Dittersdorf, Carl Ditters von: Sonate Hercule en Dieu (AE213)

Dittersdorf, Carl Ditters von (1739-1799)

As one would expect, nothing even approaching the routine intrudes into this symphony. Even in its tonal architecture the work is unusual: the symphony, which is largely in C major, closes in the comparatively remote key of A major. The two movements which lend themselves most readily to Dittersdorf 's vivid pictorial style are the Adagio and the brilliant fugal Finale with its tortured chromatic harmonies and shuddering pedal point. Nonetheless, the Minuetto and Alternativo are also highly effective movements and succeed admirably in suggesting Deianiras's unstable emotional state. The techniques Dittersdorf employs to depict this instability - rincipally by means of syncopation and unexpected harmonic shifts - are familiar to us from his earlier Sinfonia ' Il Combattimento delle passioni umani'. The first-movement depiction of 'labour' through the medium of counterpoint anticipates Haydn's famous chorus in The Four Seasons . The last bars of the work, in which Hercules appears as a glimmering star, are quite magical in their effect. The parts are marked carefully although Dittersdorf is not over-detailed in his instructions to the performers. The occasional copying errors provide insufficient evidence to determine whether the parts were copied from a piano score or prepared directly from the composer's full orchestral score. Little editorial work has been necessary to prepare this edition. The style and notation of articulation and dynamic markings have been standardised throughout and, where missing from the source, markings have been reconstructed from parallel passages. These are indicated by the use of dotted slurs or brackets where appropriate. Like most eighteenth-century sources, the manuscript is at times inconsistent in its notation of appoggiature ; these too have been standardised to minimise confusion. Obvious wrong notes have been corrected without comment; editorial emendations with no authority from the source are placed within brackets. Allan Badley