?) told Joachim's niece, who was also a violinist, to play an unperformed work of his. Yehudi Menuhin got a copy of the score and was also ready to perform it in the United States, but the concert was cancelled. Strangely enough, due to publishing rights held in Germany, the concerto did not get performed until 1937. 

It's still not quite in the core of the repertoire, and not quite out of it either. At least I've never heard it in concert - is it just my bad luck?


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## Lukecash12 (Sep 21, 2009)

Sorabji's Archmagicum, as well as pretty much the most of the rest of his work that we sadly haven't heard yet.


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## Ukko (Jun 4, 2010)

waldvogel said:


> Schumann's Violin Concerto was left unperformed for almost 100 years. It was one of the last works that Schumann composed before his final insanity. Joseph Joachim (who had the score but had never performed the concerto),Clara and Brahms apparently looked at the score and thought that it was a sign of his illness. Joachim wanted to wait until the 100th anniversary of Schumann's death before the concerto would be played. That would have meant 1956.
> 
> The concerto was unearthed in a seance (!) in 1933, in which the voice of Robert Schumann (who else?) told Joachim's niece, who was also a violinist, to play an unperformed work of his. Yehudi Menuhin got a copy of the score and was also ready to perform it in the United States, but the concert was cancelled. Strangely enough, due to publishing rights held in Germany, the concerto did not get performed until 1937.
> 
> It's still not quite in the core of the repertoire, and not quite out of it either. At least I've never heard it in concert - is it just my bad luck?


Clara and Johannes were not far wrong I think. The music is clearly Schumann's, but there is something... odd about it. I first heard it long before I new anything about him, or any of his music except the piano concerto and the fantasy Op. 17, and _there was something odd about it._ Nothing seemed to come out 'right'.

And now I have to hear it again; but it's not going to work right, I'm sure of it.


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## Vaneyes (May 11, 2010)

Albinoni, Tartini, Lalo, Chausson, Castelnuovo Tedesco, Severac, Arnold, Delius, Enescu, Ginastera, Gubaidulina, Hindemith, Khachaturian, Krenek, Maderna, Martin, Mompou, Myaskovsky, Rawsthorne, Roussel, Schnittke, Scriabin, Szymanowski, Takemitsu, Walton, *need more love*.


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## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

Some other ones I like are -

*Mahler's piano quartet movement,* its the slow movement of a larger work. I think he burnt the other movements? I quite like this, shows a kind of Brahmsian side to him, but its an early work.

*Puccini's Messa di Gloria,* which was performed (or partially performed) not long after it was written but not published and performed again well into the 20th century, I believe years (decades?) after the composer's death. Its easily among my favourite works by Puccini, I love its lyricism and the way how like Verdi he makes sacred music into opera. A number of the tunes from this work where to find their way into Puccini's operas, actually.

*Shostakovich's 4th symphony,* suppressed by the composer and not premiered until about 25 years after its composition (that's a quarter of a century). The reasons where political, Stalin's attack on the opera Lady Macbeth of Mzensk in the party mouthpiece, Pravda. I believe the first violin concerto was similarly suppressed and not performed until after Stalin's death.


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## Mahlerian (Nov 27, 2012)

Sid James said:


> Some other ones I like are -
> 
> *Mahler's piano quartet movement,* its the slow movement of a larger work. I think he burnt the other movements? I quite like this, shows a kind of Brahmsian side to him, but its an early work.


We also have part of a scherzo. Actually, although he did indeed burn a lot of his juvenilia, Mahler didn't complete any large scale works until Das Klagende Lied, so most of what he did in were movements and parts of larger projects (although supposedly he wrote a symphony during his school days that he may or may not have finished).


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## Kieran (Aug 24, 2010)

This Mahler piano quartet, was it featured in the movie Shutter Island? The scene where Leonardo di Caprio and Mark Ruffallo's characters first encounter Max von Sydow and Ben Kingsley and Leo recognises the music, sparking another memory of the war.

Was that this quartet? Anybody know?


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## Mahlerian (Nov 27, 2012)

Kieran said:


> This Mahler piano quartet, was it featured in the movie Shutter Island? The scene where Leonardo di Caprio and Mark Ruffallo's characters first encounter Max von Sydow and Ben Kingsley and Leo recognises the music, sparking another memory of the war.
> 
> Was that this quartet? Anybody know?


Yes, although I haven't seen the movie (been meaning to), it was this piece.


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## Kieran (Aug 24, 2010)

Mahlerian said:


> Yes, although I haven't seen the movie (been meaning to), it was this piece.


I think it's a fine movie, I have to say, and I remember this in particular because the music was beautiful, but also, diCaprio invests so much cracked emotion in the way he says the music is "Mahler," that it adds a note to the music that probably wasn't there for anyone else - the note being darkened by his memory of when he first heard it...


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## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

Another category like this is when works are assigned an opus number specifically for works first published after the composer's death (*Op. posth*.).

*Schubert* has quite a few of these, and among them are the late string quartets and piano sonatas (& also the 9th symphony, which Schumann found and Mendelssohn premiered). Among these are favourite works of mine - esp. the 15th string quartet - and I think of many listeners too.

A number of *Bruckner's* symphonies where not performed or only partially performed during his lifetime too (eg. the 9th was assigned the Op. posth. designation).

Some of* Chopin's* 19 waltzes are Op. posth. too but I don't know if he had other works like that?

There's also the curious case of a* Brahms* manuscript that went missing but was found again decades after his death. He sent his _Piano Trio in A _to a colleague, a music professor at a university to get an opinion on before possible publication. Looks like they both forgot about it and it was found among that colleague's papers when he died in the early 20th century (around the 1920's or '30's). Scholarly consensus is that this work is genuine Brahms. Its been assigned Op. posth. too. I don't mind this work but its not among my favourite works by Brahms.

Brahms was highly self critical, as was *Edgard Varese*. A couple of his pieces where saved from the trash bin by his assistant Chou Wen Chung -_ Nocturnal_ and_ Dance for Burgess._ These where completed by sketches which I think Varese would perhaps have trashed. They're a worthy addition to his slim catalogue of works - a mere two cd's worth! I don't know if these where published as posthumous but they where not performed until after his death.


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## violadude (May 2, 2011)

Mahlerian said:


> We also have part of a scherzo. Actually, although he did indeed burn a lot of his juvenilia, Mahler didn't complete any large scale works until Das Klagende Lied, so most of what he did in were movements and parts of larger projects (although supposedly he wrote a symphony during his school days that he may or may not have finished).


Schnittke finished a version of the Scherzo. I don't know if you've heard it.


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