Tuesday, January 14, 2025

January 14 - Ludwig von Köchel (The Musical Birthday Series, 6th Annual Cycle)

Previous posts for January 14th are here: Franchinus Gaffurius (2020), Ludwig von Köchel (2021), Jack Jones (2022), François Joseph Dizi (2023), and Russ Columbo (2024)

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Ludwig von Köchel (14 January 1800 – 3 June 1877) was an Austrian musicologist, writer, composer, botanist, and publisher, best known for cataloguing the works of Mozart. 



 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thoughts on Köchel (Ninth Edition)


A major shortcoming of Köchel first edition was that there was no room to expand the strictly sequential numbering in the main catalogue to allow for any new discoveries or further reassessment of existing works, and as of 2024 a new organizational system is used for the ninth version. . – adapted from Wikipedia, s.v. “Köchel catalogue”


Though Köchel had a vision of completeness,

The upshot of his echt-Teutonic neatness

Was a system insufficiently elastic

To flex around the changes, sometimes drastic,

When scholars found the need make additions,

Or dump some pieces clouded by suspicions.


From time to time new editors will tweak it,

And yet it feels familiar when we seek it,

And each edition bears a family likeness

To Köchel’s old original Verzeichnis.

 

 

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