IMSLP Forums

Today, Snailey and I had a small discussion on my user page on how to organize the works of Vivaldi best. Snailey's original proposal was to have one page for each Op. number and to put all concertos/sonatas of this respective Op. there. Of course, for those works which do not belong to any Op. we still need a separate page. Now my idea was to create a single page for each concerto, indepedent of whether it belongs to an Op. or not and to use the Op. pages just as some kind of collection. This way, people who are looking e.g. for L'estro armonico would easily find the Concertos Op.3 while someone looking for RV 567 would also find this work directly.
What do you think about this suggestion?

I'd definitely recommend keeping one page per RV number. For those collections of works with opus numbers, you could keep stub pages with links to the component works (like the Má Vlast model).

Davydov wrote:I'd definitely recommend keeping one page per RV number. For those collections of works with opus numbers, you could keep stub pages with links to the component works (like the Má Vlast model).

This makes the most sense.

I wish that the Bach cantatas had been granted that privilege. They're stuck in groups of 10.

That's going to change, btw.
Let's give this another day, and if noone can raise a real objection, then this soudns great!
Now, who's going to implement it...

Perhaps before rushing to move the pages, someone should organise a list of the current page titles in the Wiki and pair them to a preferred title, which can be posted somewhere for comment? It's not the sort of thing you want to have to do multiple times, and we've already had some little controversy over people's varying opinions about how the works should be described and sorted.

My view is also that each item in the RV should have its own page, along with umbrella pages for the opus numbers. I am not yet inclined to a view whether the page titles should include items such as key and fullish instrumentation - the RV is sorted by work category and then by key, so there will inevitably be a lot of entries sorted as "Violin concerto in A major, RV ###" ... "Violin concerto in B flat major, RV ###" and so on.

To my mind there is no problem with the pages for the opus numbers being rather lengthier than mere stubs, and in fact including as duplicate entries all of the scores and parts for their component concertos; however, to keep the pages within the realms of manageability, the opus numbered pages bear a notice “For arrangements and transcriptions of individual concertos, please refer to the specific work pages...” followed by a list of links.

PML

Well at the moment, all Vivaldi works are organized in a unified style. Solo concertos are names as "xyz Concerto in G major, RV ###" while Concertos for more than one instrument are named "Concerto for x1, x2,... in G major, RV ###". The same is true for the Sonatas though we just have very few of them at the moment. As I am the one who uploaded most of the Vivaldi stuff, I probably don't have to mention that this is the version I personally prefer

Originally, I thought about the Op. pages as a collection of the files we have for the individual people as pml suggested, however the idea of just having a page containing links to the RV number pages also sound nice to me, as this seems to be well-arranged.

I like the idea of each RV number with its own page. This does not preclude having a few pages for those opus numbers that are well-known like L'estro armonico in addition, just to make things easier for visitors to the site.

Or, indeed, administrators like me who don't know the RV numbers for "La Stravaganza" off the top of their heads

As we all seem pretty much agreed, I've made a start on Op.7 and Op.3. In some cases the component parts already had their own pages, and the only real obstacle for thought was the 2 sets of unsplittable parts for Op.3, which are linked to from all the concertos involved.

Having each work on a separate page is a big advantage when it comes to tagging, as we can now be precise about the instrumentation of each work, which isn't always possible when they're lumped together.

Is RV 549 really for 4 Violins and Cello? The RV catalogue says its just for 4 violins...(I'm too lazy to download the whole 55 MB file to check it myself).

There's a cello solo in the first movement, apparently. That's not too uncommon.

I suggest leaving the original 18th Century set of parts for Op. 3 on the Opus 3 page as these are large files (about 60 MB each, if I recall correctly); if someone is prepared to go to the effort of splitting them and re-joining them then the fragments thereof could replace the equivalent on the derivative work pages.

And RV 549 does have a prominent solo part for cello along with the 4 violins, and I think so does one of the other concertos in Op. 3 – whether it is significant enough to merit being mentioned as a solo instrument in the work title is however a matter for debate.

PML

Frankly some call these concerti grossi, but I think that's too far.
I would not call those solo cello parts. They do not hold up to any sort of comparison with a vivaldi cello concerto. Prominent solo parts in 19th and 20th century concerti do not merit the inclusion