Violinist Heinrich Wilhelm Ernst, a friend of Mendelssohn, was one of the great virtuosi of his age, standing alongside Paganini, Vieuxtemps and Wieniawski. Like them, he left behind a series of compositions that showcase the violin’s potential. Two works stand out among the few of his pieces that are still performed today, both of them brilliant and technically-challenging works for solo violin: his arrangement of Schubert’s “Erlkönig’, published in 1854; and the last of his Six Polyphonic Studies of 1864, whose theme is from the extremely popular Irish folksong of the time “The last rose of summer”. Henle is issuing an Urtext edition of these two pearls of solo violin literature for the first time, overseen by violinist Ingolf Turban.
G. Henle Publishers stands for Urtext sheet music of the highest quality. The Urtext editions not only provide the undistorted and authoritative musical text but are also aesthetically pleasing, optimised for practical use and extremely durable. And then there is the strong, distinctive blue profile: (almost) all of the Urtext editions are bound in the characteristic blue cardboard.
Musicians trust Henle's blue Urtext editions because they:
- provide an undistorted, reliable and authoritative musical text
- offer superb, aesthetically appealing music engraving
- are optimised for practical use (page turns, fingerings)
- are of high quality and durable (cover, paper, binding)
- contain a short preface that introduces the work (particularly useful for AMEB exams) in German, English and French, as well as explanatory footnotes for particularly interesting passages in the score
- contain a description of the sources, an evaluation of the sources, readings and a documentation of the corrections made (= "Critical Report") in German and English, and often also in French
