a completed symphony fragment

[gprengel]

2 months ago I discovered a symphony fragment of about 80 measures (till 2:25) and some sketches for the development of a certain composer (you can guess the composer's name!) which fascinated me so that I wanted to complete it. Here it is:

www.gerdprengel.de/symphony_C_Major_1.mp3

http://www.gerdprengel.de/Symphony_in_C.pdf


What do you think ... ?

Gerd

[Peter]

Mendelssohn of course! I think you've done a great job Gerd.

[gprengel]

Mendelssohn of course! I think you've done a great job Gerd.

Haha, indeed! How do you know? Because you know that in the recent months I have dealt so much with Mendelssohn, or by the music itself? What would you say are the "Mendelssohn" characteristics of the piece?

[Peter]

Haha, indeed! How do you know? Because you know that in the recent months I have dealt so much with Mendelssohn, or by the music itself? What would you say are the "Mendelssohn" characteristics of the piece?

The music itself Gerd - the main theme and the harmony are typical Mendelssohn. I can't imagine anyone else writing bars 63-78 which bare a resemblance to part of the Wedding march.

[gprengel]

The music itself Gerd - the main theme and the harmony are typical Mendelssohn. I can't imagine anyone else writing bars 63-78 which bare a resemblance to part of the Wedding march.

Thank you, helpful hint to the wedding march ...

The base of the first 73 bars of my work is this piano reduction:
https://imslp.org/wiki/Special:ImagefromIndex/208344

bars 84 - 95 with the lovely second theme I got from an article bei L. Todd, also the end of the exposition and beginning of the development (bars 127 -147) and furthermore 177 - 190)

[Peter]

Thank you, helpful hint to the wedding march ...

The base of the first 73 bars of my work is this piano reduction:
https://imslp.org/wiki/Special:ImagefromIndex/208344

bars 84 - 95 with the lovely second theme I got from an article bei L. Todd, also the end of the exposition and beginning of the development (bars 127 -147) and furthermore 177 - 190)

It would be interesting to see the original manuscript which apparently exists in the Bodleian Library, Oxford.

[gprengel]

Or even the original orchestra score of the first 73 bars, which is in Leipzig, as I was told! Next year they plan to publish that....

[Peter]

Excerpts from the opening of the first movement and a section believed to be part of the slow movement were published in short score in A Dictionary of Music and Musicians, Vol.2 (1880). The manuscript full score was in the possession of Mendelssohn’s oldest daughter.
Todd refers to this symphony in Mendelssohn: A Life in Music, pages 492–493 and it is mentioned in letters from February to April 1845.

[gprengel]

Excerpts from the opening of the first movement and a section believed to be part of the slow movement were published in short score in A Dictionary of Music and Musicians, Vol.2 (1880). The manuscript full score was in the possession of Mendelssohn’s oldest daughter.
Todd refers to this symphony in Mendelssohn: A Life in Music, pages 492–493 and it is mentioned in letters from February to April 1845.

Today I received from the city of Leipzig a pdf of the original score from Mendelssohn, eleven beautifully handwritten pages!! I am very excited and will adapt my score accordingly. I am also curious in what way Mendelssohn's orchestration differs from mine which was done on the basis of the piano arrangement ... :-)

I check with them whether it is allowed to post it in a forum ....

Gerd

[gprengel]

Well now I received a copy of Mendelssohn's original beautifully handwritten score and changed my version accordingly.
Interestingly my first version wasn't even so far away from Mendelssohn's :-) The biggest difference was that Mendelssohn made much more use of the timpani (with great tremolos!). And his brass instruments were better ....

My tremolos in the violins in the beginning is not in the score from Mendelssohn, but I keep them, because otherwise the beginning would be a bit thin and static

So here now a new version with Mendelssohn's original score of the first 2 minutes and my completion (the same links as before):

www.gerdprengel.de/symphony_C_Major_1.mp3
www.gerdprengel.de/Symphony_in_C.pdf

Gerd

[gprengel]

Recently I got to know a very interesting new sound tool ( --> www.noteperformer.com ) and with this I recorded my Mendelssohn symphony fragment anew. I think especially the loud tutti passages come with much more clarity:

http://www.gerdprengel.de/Mendelssoh..._symphony1.mp3

Gerd

[gprengel]

Finally I made it to complete also the beautiful second movement sketch from Mendelssohn to a whole Andante movement of about 14 minutes. The first 2:50 minutes are based on a full melody sketch with various hints to the accompaniement by Mendelssohn.
After orchestrating this I continued with a new middle part with various themes with each increasing in strength and coming to a dramatic climax with an appassionate fugato.
After this various variations of Mendelssohn's beautiful Andante theme follow until a recapitulation of the beginning. The movement ends with a most tender final variation.

http://www.gerdprengel.de/Mendelssoh...ny_Andante.mp3
http://www.gerdprengel.de/Mendelssoh...ny_Andante.pdf

Enjoy - it means very much to me!

Gerd