A Centered Beam in Bach

[John Ruggero]

In the second movement of his Italian Concerto, Bach uses continual centered beams to distinguish two groups of instruments represented in the left hand:

Italian Concerto 2 Ex 1.png (857.15 KiB) Viewed 14120 times

Or was it just a convenient way to save space?

Later editions modernize this notation because of the great difficulties in engraving it legibly when using treble and bass clefs only.

However, the following gives one pause:

According to the editor of the Wiener Urtext edition, in m. 37 of the first printing of the first edition, the engraver, perhaps flummoxed, engraved:

Italian Concerto 2 Ex 3.png (14.98 KiB) Viewed 14120 times

Bach corrected this in his own copy of the first edition, a correction that appeared in the third printing:

Italian Concerto 2 Ex 2.png (1.71 MiB) Viewed 14120 times

This was a difficult correction for the engraver to make. Remnants of the earlier beam are evident in the example. Note that the engraver didn't move the eighth rests down into the proper position, perhaps to simplify the correction and/or avoid the damaged area. Would Bach have insisted on this correction if were merely a matter of consistency? And did his concern have to do with the fact that this is a crucial and very dramatic point at which the main dominant harmony and lowest bass note finally appear?

[NeeraWM]

Simply fascinating.
The Treble-Bass clef is indeed a history of convenience, one that has born inevitable consequences.
In this case I believe the space saving was the key because having a beam obscure ledger lines is not something that anyone should even try to replicate nowadays.

[John Ruggero]

In this case I believe the space saving was the key because having a beam obscure ledger lines is not something that anyone should even try to replicate nowadays.

I find it fascinating as well, Neera. As I mentioned, space saving might have been the reason that the engraver (and Bach) used centered beams to begin with, but that doesn't explain why Bach would insist on a centered beam in this one measure where spacing is not an issue. In thinking about it further, I would guess that consistency in showing the three voices, especialy at such a crucial point, was paramount to Bach.

I decided to modernize the left hand in the main text of my edition and supply the entire second movement with the original clefs and beaming in an appendix, because I feel that this could be influential for the interpretation.

Italian Concerto.2.png (75.34 KiB) Viewed 13283 times

There is a copy of the Italian Concerto by one Johann Christoph Oley that appears to be based on an earlier version in Bach's own manuscript. (Bach's later copy that was sent to the engraver is now lost.) In this version, the left hand is entirely in the bass clef and the accompaniment is sometimes divided between the staves in the style then common. But despite the different layout, centered beams rule. In the published version, Bach apparently decided to restrict the accompaniment entirely to the lower staff in the style that is now most common, probably to depict the two distinct competing forces of solo and tutti.

Oley 2.png (252.44 KiB) Viewed 13283 times

Oley 1.png (499.71 KiB) Viewed 13283 times

[NeeraWM]

Another point of consideration may be that there are so many things that look better when handwritten than in engraved form and vice versa.
Imagining the two above handwritten passages with the "proper" beaming would make them look quite ugly, I think.

[John Ruggero]

I have found only a few centered beams to be difficult to translate from manuscript to engraving in a way the preserves the import of the music. I once even resorted to a curved one and find it tolerable; maybe even more than tolerable:

curved slur.png (110.81 KiB) Viewed 13254 times

[NeeraWM]

The fact that it is possible to translate them in modern notation doesn't necessarily mean that one should do it.
With all the white space between the treble staff and the piano, I would not agree on bar 37's centred beam.
Nice job with the curved one, though. Was Finale capable of this?

[John Ruggero]

Thanks, Neera. Yes, I did it in Finale, but it took work. I was able to preserve almost all of the meaningful centered beams in this very complex piece (it's from the first movement of an arrangement of the B minor Flute Sonata), so it seemed a shame to omit the one in m. 36. But it's not an essential one and I would probably modernize it now. The one in m. 37 delineates phrasing, so that one stays. I would give it a little less of a beam slant, however. Also the one in the RH of m. 36 should straddle the second line more.

Judging from his manuscripts, Bach didn't have a thing about curved vs straight beams and used both. And he accepted the fact that his free-hand beams would be engraved as straight beams, since they appear throughout his opus 1. But to me, the original example of this thread does show him taking the notation very seriously and expecting the engraver to stay closer to what he had written.