sources - Nottingham eTheses - The University of Nottingham
sources - Nottingham eTheses - The University of Nottingham sources - Nottingham eTheses - The University of Nottingham
1.4 Post-première revisions and the 1906 revival According to one interpretation of a letter he wrote to Kovařovic on 9 February 1904, Janáček may have made some revisions to the opera soon after the première. 49 However, the importance of the 1906 revival is that it prompted the first substantial (and substantiated) post-première revisions to the work. Evidence of this comes in a letter from the conductor Cyril Metoděj Hrazdira to Janáček on 11 July 1906 (for transcription and translation, see APPENDIX II). Hrazdira — another former Janáček pupil — conducted the première and all the early performances of Jenůfa from 1904 to 1906. 50 His proposals for a number of cuts, perhaps prompted by the controversy surrounding Charvát’s article in Jeviště, seem to have been accepted and indeed added to by Janáček (see CHAPTER 2, §2.2, and APPENDIX IV). Because the first performance following these suggestions and consequent revisions took place in Ostrava (another ‘touring’ performance, given on 25 September 1906), this post- première revision has even been claimed as the ‘Ostrava’ version of Jenůfa. 51 As will be seen below (CHAPTER 2, §2.2), this set of revisions is in turn crucial in determining what was heard at the première in 1904. 49 JA vii, 17; Eng. trans. JODA, JP35. This is Štědroň’s interpretation (ZGJ, 111; Štědroň 1968b, 24) of Janáček’s penultimate paragraph: ‘All sorts of corrections were of course necessary in the score — ; I think that many of the criticisms that were made have now fallen away in the corrections.’ However, a perhaps more plausible explanation is that Janáček was referring to the ‘criticisms’ implicit in Prague’s earlier rejection of the opera, and to the ‘corrections’ he had in consequence made in October 1903 (see above); this is Tyrrell’s view (Tyrrell 1996, xii / Tyrrell 2000, vi). See CHAPTER 2, §2.2. 50 Cyril Metoděj Hrazdira (1868–1926) was one of Janáček’s pupils at the Brno Organ School (1886–8) and conductor at the Brno National Theatre from 1903 to 1907. One of his own operas, Ječmínek, was premièred there in the same season as Jenůfa (3 March 1904); Němcová 1971, 134. 51 See Gregor 1978 and Mazurek 1978. 13
1.5 Later revisions and publication The 1906 performances themselves may have prompted Janáček to make the next set of more extensive revisions. A note at the end of Act 2 of ŠFS reads ‘opraveno 10.I.1907’ [revised 10 January 1907], indicating a process of revision that probably began only a month earlier. 52 But a further incentive for these changes — which are much more wide-ranging and radical than any of the composer’s earlier alterations — is likely to have been Janáček’s decision to submit the opera in March 1907 to the Czech Academy in application for an award. 53 It was not until December that Janáček heard that his application had failed, 54 but by that time the Brno-based Klub přátel umění [Club of the friends of art] had decided — largely on Janáček’s own initiative — to begin a modest programme of music publication. The first (and in the event far from modest) project, a vocal score of Jenůfa, was turned round in a remarkably short space of time, and by mid-March 1908 copies were being sent out to the Club’s members. 55 How far in advance the idea of publishing Jenůfa in vocal score had been floated is not clear, but the head of the Club’s music committee was Janáček’s champion and former pupil, the critic Jan Kunc (1883–1976). If the idea had been around earlier, the incentive of publication might well be seen as a plausible further explanation for the much more radical nature of Janáček’s winter 1906/7 revisions, as compared with the essentially stop-gap revisions of summer 1906 (which were largely 52 A letter from Josef Antoš Frýda (director of the Brno National Theatre, 1905–9) to Janáček on 11 December 1906 refers to Janáček’s request for the return of the scores of Jenůfa and Osud (BmJA, D 717); see JYL i, 672. It seems that Janáček spent the Christmas–New Year holidays revising Jenůfa; with his heavy teaching commitments, most of his compositional activity was concentrated in the holiday periods. 53 ZGJ, 112. 54 Ibid. 55 JODA, 62–3. For a detailed account of the Klub přátel umění and its activities, see Kundera 1948. 14
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1.4 Post-première revisions and the 1906 revival<br />
According to one interpretation <strong>of</strong> a letter he wrote to Kovařovic on 9 February 1904,<br />
Janáček may have made some revisions to the opera soon after the première. 49<br />
However, the importance <strong>of</strong> the 1906 revival is that it prompted the first substantial<br />
(and substantiated) post-première revisions to the work. Evidence <strong>of</strong> this comes in a<br />
letter from the conductor Cyril Metoděj Hrazdira to Janáček on 11 July 1906 (for<br />
transcription and translation, see APPENDIX II). Hrazdira — another former Janáček<br />
pupil — conducted the première and all the early performances <strong>of</strong> Jenůfa from 1904<br />
to 1906. 50 His proposals for a number <strong>of</strong> cuts, perhaps prompted by the controversy<br />
surrounding Charvát’s article in Jeviště, seem to have been accepted and indeed added<br />
to by Janáček (see CHAPTER 2, §2.2, and APPENDIX IV). Because the first<br />
performance following these suggestions and consequent revisions took place in<br />
Ostrava (another ‘touring’ performance, given on 25 September 1906), this post-<br />
première revision has even been claimed as the ‘Ostrava’ version <strong>of</strong> Jenůfa. 51 As will<br />
be seen below (CHAPTER 2, §2.2), this set <strong>of</strong> revisions is in turn crucial in determining<br />
what was heard at the première in 1904.<br />
49 JA vii, 17; Eng. trans. JODA, JP35. This is Štědroň’s interpretation (ZGJ, 111; Štědroň 1968b, 24) <strong>of</strong><br />
Janáček’s penultimate paragraph: ‘All sorts <strong>of</strong> corrections were <strong>of</strong> course necessary in the score — ; I<br />
think that many <strong>of</strong> the criticisms that were made have now fallen away in the corrections.’ However, a<br />
perhaps more plausible explanation is that Janáček was referring to the ‘criticisms’ implicit in Prague’s<br />
earlier rejection <strong>of</strong> the opera, and to the ‘corrections’ he had in consequence made in October 1903 (see<br />
above); this is Tyrrell’s view (Tyrrell 1996, xii / Tyrrell 2000, vi). See CHAPTER 2, §2.2.<br />
50 Cyril Metoděj Hrazdira (1868–1926) was one <strong>of</strong> Janáček’s pupils at the Brno Organ School (1886–8)<br />
and conductor at the Brno National <strong>The</strong>atre from 1903 to 1907. One <strong>of</strong> his own operas, Ječmínek, was<br />
premièred there in the same season as Jenůfa (3 March 1904); Němcová 1971, 134.<br />
51 See Gregor 1978 and Mazurek 1978.<br />
13
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