FEcor - Chopin's FE proof
| Publisher: | Maurice Schlesinger |
| Date: | XI 1832-III 1833 |
| Title: | Etudes || No. 2 |
| Dedication: | None |
Trial copy of FE1 with detailed corrections by the composer. Chopin corrected some of the errors, added the vast majority of performance indications, including the entire, very detailed, fingering of the Etude. FEcor constitutes a unique source, allowing for reconstruction of two stages of works on editing the Etudes:
- [FE0] – probably the first layout of the Etude, as in the printed text there are no traces of corrections; a few signs in bars 4, 12, 27, 30-31, 43, 48 and 49 are the only performance markings;
- [FE0'] – another proof copy whose image offers inclusion of Chopin's corrections except for those which were misinterpreted by the engraver; it served for further works on the piece's text.
[FE0] displays numerous common features with CLI, e.g., lack of the majority of performance indications, lack of a number of necessary accidentals, original rhythmic values in the L.H. (e.g. in bar 4 and analog., 19-24), other original versions or even errors changed in proofreadings of FE (e.g. in bars 2, 6 and analog., 10, 42, 43, 44, 45). It allows for assuming that the base text for FE could have been the same autograph on the basis of which CLI was prepared – [AI]. If it was the case, the autograph had to be however initially corrected and completed by Chopin, which is proved by differences between CLI and [FE0]: the aforementioned performance indications of [FE0], change of the part of the L.H. in the 1st half of bar 19, reduction of the number of notes in the lower voice in the R.H. at the end of bars 19, 21 and 23, enharmonic changes, e.g. d
3 to e
3 in bar 47, change of the rhythm in the L.H. in bar 47.
There are no direct reasons to date the creation of FEcor. However, on the basis of letters exchanged between the editors of the Etudes, Schlesinger in Paris and Kistner in Leipzig, it stems that on 24 XI 1832 the French editor had already been working on the Etudes, yet on 2 II 1833, due to Chopin's delaying proofreading, he still did not have a copy which would be ready enough to be sent to his German partner. In turn, on 27 March the Etude's proofs had already been sent to Leipzig, therefore, FEcor was most probably developed between November and March.
| Original in: | Bibliothèque de l'Opéra, Paris |
| Shelf-mark: | Rés. 50 (4) |
