Introduction

It was the writing by Ian Bent and William Drabkin of the General Preface to the English translation of Der Tonwille (New York: Oxford University Press, 2004–2005), entailing as it did examining much of Schenker's correspondence with Universal Edition and the attorneys involved in the potential court proceeding between the two contending parties, that gave the initial impetus to what is now Schenker Documents Online.

Phase 1 : Schenker Correspondence Project : 2003–2007

An independent web-based project entitled The Schenker Correspondence Project, the purpose of which was to publish all Schenker's correspondence in a scholarly, digital edition, was launched in 2003. This was co-ordinated from the UK by Professors Ian Bent and William Drabkin, the editing done by a small international team of scholars, the data held on the servers of Columbia University in the City of New York using the webblog software package MovableType, with a linked website on the server of the University of Cambridge Faculty of Music, for both of which invaluable technical support was provided by those institutions. The first document went up on the site on June 12, 2004.

2003–2007 marked phase 1 of the project, and served as a pilot for an eventually larger, more comprehensive undertaking; it was almost entirely unfunded. The years 1900–1912 formed the primary focus of Schenker's correspondence for phase 1, emphasis being placed on Schenker's two principal publishers, Universal Edition and J. G. Cotta—although correspondence from later years (Angi Elias, August Halm, Maximilian Harden, Oswald Jonas, Felix-Eberhard von Cube, Viktor Zuckerkandl, and others) was also published. Some 500 items of correspondence were posted to the web during this phase.

Phase 2 : Schenker Documents Online : 2007–2010

So important did Schenker's diaries prove to be in corroborating his correspondence that for phase 2, spanning 2007–2010, the scope of the project was expanded to include both Schenker's diaries and his lessonbooks, with the aim of providing the end-user with fluid movement among the three categories of documents. In 2007, the project was retitled Schenker Documents Online (SDO). Funding was obtained from the Leverhulme Trust in the UK for three years specifically to design and deliver a new web environment using XML encoding and following TEI guidelines: the design work was carried out at the Centre for Computing in the Humanities at King's College London, on whose servers the project would in future be maintained. For phase 2, the focus shifted to the eight-year period 1918–25, one which saw the emergence of Urlinie and Ursatz and the beginnings of layered voice-leading analysis, and in which the outcome of World War I and ensuing economic stringency had a major impact on Schenker's thinking. Correspondence with Universal Edition again occupied a central place, along with other correspondence streams (Guido Adler, Wilhelm Furtwängler, Anthony van Hoboken, the Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde, Felix Salzer, Moriz Violin, Hans Weisse, and others).

For phase 2, Schenker Documents Online entered into collaboration with a team of scholars working at the Universität für Musik und Darstellende Kunst in Vienna, who transcribed and translated Schenker's diaries for 1918–25 in extenso, delivering XML-encoded files for publication on SDO. This work was funded for three years by the Austrian Fonds zur Förderung der wissenschaftlichen Forschung (FWF). Funds were provided by other British trusts for the supply of document scans and for other purposes. The new web environment was released in its first version in September 2009.

Phase 3 : SDO : 2011–2014

Phase 3 focussed primarily on the period October 1925 to September 1930, the period in which Schenker arrived at the final formulation of his theory, and resumed work on Der freie Satz. Emphasis was placed on Schenker's correspondence with the third of his three main publishing houses, Drei Masken Verlag of Munich, with the engravers Waldheim-Eberle of Vienna, and with those involved in their publication of Das Meisterwerk in der Musik (Otto Erich Deutsch, Alfred Einstein, and others) as well as that with Universal Edition, the content of which interlocks with that of DMV; and also on the diaries for 1925‒30, and the lessonbooks for the seasons 1925/26 to 1929/30 (the latter, however, was not carried out). This phase was funded by a large grant from the Arts & Humanities Research Council of Great Britain. During this phase, some transfer of correspondence from the Columbia site was carried out, and some editing of new material outside the 1925‒30 framework (e.g. Walter Dahms, Viktor Hammer).

For phase 3, Schenker Documents Online was based at the Department of Music of the University of Southampton in collaboration with the Department of Digital Humanities of University of London King's College. The Principal Investigator was William Drabkin, Co-Investigators were Paul Spence and Andrea Reiter, with post-doctorate fellows Marko Deisinger and David Bretherton and PhD candidates Kirstie Hewlett and Georg Burgstaller. As part of the AHRC project plan, SDO published Heinrich Schenker: Selected Correspondence, edited by Ian Bent, David Bretherton and William Drabkin and published by The Boydell Press of Woodbridge, Suffolk. This 568-page volume presents some 450 letters in English translation, organized into six sections devoted to aspects of his professional life, with extensive introductory materials and supporting commentary.

