In
musicology, the opus number is the "work number" that is assigned to a
musical composition, or to a set of compositions, to indicate the
chronological order of the
composer's production. Opus numbers are used to distinguish among compositions with similar titles; the word is abbreviated as "Op." for a single work, or "Opp." when referring to more than one work.
To indicate the specific place of a given work within a
music catalogue, the opus number is paired with a
cardinal number; for example,
Beethoven's
Piano Sonata No. 14 in C-sharp minor (1801, nicknamed ''Moonlight Sonata'') is "Opus 27, No. 2", whose work-number identifies it as a companion piece to "Opus 27, No. 1" (
Piano Sonata No. 13 in E-flat major, 1800–01), paired in same opus number, with both being subtitled ''Sonata quasi una Fantasia'', the only two of the kind in all of Beethoven's 32 piano sonatas. Furthermore, the ''Piano Sonata, Op. 27 No. 2, in C-sharp minor'' is also catalogued as "Sonata No. 14", because it is the fourteenth
sonata composed by Ludwig van Beethoven.
Given composers' inconsistent or inexistent assignment of opus numbers, especially during the
Baroque (1600–1750) and the
Classical (1750–1827) eras, musicologists have developed other catalogue-number systems; among them the ''
Bach-Werke-Verzeichnis
The (BWV; ; ) is a catalogue of compositions by Johann Sebastian Bach. It was first published in 1950, edited by Wolfgang Schmieder. The catalogue's second edition appeared in 1990. An abbreviated version of that second edition, known as BWV ...
'' (BWV-number), and the ''
Köchel-Verzeichnis'' (K- and KV-numbers) which enumerate the works of
Johann Sebastian Bach and
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, respectively.
Etymology
In the
classical period, the Latin word ''opus'' ("work", "labour"), plural ''opera'', was used to identify, list, and catalogue a work of art.
By the 15th and 16th centuries, the word ''opus'' was used by Italian composers to denote a specific musical composition, and by German composers for collections of music. In compositional practice, numbering musical works in chronological order dates from 17th-century Italy, especially
Venice. In common usage, the word ''opus'' is used to describe the best work of an artist with the term ''
magnum opus
A masterpiece, ''magnum opus'' (), or ''chef-d’œuvre'' (; ; ) in modern use is a creation that has been given much critical praise, especially one that is considered the greatest work of a person's career or a work of outstanding creativity, ...
''.
In Latin, the words ''opus'' (singular) and ''opera'' (plural) are related to the words ''opera'' (singular) and ''operae'' (plural), which gave rise to the Italian words ''opera'' (singular) and ''opere'' (plural), likewise meaning "work". In contemporary English, the word ''opera'' has specifically come to denote the dramatic musical genres of opera or ballet, which were developed in Italy.
[''Oxford English Dictionary'', s.v.]
opera, n. 1
,
opera, n. 2
As a result, the plural ''opera'' of ''opus'' tends to be avoided in English. In other languages such as German, however, it remains common.
Early usage
In the arts, an opus number usually denotes a work of
musical composition, a practice and usage established in the seventeenth century when composers identified their works with an opus number. In the eighteenth century, publishers usually assigned opus numbers when publishing groups of like compositions, usually in sets of three, six or twelve compositions. Consequently, opus numbers are not usually in chronological order, unpublished compositions usually had no opus number, and numeration gaps and sequential duplications occurred when publishers issued contemporaneous editions of a composer's works, as in the sets of
string quartets by
Joseph Haydn (1732–1809) and
Ludwig van Beethoven (1770–1827); Haydn's Op. 76, the
Erdödy quartets (1796–97), comprises six discrete quartets consecutively numbered Op. 76 No. 1 – Op. 76 No. 6; whilst Beethoven's Op. 59, the
Rasumovsky quartets (1805–06), comprises String Quartet No. 7, String Quartet No. 8, and String Quartet No. 9.
19th century to date
From about 1800, composers usually assigned an opus number to a work or set of works upon publication. After approximately 1900, they tended to assign an opus number to a composition whether published or not. However, practices were not always perfectly consistent or logical. For example, early in his career, Beethoven selectively numbered his compositions (some published without opus numbers), yet in later years, he published early works with high opus numbers. Likewise, some posthumously published works were given high opus numbers by publishers, even though some of them were written early in Beethoven's career. Since his death in 1827, the un-numbered compositions have been cataloged and labeled with the German acronym WoO (''Werk ohne Opuszahl''), meaning "work without opus number"; the same has been done with other composers who used opus numbers. (There are also other catalogs of Beethoven's works – see
Catalogues of Beethoven compositions.)
