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"..it becomes a quite different piece."

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I have not ever said anything negative about the Reiner performance, except that it was conducted from a score with errors. I can enjoy it, but I can't disregard that it embodies mistakes, that is, things Bartok did not intend, and had he lived longer might have corrected.

I assume that most conductors would agree that there is a substantial difference between "allegretto" and "allegro," and between a metronome marking of 74 and 94! That is what we are talking about for Mvmt II. But one of course could see how a handwritten 9 might be mistaken for a European 7.

Furthermore, the printed score calls that movement "Game of the pairs" (Giuoco delle coppie) whereas the autograph manuscript says "Presentation of the pairs" (Presentando le coppie). "Game" does not really make sense in terms of what the pairs of instruments do, but "Presentation" nails it, and makes clear that there is to be a sort of promenade or wedding procession, which does end in a mock Lutheran chorale.

Indeed, as the couples recess in reverse order, they are accompanied by additional instruments scurrying around--perhaps "the pitter-patter of little feet," and that would be a very fine Bartokian joke indeed.

Solti said that these textual clarifications made the work "a quite different piece." He also said that he had no doubt that thousands of previous performances, including his own, had been given with Mvmt. II at a wrong, too-slow, speed.

That being said, you can't have everything, and the sound of Solti's 1981(?) digital effort with Chicago is a bit astringent or chilly. I would not call it "definitive," but I certainly would call it necessary to a complete understanding of the work.

Look at it this way: if a conductor had never been told and could not figure out for himself that Mvmt. IV contains a parody of Shostakovich's "Leningrad" Symphony, wouldn't that result in him conducting those notes in a manner Bartok did not intend? I think that it is fair to say that Bartok expected all conductors and most audience members to catch the joke. In the same way, if you conceptualize Mvmt. II as a procession of couples with some almost Disney-esque personification, it moves differently than if it is a "game" like chess.

Cordially,

John Marks


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