Materials for Bruckner's Sixth discovered
The conductor and musicologist Benjamin-Gunnar Cohrs has discovered handwritten material on Bruckner's Sixth Symphony in the archives of St. Florian Abbey, which was previously thought to be lost.
As Cohrs writes, a handwritten set of parts of Bruckner's Sixth Symphony was copied, which was used both for a novelty rehearsal by the Vienna Philharmonic in 1882 and for the first performance of the Adagio and Scherzo under Wilhelm Jahn in 1883. It had previously been assumed that this set of parts had been lost. This was also noted by Leopold Nowak in the revision report for the Sixth.
Benjamin-Gunnar Cohrs initially discovered a remnant of the set in the archives of St. Florian Abbey - a part for bassoon I in a copyist's hand, with autograph entries and the anonymous pencil note "Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde Wien" (GdM) on the title page. Cohrs' further search in the archives of the GdM in Vienna then revealed the complete set of parts; only the bassoon part in St. Florian is missing.
According to Cohrs, earlier researchers may have overlooked this because the set of parts is indexed under the same call number as the dedication score copy, but is kept in the archive magazine at a different location. The set of parts consists of all the wind parts, timpani and one string part each (with the exception of the viola, of which six copies survive). The copyist has yet to be identified. Most of the parts contain some autograph corrections as well as pencil annotations by players.
More info: www.benjamingunnarcohrs.com
