Schubert’s “Tenth”: an Interpretation Between Construction and Restitution

Abstract

Abstract In Franz Schubert’s creation the fragment takes on various forms of manifestation, ranging from the fragmentary reception of an already constituted piece to the fragmentary notation, in the form of a sketch, of a work that has not yet been completed. A special place belongs to the Tenth Symphony in D major, D 936A, by Schubert, left unfinished; we received it as a sketch, in a convolute, together with two other unfinished symphonies in the same key: D 615 and D 708A. The present study aims to expose three artistic interpretations of these sketches, materialized in completed musical works, with a distinct approach. The intention of the British composer and conductor Brian Newbould was to finish the symphony in the way that Schubert himself would have done, anchoring the musical ideas from the sketches in the composer’s style. Peter Gülke approached the sketches through the eyes of the researcher and the analyst, with the intention of obtaining their most accurate and authentic reproduction, emphasizing the materialization of some of Schubert’s possible intentions. Finally, Luciano Berio manages in Rendering to musically render the sketches per se, imagining a musical fresco where the concrete musical ideas, written by Schubert, are deliberately mixed with the provisional character of the manuscript.