The practice of enumerating a posthumous opus ("Op. posth.") is noteworthy in the case of
Felix Mendelssohn (1809–47); after his death, the heirs published many compositions with opus numbers that Mendelssohn did not assign. In life, he published two
symphonies (
Symphony No. 1 in C minor, Op. 11; and
Symphony No. 3 in A minor, Op. 56), furthermore he published his symphony-cantata ''
Lobgesang'', Op. 52, which was posthumously counted as his Symphony No. 2; yet, he chronologically wrote symphonies between symphonies Nos. 1 and 2, which he withdrew for personal and compositional reasons; nevertheless, the Mendelssohn heirs published (and cataloged) them as the
'' Italian'' Symphony No. 4 in A major, Op. 90, and as the
'' Reformation'' Symphony No. 5 in D major and D minor, Op. 107.
While many of the works of
Antonín Dvořák (1841–1904) were given opus numbers, these did not always bear a logical relationship to the order in which the works were written or published. To achieve better sales, some publishers, such as
N. Simrock, preferred to present less experienced composers as being well established, by giving some relatively early works much higher opus numbers than their chronological order would merit. In other cases, Dvořák gave lower opus numbers to new works to be able to sell them to other publishers outside his contract obligations. This way it could happen that the same opus number was given to more than one of his works. Opus number 12, for example, was assigned, successively, to five different works (an opera, a concert overture, a string quartet, and two unrelated piano works). In other cases, the same work was given as many as three different opus numbers by different publishers. The sequential numbering of his symphonies has also been confused: (a) they were initially numbered by order of publication, not composition; (b) the first four symphonies to be composed were published after the last five; and (c) the last five symphonies were not published in order of composition. The ''
New World Symphony'' originally was published as No. 5, later was known as No. 8, and definitively was renumbered as No. 9 in the critical editions published in the 1950s.
Other examples of composers' historically inconsistent opus-number usages include the cases of
César Franck
César-Auguste Jean-Guillaume Hubert Franck (; 10 December 1822 – 8 November 1890) was a French Romantic composer, pianist, organist, and music teacher born in modern-day Belgium.
He was born in Liège (which at the time of his birth was pa ...
(1822–1890),
Béla Bartók (1881–1945), and
Alban Berg (1885–1935), who initially numbered, but then stopped numbering their compositions.
Carl Nielsen
Carl August Nielsen (; 9 June 1865 – 3 October 1931) was a Danish composer, conductor and violinist, widely recognized as his country's most prominent composer.
Brought up by poor yet musically talented parents on the island of Funen, he ...
(1865–1931) and
Paul Hindemith (1895–1963) were also inconsistent in their approaches.
Sergei Prokofiev (1891–1953) was consistent and assigned an opus number to a composition ''before'' composing it; at his death, he left fragmentary and planned, but numbered, works. In revising a composition, Prokofiev occasionally assigned a new opus number to the revision; thus
Symphony No. 4 is two thematically related but discrete works: Symphony No. 4, Op. 47, written in 1929; and Symphony No. 4, Op. 112, a large-scale revision written in 1947. Likewise, depending upon the edition, the original version of Piano Sonata No. 5 in C major, is cataloged both as Op. 38 and as Op. 135.
Despite being used in more or less normal fashion by a number of important early-twentieth-century composers, including
Arnold Schoenberg (1874–1951) and
Anton Webern
Anton Friedrich Wilhelm von Webern (3 December 188315 September 1945), better known as Anton Webern (), was an Austrian composer and conductor whose music was among the most radical of its milieu in its sheer concision, even aphorism, and stead ...
(1883–1945), opus numbers became less common in the later part of the twentieth century.
Other catalogues
To manage inconsistent opus-number usages — especially by composers of the
Baroque (1600–1750) and of the
Classical (1720—1830) music eras —
musicologists have developed comprehensive and unambiguous catalogue number-systems for the works of composers such as:
*
Johann Sebastian Bach — catalogued with a BWV-number; a ''
Bach-Werke-Verzeichnis
The (BWV; ; ) is a catalogue of compositions by Johann Sebastian Bach. It was first published in 1950, edited by Wolfgang Schmieder. The catalogue's second edition appeared in 1990. An abbreviated version of that second edition, known as BWV ...
'' number assigned by
Wolfgang Schmieder
Wolfgang Schmieder (May 29, 1901 – November 8, 1990) was a German music librarian and musicologist.
