Webern in exchange with his publisher

"I hope that the songs are short enough." These were the words of Anton Webern on July 23, 1914, when, at the request of Universal-Edition, he wrote three of his compositions for what would later be published under the title The modern song (1915) to the publisher. However, none of the unspecified works were printed; the actual publishing relationship only began in the summer of 1920, when the contracts for Opera 1, 2, 3 and 6 were signed. The correspondence, of which a total of 264 documents from the years 1911 to 1945 have been preserved, also gained momentum; in addition, there are several crisply formulated reviews of other works by Webern ("in places completely impossible, childish. Instrumentation indisputable") and 41 letters with Wilhelmine Webern, which complete the collection. Like every publisher's correspondence of those years, this also reveals a great deal about the business relationships and the printing of the compositions, about (planned) performances and the reception of the works as a whole - valuable additions to the overall picture. Above all, the correspondence provides information on sometimes surprising constellations and personal assessments: For example, Hindemith, who played the op. 5 pieces with the Amar Quartet in Salzburg in 1922, had, in Webern's words, "written to me about it with great affection and interest". (Unfortunately, this letter is lost today).

The publication of such extensive correspondence is always associated with challenges. On the one hand, there are the documents themselves, the correct and unambiguous translation of the wording (including the stenographic publisher's comments), and the question of the diplomatic presentation of the text. But then there is also the question of the depth of indexing in the commentaries, which in many cases make individual statements comprehensible. In all aspects, the present edition, published in the series of supplements to the Webern Complete Edition, follows a methodically pragmatic approach in which orthography and paragraphs are preserved and the layout is so clearly laid out that even the source descriptions and text-critical annotations are easy to read.

Anton Webern - Briefwechsel mit der Universal-Edition, edited by Julia Bungardt, 368 p., € 58-00, Musikzeit Verlag Lafite, Vienna 2020, ISBN 978-3-85151-102-4