Mahler-6, Editions   home   articles

It is astonishing that such a major work as Mahler’s Symphony nr.6 only recently got a critical edition that was based upon all the available sources.

Mahler composed his 6th symphony in 1903-04 and finished the manuscript score in 1905. He always improved his compositions after the first performance. Especially the instrumentation was revised. Also the ‘sixth’ still was a work in progress after the first performances in 1906. Compared with other works the process of revising the instrumentation was completed very vast. Therefore the first edition (EA, Erstausgabe, 1906) could be followed in by a revised edition (NA, Neuausgabe, 1906) in the same year.

In the Critical Edition of the Collected Works (Kritische Gesamtausgabe der Internationalen Gustav Mahler Gesellschaft, Wien) a new critical score of the symphony was published (GA, Gesamtausgabe,1963, prepared by Erwin Ratz). It is based upon NA,1906 with the corrections Mahler put in Mengelberg’s NA,1906-score (NAMeng). This Ratz-edition was to become the standard for the next 35 years.

One source of  very important information, Mahler’s own correction-copy for the NA,1906 (CorrMahler) was not yet available when Erwin Ratz prepared his edition in the nineteen-sixties. With this data Karl Heinz Füssl and Reinhold Kubik revised the GA,1963. It was published in 1998 as Revised Edition in the Collected Works (Revidierte Ausgabe,1998). Though many details will cause an everlasting discussion we must conclude that this recent edition is the best reconstruction of Mahler’s final concept of the symphony until hidden documents will give new evidence.

EA,1906          →  =    ‘Originalfassung’, Eulenburg, 1968,

↓                                  ed.Hans F. Redlich

NA,1906 

↓

NAMeng →    GA,1963 (Erwin Ratz)

↓

CorrMahler→RA,1998 (Karl Heinz Füssl&Reinhold Kubik)

The problem of the position of the Scherzo and Andante and the hammer is discussed in an other article.