Making the Music Work: Toward a 'Dynamic Edition' of Chopin

Abstract

Editing Chopin requires a delicate balance between inclusivity and fidelity. Striking that balance is far from easy, however, not least because numerous relevant sources exist for most of Chopin's compositions. Even the approach adopted by the most sophisticated recent Chopin editions proves inadequate given the sheer quantity of variants and the impossibility of fitting all onto the page. The solution resides not in printed editions but in digital media, thanks to the development of technologies for storing, retrieving, combining and supplementing the information that previously would have fed into or emanated from conventional printed editions but which could not easily have been presented within them. Notwithstanding certain limitations, there are remarkable practical advantages to on-screen rather than in-print display. It is therefore surprising that although abundant digital editions exist of collections of letters, historical documentation and literature of all kinds, many fewer counterparts have been produced in the field of music. This article provides background information about the issues adumbrated here, as well as a detailed case study of the Online Chopin Variorum Edition (OCVE), which was developed with funding from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation from 2002 to 2017.