Variations for String Quartet

This 1949 work has been typeset from the pencil manuscript, dated 1949 according to Tranchell's list of own works. 1949 was the year in which Tranchell completed his MusB.

The score contains no corrections or alterations, though some accidentals appear to have been retro-fitted (e.g. the natural on the second C in Violin II 1st bar, in the image below). This is not uncommon in early Tranchell scores, as he generally used a system where each accidental applied only to the note it preceded - hence the seemingly unnecessary flats in the Viola part in Bar 1 - so Violin II's second C would anyway be natural according to that system, but frequently we find clarificatory accidentals added later, perhaps when other musicians found this system unfamilar.

In the typeset edition we have used a more conventional approach with each accidental applying for the whole bar, though we have been generous with cautionary accidentals where there could be doubt.

The score is accompanied by a note, reproduced below, and transcribed thus:

1. pulsation of intro. to giv[...]
2. unison in scales - bad.
3. less unison throughout
4. contrapuntal treatment of intro theme. to make more interesting.
5. 2nd subject use lower register of violin?
6. odd conventionality: Richard Strauss.
outcrops. anticlimax.
7. 2nd subject tune - Strauss.

Lennox Berkeley
Divertimento.
For Chamber Orchestra

Possibly these are notes made before, or taken during, a tutorial with a supervisor such as Boris Ord?

Access the PDF score here or by clicking the image below.