Main text
Main text
½A - Semi-autograph
A - Autograph of the piano part
Morch - Manuscript of the orchestra part
GE - German edition
GE1 - First German edition
GE1a - Retouched impression of GE1
GE2 - Second German edition
FE - French edition
FE1 - First French edition
FE2 - Corrected impression of FE1
FED - Dubois copy
FEJ - Jędrzejewicz copy
FES - Stirling copy
EE - English edition
EE1 - First English edition
EE2 - Revised impression of EE1
EE3 - Corrected impression of EE2
compare
  b. 119-122

The interpretation of the slurring of A in these bars, supported by the rhythmic notation (separated semiquavers in bar 120 and minims in bars 121-122), is beyond any doubt. However, at an attempt to interpret the slurs literally, they can seem to be misleading – both separated semiquavers in bar 120 seem to be at the same time the last and first notes of subsequent slurs; the phenomenon is even clearer in bars 121-122. Admittedly, in GE1 the slurs were reproduced correctly, in accordance with the musical sense, yet it is already a result of an intense proofreading – in the entire line of GE1, spanning bars 119-121, one can see traces of correction of slurs, probably more than once (in bar 120 traces indicate deletion of two slurs of a different, yet partially overlapping range). Two phases of proofreading, out of which the first did not yield satisfactory results, may suggest that Chopin, having seen a great number of errors, ordered to perform the proofreading after A in the first phase and it was only in the second phase that he personally marked the still remaining, substantial inaccuracies.
The traces were most probably one of the reasons one decided to engrave again the entire bottom part of the page (more than a half) when preparing GE1a. The makeover spanned bars 119-127 and the bottom most elements in bars 116-118, e.g. the tie of e in bars 117-118. In spite of a significant volume of work, no mistakes were committed, which would happen in other similar cases – see the characterization of GE1.  

Compare the passage in the sources »

category imprint: Corrections & alterations; Source & stylistic information

issues: Inaccurate slurs in A, Corrected slurs of Op. 21 in GE1

notation: Slurs

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