Dussek, Musica Antica Bohemica

[coulonnus]

I would be ready to scan and upload the Sonatas No.17 and No.19 that are missing at present in the Dussek category, because I have the Vol. 59 of Musica Antiqua Bohemica, 1962.

But the Public_domain article of IMSLP states that fingerings are significant editorial contributions, and there are fingerings. Moreover there are quite a few Ossia passages at page bottoms.

How come there are already Dussek Sonatas from this very edition on IMSLP? What may I do?

[KGill]

The edits in the other MAB submissions appear to have been considered urtext in nature, and therefore subject to a much-reduced copyright term (25 years, I believe). Therefore, anything like that published before 1984 is PD. Which is also how all the Paderewski editions of Chopin are PD- published in the '40s/'50s; no regard is given to the lifespans of the editors (one of whom died in the '70s). (An actual copyright reviewer will be able to provide a more definitive answer .)

[Carolus]

Are you sure the fingerings and ossias were not put there by Dussek? The MAB series was all very much in the urtext mode, so it strikes me as unlikely they would have arbitrarily added ossias and fingerings unless they came from Dussek (as in a personal copy of a published score) or a student. The items in the series issued before 1964 are all free in the USA, later issues may be protected.

[coulonnus]

Are you sure the fingerings and ossias were not put there by Dussek? The MAB series was all very much in the urtext mode, so it strikes me as unlikely they would have arbitrarily added ossias and fingerings unless they came from Dussek (as in a personal copy of a published score) or a student. The items in the series issued before 1964 are all free in the USA, later issues may be protected.

I'm not sure for these two Sonatas, but at
http://ora-web.swkk.de/digimo_online/digimo.entry
you can download (low resolution) Sonatas Op.35 No.1 and 2, and compare them to the same MAB-serie Sonatas, and you won't find any fingerings nor Ossias in the Pleyel 1800
edition.

"Urtext" doesn't prevent publishers from adding fingerings and ossias (look at a Henle edition for example). I concede there aren't any other additions like slurs, pedalling,
dynamics etc.

[Carolus]

Coulonnus is quite correct that the appelation "urtext' is no guarantee that fingerings, etc. have not been added - Henle being the most obvious example. We really don't know unless the preface or editor's notes to the MAB volume actually mentions what was added. At any rate, everything in the series issued before 1964 was reprinted by Kalmus at one point (even if they allowed their reprint to go out of print itself - which they have on a number of items).

[coulonnus]

Coulonnus is quite correct that the appelation "urtext' is no guarantee that fingerings, etc. have not been added - Henle being the most obvious example. We really don't know unless the preface or editor's notes to the MAB volume actually mentions what was added.

The editor's notes of vol. 3 and 4 do not mention fingerings, but they say: "I would like to
add that many of the signs for performers that were lacking have been included according to the other analogous cases." Moreover there are many slurs, hairpins, dynamics etc. between square brackets in all Sonatas.

At any rate, everything in the series issued before 1964 was reprinted by Kalmus at one point (even if they allowed their reprint to go out of print itself - which they have on a number of items).

Is 'reprinted by' synonym of 'public domain'? Although Kalmus specializes in PD reprints,
would it be impossible that Kalmus negotiated the reprint permission with MAB for this very Dussek edition?

[Carolus]

Yes, public domain is what I was alluding to. Kalmus has only a very few licensed re-issues. Most of their catalog consists of reprints of works which are in the public domain. They have started to publish new editions of their own, recently.