Samtliche Orgelwerke (review)

Johann Gottfried Walther. Sämtliche Orgelwerke. Herausgegeben von Klaus Beckmann. Wiesbaden: Breitkopf & Härtel, c1998-99. [Vol. 1: Freie Orgelwerke; Konzerttranskriptionen. Introd. in Ger., Eng., p. 4-7; score, p. 8-153; Revisionsbericht, p. 154-60. ISMN M-004-18042-6; Edition Breitkopf 8678. DM 59. Vol. 2: Choralbearbeitungen A-G. Introd. in Ger., Eng., 2 p.; score, p. 7-143; Revisionsbericht, p. 144-54. ISMN M-004-18047-1; Edition Breitkopf 8679. DM 59. Vol. 3: Choralbearbeitungen H-M. Introd. in Ger., Eng., 2 p.; 1 plate; score, p. 8-153; Revisionsbericht, p. 154-64. ISMN M-004-180461-7; Edition Breitkopf 8680. DM 59. Vol. 4: Choralbearbeitungen N-Z. Introd. in Ger., Eng., 2 p.; 1 plate; score, p. 8-144; Revisionsbericht, p. 145-55. ISMN M-004-18069-3; Edition Breitkopf 8681. DM 59.]

Continuing its impressive publications of music by the North-German organ masters, Breitkopf & Härtel has recently published a new, four-volume edition of the collected organ works of Johann Gottfried Walther (1684-1748) under the editorship of Klaus Beckmann, which now supersedes Heinz Lohmann's three-volume edition of Walther's selected organ works (Ausgewählte Orgelwerke) issued by the publisher in 1966 (rev. ed., 1977). In turn, this publication took the place of yet an earlier Breitkopf & Härtel edition prepared by the eminent and prolific musicologist Max Seiffert, who in 1906 was the first to edit Walther's collected works for organ as part of Denkmäler deutscher Tonkunst (ser. 1, vols. 26-27). The opportunity after World War II for Breitkopf & Härtel (relocated from Leipzig to Wiesbaden) to reissue its older editions in photographic reprints prompted an equally famous scholar of the next generation, Hans Joachim Moser, to edit and critically revise Seiffert's work in 1958 (jointly published with the Akademische Druck- u. Verlagsanstalt in Graz). In fact, Moser had very little work to do, and in his brief introduction to the reissued edition, rightly praises the quality of Seiffert's work--arguably one of his best projects. Seiffert's work also formed the basis for the practical editions of Walther's organ chorales by Hermann Poppen (Orgelchoräle: Auswahl für den gottesdienstlichen Gebrauch [Kassel: Bärenreiter, 1930; 2d ed., 1935; 4th ed., 1956]). Although Moser's second critical commentary offers corrections for only six unimportant misprints, at $25 (the price I paid in the late 1950s), it was an excellent value for a 364-page double volume. By comparison, this amount today would not even buy one volume of the new edition.

Beckmann's division of Walther's works is logical: the first volume contains the free works, preludes (and one toccata) and fugues (and the like), a set of variations on a basso continuo by Arcangelo Corelli, and one original concerto, together with fourteen of Walther's arrangements of concertos by others; the chorale settings are divided alphabetically over the remaining three volumes. There are two different German introductions with acceptable English translations, one for the free works and arrangements and a second repeated in each of the chorale volumes. The separate critical commentaries for each volume, in German only, include, in addition to remarks on editorial practice and ornamentation, a full description of printed and manuscript sources. They are a pleasure to use compared with Seiffert's. No doubt the luxury of full translations of the complete commentary would have added to the size and cost of the volumes; in any event, most performers curious to retrace Beckmann's editorial footsteps probably have some ability in reading German. Nevertheless, if this edition should achieve a well-earned reissue, Breitkopf & Härtel might consider an English translation of at least the sections on editorial practice or, failing that, the section on ornamentation.Walther's chorales especially abound in ornaments of all kinds, and Beckmann provides much important information about performing them that should be easily available to all organists playing from these scores.

It is perhaps in Walther's organ transcriptions of concertos by contemporaries such as Giuseppe...