Schmieder was born in Bromberg (now Bydgoszcz, Poland).Eggebrecht, Hans. "Wolfgang Schmieder". ''Oxford Music Online''. 2001, https://doi.o ...
; however, older sources occasionally use S-numbers.
*
Dietrich Buxtehude — catalogued with a BuxWV-number, a ''Buxtehude-Werke-Verzeichnis'' work number.
*
Marc-Antoine Charpentier
Marc-Antoine Charpentier (; 1643 – 24 February 1704) was a French Baroque composer during the reign of Louis XIV. One of his most famous works is the main theme from the prelude of his ''Te Deum'', ''Marche en rondeau''. This theme is still us ...
- identified with an H-number per H.W. Hitchcock’s comprehensive catalogue.
*
Frédéric Chopin — three catalogue systems have been applied: (i) B-numbers, by Maurice J.E. Brown; (ii) KK-numbers, by
Krystyna Kobylańska; and (iii) work-letters (A, C, D, E, P and S), by Józef Michał Chomiński. Generally, these alternative music-catalogue systems identified compositions that the composer had not numbered.
*
Claude Debussy — identified with an L-number, per
François Lesure
François Lesure (23 May 1923 in Paris – 21 June 2001) was a French librarian and musicologist.
Biography
François Lesure studied at the Sorbonne, the École nationale des chartes (graduated in 1950), the École pratique des hautes étude ...
's comprehensive catalogue.
*
Antonín Dvořák — identified with a B-number, per
Jarmil Burghauser's comprehensive catalogue; which resolved the problems of different and duplicate opus-numbers assigned by the publishers of Dvořák's music.
*
Joseph Haydn — identified with a Hob.-number, per the 1957 catalogue by
Anthony van Hoboken. Although he assigned Hoboken-numbers to the
string quartets
The term string quartet can refer to either a type of musical composition or a group of four people who play them. Many composers from the mid-18th century onwards wrote string quartets. The associated musical ensemble consists of two violinist ...
, those compositions usually are known by opus numbers.
*
Franz Liszt — identified with an S-number, per the catalogue ''The Music of Liszt'' (1960), by
Humphrey Searle
Humphrey Searle (26 August 1915 – 12 May 1982) was an English composer and writer on music. His music combines aspects of late Romanticism and modernist serialism, particularly reminiscent of his primary influences, Franz Liszt, Arnold Schoen ...
.
*
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart — identified either with a K-number or with a KV-number (''
Köchel-Verzeichnis nummer''), per the catalogue system of
Ludwig Ritter von Köchel.
*
Niccolò Paganini
Niccolò (or Nicolò) Paganini (; 27 October 178227 May 1840) was an Italian violinist and composer. He was the most celebrated violin virtuoso of his time, and left his mark as one of the pillars of modern violin technique. His 24 Caprices fo ...
— identified with an MS-number, per the 1982 ''Catalogo tematico'', by
Moretti and Sorrento.
*
Domenico Scarlatti — identified with three catalogue systems; (i) L-numbers, per the 1906 catalogue by
Alessandro Longo; (ii) K-numbers and Kk-numbers, per the 1953 catalogue by
Ralph Kirkpatrick; and (iii) P-numbers, per the 1967 catalogue by
Giorgio Pestelli.
*
Franz Schubert — identified with a D-number, per the
catalogue of Otto Erich Deutsch.
*
Maurice Ravel — identified with an M-number, per the 1986
catalogue by
Marcel Marnat
Marcel Marnat (born 6 July 1933) is a French musicologist, journalist and radio producer.
Biography
After a scientific training, he collaborated in the writing of various cultural newspapers and magazines (''Combat'', ''Jazz Hot'', ''Arts'', ...
.
*
Henry Purcell — identified with a Z-number, per the
catalogue by
Franklin B. Zimmerman
Franklin Bershir Zimmerman (born June 20, 1923, Wauneta, Kansas) is an American musicology, musicologist and conducting, conductor who has published extensively in the field of Baroque music, and particularly on the English composer, Henry Purcell ...
.
*
Antonio Vivaldi - identified with a RV number, per the Ryom-Verzeichnis catalogue by
Peter Ryom.
*
Gustav Holst
Gustav Theodore Holst (born Gustavus Theodore von Holst; 21 September 1874 – 25 May 1934) was an English composer, arranger and teacher. Best known for his orchestral suite ''The Planets'', he composed many other works across a range ...
— identified with an H. catalogue number, per A Thematic Catalogue of Gustav Holst's Music by
Imogen Holst.
See also
*
WoO
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Opus Number
Identifiers
Musical terminology
Music publishing