In March 2013 the members of the phase 3 project team presented papers at a special Schenker Documents panel at the Fifth International Schenker Symposium, hosted by the Mannes College; these were published in the journal Music Analysis, vol. 34, No. 2, "Special Issue on Schenker Documents" (July 2015).

Phase 4 : 2014‒2017

Phase 4 comprised two main initiatives. First, the team of scholars in Vienna headed by Martin Eybl extended its previous coverage to include 1912-14 and 1931 to Schenker's death in January 1935, again funded by the FWF. Transcription was by Marko Deisinger, translation by William Drabkin (with annotations by both), editorial work by Kirstie Hewlett, and XML encoding by Iby-Jolande Varga.

Second, much of the correspondence encoded during phase 1 and the early part of phase 2 in MovableType on the Columbia University website (which finally went offline around the end of this period) was re-edited and XML encoded on the main site. The largest collections were those with Universal Edition, Josef Weinberger, and J.G. Cotta, encompassing 1901 to 1909, but important collections with numerous private persons, for example Felix-Eberhard von Cube, Wilhelm Furtwängler, August Halm, Oswald Jonas, and Julius Röntgen, were re-edited and encoded on the present site.

Phase 5 : 2018-2022

Phase 5 comprised three projects. The first closed the remaining gaps in Schenker's diaries: that from 1896 to 1911, transcribed, translated, and encoded by Ian Bent; that from 1915 to September 1917, and the separate political diary that Schenker created between November 1918 and June 1919, produced by Marko Deisinger with William Drabkin, Kirstie Hewlett, and Iby-Jolande Varga, this team now headed by Deisinger and again funded by FWF. Thus, after fourteen years, the online presentation of the entire diary series from 1896 to 1935 was finally accomplished, giving access to an unprecedented body of information on Schenker's career, works, teaching, private life, contacts with family, friends, and colleagues, and dealings with the outside world.

The second project was to make significant inroads into Schenker's lessonbooks, which are rich in information on Schenker's teaching methods and his dealings with his pupils. Those presented for the first time were January-March 1912 (the first lessonbook) and 1913/14 to 1920/21. These yield a continuous sequence from October 1913 to June 1921 plus 1923/24, edited and translated by Ian Bent, Alan Dodson and Sigrun Heinzelmann, the original transcriptions being by Robert Kosovsky, who must be credited with laying the foundation for this entire project.

The third project concerned correspondence, and included that with Universal Edition for 1910 and 1911, the completion of the surviving correspondence with all of Schenker’s pupils (c.700 items), and Karl Grunsky, members of the Brahms circle Ernst Rudorff and Eugen d’Albert, Violin/Schoenberg, and parts of those with Hermann Rinn, editor of Der Kunstwart, Victor Hammer, Moriz Violin, and Josef Marx.

Phase 6 : 2022-2025

The first intiative for 2022 to 2025 is to extend coverage of Schenker's lessonbooks, starting with 1912/13 (particularly rich and informative), then to fill the gap between October 1921 and June 1923, after which to move beyond October 1924.

The second aim will be (1) to expand the coverage of Schenker's correspondence with his publishers to include Breitkopf & Härtel and Edition Peters, while continuing the coverage of that with Universal Edition and J. G. Cotta, Schenker's leading publishers; (2) to complete the early correspondence with members of the Brahms circle, and to continue the Violin-Schenker correspondence and perhaps complete that with Victor Hammer.

Phase 5 saw for the first time an unpublished Schenker analysis -- that of Brahms's Piano Quartet No. 3 in C minor, Op. 60, dating from 1913. The possibility exists of complementing this with other analyses from the period 1912 to 1916, known collectively as Die Kleine Bibliothek ("The Little Lbrary").

Since 2020, the SDO website has been maintained on a limited basis by King's Digital Lab [KDL}, an independent unit affiliated with the Department of Digital Humanities [DDH] of King's College London. This maintenance is conducted under a Service Level Agreement [SLA] that provides continuity, upgrading of technology, and one full update of the site per annum. SDO is grateful to Dr. Marko Deisinger for funding its SLA through to the end of 2025 out of his grant from the Austrian Fonds zur Förderung der wissenschaftlichen Forschung (FWF).

Beyond 2025

Here SDO will enter unfunded territory, and its future will become uncertain. By then, also, old age may be taking its toll on its two editors. A new generation of Schenker scholars will be needed to launch a fresh Schenker Documents research project and fund it; otherwise the website may go dark and 22 years of work be lost, sharing the fate of so many other digital music research sites over recent decades.