Bach gave his wife Anna Magdalena two handwritten books of music. The second one is of particular value with its gilt-edged, vellum-covered binding. In this little book of 1725 he noted down numerous piano works in the most different styles – both his own and by other composers. The Henle Urtext edition, which incidentally is one of our bestselling titles, faithfully reproduces the complete contents of this manuscript, aside from the movements from the “French Suites” (HN 593) and “Partitas” (HN 28) in the notebook, which can be found elsewhere in the Henle catalogue. It is also an example of beautiful engraving by hand.
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
