At a friendly invitation from the Kapellmeister of Linz Cathedral, Franz Xaver Glöggl, he asked Beethoven to compose "equales". In the mind of the choirmaster, this was a tradition of the city and its surroundings: short pieces for identical wind instruments in a mainly homophonic style intended for funeral ceremonies highly regulated by the Kirchenmusik Ordnung.
The composer, who had been living in Vienna for two decades, was not familiar with this tradition specific to the city of Linz and asked to hear some of them. Calling three instrumentalists that same day, Glöggl responded to Beethoven's wish, who apparently wrote three of these short pieces, dark and meditative in character, quickly in the afternoon.
And, at the beginning of November 1812, All Saints' Day, these Three Equales were played for the first time, slow meditations that surprising harmonies charge with strong emotion. Automatic translation.
On rapporte que les Trois Equales furent données lors des funérailles de Beethoven dans une version chantée sur les paroles du Miserere. Automatic translation.
Le manuscrit fait apparaître une particularité : seule la première Equale comporte des indications de nuances et d'accentuations ; les deux autres n'en comportent aucune, mise à part une indication initiale de tempo : poco adagio et poco sostenuto (on peut penser que les circonstances de la composition expliquent cette omission).
Pour les Equales 2 et 3, l'édition de L'Oiseau d'Or propose des indications de nuances et d'accentuations ; celles de la première restent conformes au manuscrit. En outre, comme il est d'usage aujourd'hui, les trombones 1 et 2 sont écrits en clé d'ut quatrième.
15 pages : the download includes the score (4 pages) and a separated part for each part (2x4 pages).
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