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It may come as a surprise to open an
anthology of oboe methods from 1800-
1860 and find that the first work is not for
oboe but Frédéric Chalon’s Méthode pour
le cor anglais (c. 1802). It might have
been less misleading to mention cor
anglais in the title of the anthology.
Cholon’s is the only work dedicated
specifically to the cor anglais, but the
instrument is treated by several other texts
included in the anthology. Despite being
no more than an assemblage of fingering
charts for a two-keyed instrument and a
series of duets, Chalon provides us with
rare and important information, including
a scale in quarter tones intended to
instruct how to “draw the sound from one
note to another [filer un son d’un ton à
l’autre]”, also a chart of trill fingerings,
and special fingerings to use for slurring
across octaves. Moreover, this work
should not be passed over by oboists as
all the material is equally applicable to
the two-keyed oboe. The duets were
printed with the parts for corno primo
and corno secondo in separate
gatherings. The facsimile reproduces the
part books sequentially in one volume.
This is a shortcoming as it is impossible to
perform the duets without copying the
pages for one of the players.
Of all French methods, Joseph-François
Garnier’s Méthode raisonnée pour le
hautbois enjoyed perhaps the widest
dissemination. As well as being translated
into German (Offenbach: André, 1815)
and Italian (Bologna: Cipriani n.d.),
publishing houses in Germany and Italy
extracted the musical exercises and
studies for separate publication. The
studies lived on and are to be found in
one anthology as late as 1896 – the
second edition of Paul Wieprecht’s
Studienwerk für Oboe unter
Zugrundelegung der Oboeschule von
Garnier, Op.7 (Offenbach: André).
Despite the influence it exercised in
the nineteenth century, the Méthode
raisonnée is not printed in Fuzeau’s
nineteenth-century volumes. It is
however, to be found in the first volume
of French methods from (1600-1800).
Dating Garnier’s work is problematic. It
certainly stands on the turn of the century
– the Fuzeau editors preferred to date it in
the 1790s while more recent research
based on imprint details suggests a date
just into the new century (1802).
Supporting an earlier dating is the fact
that this method is in the older tradition
of the eighteenth-century self-help
manual rather than the more thorough
nineteenth-century Conservatoire method
tutor. It is unfortunate that Fuzeau did not
have access to cleaner copies of Garnier’s
plates, as the reproduction does little
justice to the fine quality of the original
engravings. Note that although Garnier
indicates that the illustrations of the
Delusse oboe and reed-making
equipment are printed at actual size, the
lengths given alongside the different
joints of the oboe in pouces and lignes
correspond to the scaling in neither
original nor facsimile.
The Grande méthode de hautbois by
Henri Brod is one of the most valuable
and rarest of all the methods presented
in the anthology. Rare from the
bibliophilistic standpoint because
this finely printed work survives in
remarkably small numbers outside the
dozen or so found in public collections,
and even more valuable from the
musical and historical standpoints
because it documents the work of one of
the most important oboists and oboe
designers of nineteenth-century France.
Here Brod presented his progressive
oboe designs, exceptionally detailed
instructions on reed-making as well as a
comprehensive array of study material
and a discussion of performance
practice issues. Fuzeau chose to use
the copy in the British Library (shelf
number: h.2660) giving the date as
1826/35. This might seem confusing,
but as this is the complete, two-volume
edition incorporating the first
part printed in 1826 with Brod’s
supplementary second volume from nine
years later, the designation is apt. Still,
there are further complications ascribing
this date.
Instrumental method books that endured
any longevity were invariably in a state
of flux. Revisions and additions were
constantly being made in response to
changes to instrument design and musical
fashion. The result was that practically
every surviving copy of a work such as
Brod’s is unique.
Ideally the editor should examine every
known exemplar and base the decision
of which copy to reproduce not only the
physical state and completeness of each
exemplar, but on its historical
significance.
Add to this the many practical factors
such as where the surviving copies are
housed, and whether the library or owner
is willing to furnish adequate copies and
grant reproduction rights. As it turns out,
the choice of h.2660 was not entirely
fortuitous because this copy lacks Brod’s
original fingering chart for 8-keyed oboe.
Notice the discrepancy between the oboe
depicted in the illustrations on pages 3
and 4 [pp.93 and 94 of the anthology]
and the chart of specific fingerings on
p.96 which were all part of the original
publication, and the keys listed in the
chart for the 11-keyed oboe on p.95,
and the one for 15-keyed oboe on p.105
which were interpolated sometime in the
1860s. The copy probably dates from well
after Brod’s death in 1839, and also after
Fuzeau’s self-designated cut-off date of
1860.
This chart on p.105 of the anthology was
prepared by Victor Bretonnière and served
a variety of functions. It, or a clone,
appeared in Bretonnière’s own Nouvelle
méthode de hautbois (Paris: Joly, 1867), it
was also sold separately at the Triebert
shop, perhaps distributed with each new
oboe and, as we see here, pressed into
service to extend the marketability of an
earlier method. So, while it is fascinating
to see how Brod’s method was updated
and adapted to more modern oboe
designs, it was misleading to include this
chart in the anthology, particularly as
there is no editorial commentary pointing
Double Reed News 85 Winter 2008 27