Ordonez, Karl von (1734-1786)

The present work is listed in the famous Quartbuch catalogue of (c.1775) and is, therefore, roughly contemporaneous with Haydn's 'Sturm und Drang' symphonies and works of a similar style and temperament by Ditters and Vanhal. As it is unlikely that all three composers and a number of others, including the genial Johann Christian Bach - were suffering simultaneous romantic crises, it would be fair to say that turbulent minor key symphonies were very much in vogue in the early 1770s. Ordonez's symphony is very delicately scored for a pair of oboes and strings; the Quartbuch entry also specifies horns although these are not listed on the wrapper of the sole-surviving source. Ordonez makes limited but effective use of the oboes in the outer movements and introduces two solo violas in the central movement. This edition is based on a contemporary set of manuscript parts preserved in the Biblioteca Estense in Modena (D 295). The wrapper reads: 'in g minor / Sinfonia / a. / 2 Violini / 2 Oboe / Andte 2 Viole Obl / Viola e Basso / Del Sigl. Carlo D'Ordonez'. The style and notation of articulation and dynamic markings have been standardized throughout and, where missing, reconstructed from parallel passages. These are indicated by the use of dotted slurs or brackets where appropriate. Like most eighteenth-century sources, the Biblioteca Estense manuscript is inconsistent in its notation of appoggiature; these too have been standardized to minimize confusion. Obvious wrong notes have been corrected without comment; editorial emendations with no authority from the source are placed within brackets. Allan Badley