Grasnick 5: Beethoven's Pocket Sketchbook for the Agnus Dei of the Missa Solemnis, Opus 123

Long neglected in scholarship, the so-called Grasnick 5 documents reveal Beethoven working out concepts and ideas, offering fascinating insights into his creative method. This critical edition, the third in the Beethoven Sketchbook Series, offers a facsimile and transcription of the contents of the stitched pocket sketchbook started by the fifty-year-old master during the summer of 1820. At the time, Beethoven labored over the Missa solemnis, Opus 123. The sketchbook's pages yield the entire record of his early ideas on the Agnus Dei of that work as well as a sketch for part of the Benedictus. Patrizia Metzler and Fred Stoltzfus decipher the quirks of the composer's workshopping--the infamous penmanship, multiple generations of pencil and ink marks, and omitted notation--and wrestle with the legibility issues inherent in the task of dealing with aged documents. Their commentary completes a fruitful scholarly journey and provides context for experts, musicians, and anyone else interested in this fraught period of Beethoven's creative life.