CHASE

The edition by Joseph Hellmesberger jr is one of the minority that show little or no influence from Ferdinand David. Like Dont and Vieuxtemps (perhaps representing a genuine Viennese tradition) it retains more of the separate bows of the original edition. Hellmesberger’s grandfather Georg (1800-1873) had become one of the most influential violinists in Vienna by the 1830s and his father Joseph (1828-1893), like Joachim, Dont and Singer a pupil of Joseph Boehm, dominated violin playing in Vienna for much of the second half of the century. Although there are signs in his edition that the younger Joseph was also aware of the David and Joachim approach to Beethoven’s Violin Concerto, he was much more inclined even than Dont to abstain from adding slurred bowings in the extensive passages of notes that were left unslurred in the first edition. Hellmesberger’s edition, like Vieuxtemps’s also frequently indicates the breaking up of longer slurs into shorter slurs or even separate bows. This may be connected with his intention, explicitly announced on the title page of his editions of Mendelssohn and Spohr violin concertos (but absent here): "soigneusement doigté et avec mode moderne pour le coup d’archet" (accurately provided with fingering and bowing according to the "modern fashion"). [C. B.]