Talk:Sixteen Waltzes, Op. 39 (Brahms)

Title

He published the piece in three versions simultaneously: four-hands, and 2 two-hand versions (difficult and simplified). Why do we give prominence to the 4-hand version in the title?

Also, I’m sure Brahms is not the only composer to publish a set of 16 waltzes. If it had been only 3 waltzes, it would have needed a (Brahms) to distinguish it from sets by Chopin et al. Is the fact that it's 16 waltzes sufficient to render it unique? I sort of doubt it.

I'd like to see the title become Sixteen Waltzes (Brahms). Any comments before I move it? -- Jack of Oz ^{[your turn]} 03:45, 31 August 2011 (UTC)

The original version of these waltzes (one piano-four hands) was composed in 1865 and published in 1866. Due to their popularity, Brahms later arranged them for solo piano and simplified solo piano. These two later arrangements were published in 1867.

I plan to check several other editions before recommending any actual changes to this page, but so far I have confirmed this information with the New Grove Dictionary second edition, the original Brahms scholarly edition, plus several performing editions.

Regarding changing the title to Sixteen Waltzes (Brahms), it probably isn't necessary since no other composer (that anyone has heard of) has ever used the title. "16 Waltzes" = Brahms in the same way that "32 Sonatas" = Beethoven and "48 Preludes and Fugues" = Bach. Romanobella (talk) 18:11, 9 September 2011 (UTC)

I know what you mean, but we have no 32 Piano Sonatas. The closest is Late Piano Sonatas (Beethoven), the disambiguator necessary to distinguish from Late Piano Sonatas (Schubert), which now redirects to Schubert's last sonatas. Neither do we have a 48 Preludes and Fugues. We have a 24 Preludes and Fugues (Shostakovich), though.

So maybe the 4-hand version was the original and the other versions were afterthoughts. I accept that. It still doesn't mean we need to specify the forces in the title. If he'd written a different set of 16 waltzes for violin and piano, then we'd probably need to differentiate them by naming the forces - but he didn't. So, that comes down to a choice between Sixteen Waltzes (Brahms) and Sixteen Waltzes. Which do you prefer? -- Jack of Oz ^{[your turn]} 21:03, 9 September 2011 (UTC)

Of the two I would rather see Sixteen Waltzes (Brahms), but I would actually be more in favor of Sixteen Waltzes, Op. 39 or even Sixteen Waltzes, Op. 39 (Brahms). Using the Opus number would help distinguish the entry from Brahms' other famous waltzes.

Getting rid of for piano, four hands in the title is fine as long as the article itself is adjusted to more clearly state that the original composition was piano four hands, and the other versions are "arrangements" (albeit by the composer himself). There is a direct connection between the Viennese style of these waltzes and the music of Schubert, and the fact that they were conceived as duets instead of piano solo pieces is another "tip of the hat" (so to speak) to Schubert, who wrote prolifically for that medium. Romanobella (talk) 07:19, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

What other famous waltzes did Brahms write? -- Jack of Oz ^{[your turn]} 07:41, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

The Liebeslieder Waltzes, Op. 52 (nos. 1-18) and the Neue Liebeslieder Waltzes, Op. 65 (nos. 1-14). These are songs for a group of singers with piano four hands accompaniment, but there are also "arrangements" of both of these works for piano four hands (no singers), hence the possibility of confusion with Op. 39. Romanobella (talk) 15:11, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

Yes, of course. So, after sitting on this for 7 months, I've now moved it to your suggested Sixteen Waltzes, Op. 39 (Brahms). -- ♬ Jack of Oz ♬ ^{[your turn]} 08:47, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

Tetrabrachy?

From the lead:

Sixteen Waltzes, Op. 39 is a set of 16 short waltzes for piano four hands [...]

From a box in the article:

All performances by Martha Goldstein — Preceding unsigned comment added by 178.42.147.77 (talk) 16:53, 9 April 2014 (UTC) (Bot off, Sine; I want to keep anonymous!)

What stopped you from reading the rest of the lead? -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 03:40, 10 April 2014 (UTC)

The obvious and well-known Wikipedia fact that the lead *sentence* (the first sentence of the article) is not merely a part of the lead paragraph that's no different from all other sentences in it, but is understood as *the* definition of the subject (the most concise expression of the subject, whereas a fuller one is the lead paragraph, and the fullest one is the entire complete article). That is, the obvious fact that stopping reading past the first (i.e., defining) sentence of the article is in no way an "unfinished" reading, such that it would be correct to oppose, but a distinct manner of learning the subject. Stopping reading after the first sentence is a legitimate manner of absorbing the article, and therefore, it is correct to point inconsistencies between the first sentence and the rest of the article, such as the inconsistency brought up above. Your argument would only hold if the lead sentence had no distinct subject-defining function, which would mean that it is erroneous to stop reading after it. 83.24.27.174 (talk) 15:49, 19 May 2014 (UTC)

