Deconstructing Authenticity in Three Urtext Editions of Beethoven's Symphony No. 5, Op. 67: A Conductor's Guide to Variant Readings for Performance

Westover, Christopher

Deconstructing Authenticity in Three Urtext Editions of Beethoven's Symphony No. 5, Op. 67: A Conductor's Guide to Variant Readings for Performance

dc.contributor.advisor	Wakefield, William
dc.contributor.advisor	Shames, Jonathan
dc.contributor.author	Westover, Christopher
dc.contributor.committeeMember	Callard, Jeffrey
dc.contributor.committeeMember	Riddick, Frank
dc.contributor.committeeMember	Pederson, Sanna
dc.date.accessioned	2016-07-11T16:07:17Z
dc.date.available	2016-07-11T16:07:17Z
dc.date.issued	2016
dc.date.manuscript	2016-07-11
dc.description.abstract	This document suggests a solution to the problem posed by the existence of three competing urtext editions of Beethoven’s Symphony No. 5, op. 67, by Clive Brown, Jonathan Del Mar, and Jens Dufner. The fact that a final authorized text of the work has not been produced despite the scholarly effort of at least three leading Beethoven scholars over the span of 30 years might be the best indication that a new approach is necessary. In contrast to the urtext, then, I argue for historical and social approaches to understanding the work and its text. Understanding a specific performing tradition based upon location, time, or performer opens up visions of the work not accessible to the urtext. The document surveys and evaluates the urtext editions and their commentaries, which combined represent the state of the most recent research on the work. As a resource for conductors, it combines this with a measure-by-measure concordance to the variants to reconstruct four historical states of the text from the early performance history. Behind this mostly empirical enterprise is an examination of the philosophical ramifications of the urtext and fassung letzter hand. Using recent critiques from the field of textual studies, concepts of work, text, and authorship are examined in relationship to authenticity. Drawing on recent research on the historical sources, this document finds that the urtext concept cannot apply to Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony.	en_US
dc.identifier.uri	http://hdl.handle.net/11244/43874
dc.language	en_US	en_US
dc.subject	Beethoven	en_US
dc.subject	Urtext	en_US
dc.subject	Fifth Symphony	en_US
dc.subject	Variants	en_US
dc.subject	op. 67	en_US
dc.thesis.degree	D.M.A.	en_US
dc.title	Deconstructing Authenticity in Three Urtext Editions of Beethoven's Symphony No. 5, Op. 67: A Conductor's Guide to Variant Readings for Performance	en_US
ou.group	Weitzenhoffer Family College of Fine Arts::School of Music	en_US
shareok.nativefileaccess	restricted	en_US
shareok.orcid	0000-0002-8467-9174	en_US