Requested move 5 June 2018

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: no consensus to move all of these articles at once. There may be a benefit to discussing each article individually (although probably not all at the same time). (closed by non-admin page mover) Bradv 01:21, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

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1. Sixteen Waltzes, Op. 39 (Brahms) → Sixteen Waltzes
2. Grande valse brillante in E-flat major (Chopin) → Grande valse brillante in E-flat major
3. Liebeslieder, Op. 114 (Strauss) → Liebeslieder (Strauss)
4. Waltz in B minor, Op. 69, No. 2 (Chopin) → Waltz in B minor (Chopin)
5. Waltz in C-sharp minor, Op. 64, No. 2 (Chopin) → Waltz in C-sharp minor (Chopin)
6. Waltz in A-flat major, Op. 42 (Chopin) → Waltz in A-flat major, Op. 42
7. Waltz in A-flat major, Op. 64, No. 3 (Chopin) → Waltz in A-flat major, Op. 64
8. Waltz in A-flat major, Op. 69, No. 1 (Chopin) → Waltz in A-flat major, Op. 69
9. Waltzes, Op. 34 (Chopin) → Waltzes, Op. 34
10. Waltzes, Op. 70 (Chopin) → Waltzes, Op. 70

– Per WP:CONCISE, WP:PRECISE, WP:ATDAB, and WP:DAB. These pages should (where possible, per WP:CONSISTENCY) match Waltz Suite (Prokofiev) (Op. 110), Pushkin Waltzes (Prokofiev) (Op. 120), and Mephisto Waltzes, which, like Sixteen Waltzes and several others nominated here, needs no parenthetical disambiguator. Where consistency is not possible, go back to the rest of the WP:CRITERIA and start over. There was a previous, non-WP:RM, two-editor discussion in 2011 (see top of talk page), but it's just people talking about what they subjectively like; there are no policy/guideline arguments made there, and they both appear unaware of how disambiguation is done here or why.

The purpose of our article titles, including disambiguations, is to WP:RECOGNIZABLY and WP:PRECISEly (but not over-precisely) identify the subject, not describe it in detail or provide alternative names or classifications for it. That's what the WP:LEAD section is for. Some of these, like "Waltz in A-flat major, Op. 69, No. 1 (Chopin)", are trying to cram four descriptive labels into the title at once when a maximum of two (title and a disambiguator) is sufficient in all these cases.

 — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  05:31, 5 June 2018 (UTC)

Notes:

• If there were a need to disambiguate examples like "Sixteen Waltzes", it would be Sixteen Waltzes (Brahms), which perhaps should exist as a redirect anyway.
• The opus numbers can and should also redirect, either to these articles or to disambiguation pages if they're not unique among notable works.
• In some of the Chopin cases, "Work Title (Chopin)" doesn't work, so "Work Title (Op. X)" opus number disambiguation is sufficient. Most Chopin (and other-composer) articles are already at undisambiguated or properly disambiguated titles like Waltz in E minor (Chopin).
• The "No. 3" sub-identifiers are not needed, any more than we need to give the track number or album side of a song when using the album name as a disambiguator, or include a chapter title when disambiguating a character article by the book they appear in, or use "(Johann Strauss II)" when "(Strauss)" will do.
• We might also consider WP:JARGON, and use "Opus 34" instead of "Op. 34" (which saves a single character at a great loss of clarity for everyone but experts), though this change would affect more than the waltzes category I'm doing cleanup in. Regardless, the comma disambiguation for these seems more appropriate than parenthetical, which might confusingly imply that "Op. 34" is a type of something, when it's more like a conventional subtitle of sorts.
• Strictly speaking, some of these could be shortened even further, but Waltz in B minor, etc., could possibly also refer to other notable music pieces we don't just have articles about yet. I have no objection to following usual procedure and using the shortest name, but am not personally certain that won't result in having to move a few soon after more articles arrive. I don't have a clear sense of how complete our coverage of notable Classical and related works may be.

 — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  05:31, 5 June 2018 (UTC)

• Comment: I hope you notified Classical music, who have in the rules for titles that you have to have the composer in the title if a work has to be disambiguated by opus number. For general titles such as waltz, it really helps finding something. A waltz could be by Strauss, Tchaikovsky, you name it. The number that sometimes begins a title (Sixteen Waltzes), does NOT help finding something. IMSLP would have 16 Waltzes, and have 16 only as a number, not part of the title. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 05:59, 5 June 2018 (UTC)

  No, I never notify wikiprojects of RMs, nor does anyone else who understand RM, because it's blatant WP:CANVASSING (trying to recruit a bloc vote of like-minded voters with a vested interest in keeping the names they created in the first place). The entire point of the RM process is to get Wikipedia-wide input, since it's usually the relevant wikiproject that caused the problem. That is very, very definitely the case here.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  13:17, 7 June 2018 (UTC)

• Comment 2: Id like to see all similar works by one composer treated the same, so dislike key here, op. there, only name the third. Very often a key is NOT part of the title and could first be dropped. - When a composer wrote only one kind of a thing, op. can be dropped. I took the liberty to number the proposals. I'd support #3 (onless he wrote other Liebeslieder, and we just don't have an article yet). --Gerda Arendt (talk) 06:07, 5 June 2018 (UTC)

  We do not do naming that way, though. We have WP:AT policy for a reason, and these sorts of WP:ILIKEIT-based and "my wikiproject is magically special and rules don't apply to it" arguments aren't helpful. They're why we have messes like this to clean up at all. While I have no prejudice against dropping the key info, that in itself would create a different consistency divergence. We have these untenably long, super-mega-over-disambiguated titles precisely because the classical wikiproject people who were around a decade ago ignored WP:CONCISE and WP:RECOGNIZABLE to make up their own wannabe-standard, to shoe-horn in a description instead of a name. Something has to be dropped (in most of these cases, more than one kind of something). If the key info isn't important after all, then it should not be in any titles like this at all.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  13:17, 7 June 2018 (UTC)

Who is that "we"? - Waltz alone tells me nothing, but with a composers name a lot. Yes, I like that ;) - We just had Sarabandes, which I though was for the general dance. I don't like that, it's short, precise and misleading. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 09:24, 9 June 2018 (UTC)

Oppose: Explaining further: I am all for short names, and I was the one who dropped "Johann Sebastian Bach" from his works, replaced by just "BWV" and number (Ich will den Kreuzstab gerne tragen, BWV 56), and even nothing when clearly the primary topic, such as St Matthew Passion. However, "Op." is just not personal, while BWV is for Bach, K. is for Mozart, D. for Schubert, - therefore I support the project's idea in opus cases for generic names, such as waltz, berceuse, you name it. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 06:50, 10 June 2018 (UTC)

• The proposal makes reference to the recognizability criterion, but the current titles do seem to be better in terms of WP:RECOGNIZABLE. I wouldn't assume there is only one Waltzes, Op. 34 or one Sixteen Waltzes, so having the (Brahms) or (Chopin) in the title is helpful to the end user. I'm not sure that much is gained from its exclusion. Consistency becomes a more worthwhile goal the less it is also likely to contribute to confusion. Dekimasuよ! 19:14, 12 June 2018 (UTC)
  • But "I wouldn't assume there is only one Waltzes, Op. 34 or one Sixteen Waltzes" is not how WP operates, ever, at all. We do not consider the entire possible global stockpile of "maybe" potential article titles, only those that are notable and have an encyclopedia article here, or at least a non-trivial redirect target, like a section at an article, that actually mentions the thing in question.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  03:18, 15 June 2018 (UTC)
• Support removing unnecessary disambiguation. Parentheticals are pointless if the base name already redirects to the article (or is a red link). If any of the titles is ambiguous, a dab page listing all the other uses should be created.--Cúchullain ^t/c 15:38, 13 June 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose per Dekimasu and Gerda (could support a few select ones, such as #4 and #5, maybe #2). Since titles of clasical music pieces are often generic-sounding, we need to rely more on WP:RECOGNIZABLE and WP:CONSISTENCY than on WP:CONCISE; to quote SmokeyJoe, over enthusiastic abbreviation hurts recognisability with no upside. I could support dropping opus numbers here and there, but Chopin's waltzes would be unrecognizable without the (Chopin) disambiguator. No such user (talk) 10:59, 14 June 2018 (UTC)

• I am fine with #4 and #5 (and probably #3) as well. Dekimasuよ! 18:49, 14 June 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose per Dekimasu and Gerda - appreciate the need to obstruct pop music readers as they typically don't have a clue what band the song they are looking for is by and putting the artist name on would make the article way too easy to find, but for classical music readers can't see why we should prevent them from easily finding the article. Primary redirect works well here. Let's apply WP:CRYPTIC and WP:OBSCURE to ship articles first. Those are way too helpful to readers. Then come back and obscure classical music articles. In ictu oculi (talk) 08:46, 15 June 2018 (UTC)

• It's not clear to me how much of this is sarcasm... too helpful to readers? Too easy to find? Even though you're agreeing with me, please clarify. Dekimasuよ! 21:32, 15 June 2018 (UTC)

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The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.