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The author’s arrangement of the Ninth Symphony for piano four hands is being published for the first time based on the author’s manuscript kept in the Shostakovich Foundation at the Mikhail Glinka State Central Museum of Musical Culture (rec. gr. 32, f. 99). When preparing the publication, the numerous additional author’s marks made in pencil on the manuscript were taken into account as much as possible. Unfortunately, it is rather difficult to establish the authorship of these marks with any certainty, and at times, for example in the cases of crescendo or diminuendo symbols, impossible. However, it is certain that most of these marks were not made by Shostakovich, but most likely by musicians with whom he performed the symphony using this copy.

The sheet music of the author’s manuscript of the arrangement has been collated with the author’s manuscript of the orchestral score kept at the Russian State Archive of Literature and Art (rec. gr. 2048, inv. 1, f. 12), with the proof-sheet copy of the score kept at the State Central Museum of Musical Culture (rec. gr. 32, f. 15), and also with the symphony score printed in Volume Five of Shostakovich’s Collected Works, and has been extensively supplemented with dynamic, bowing and other indications. The metronomic marks, which are entirely absent in the author’s manuscript of the arrangement, have been added in keeping with the score, and the bar numbers have also been inserted. The entire author’s texture of the arrangement has been left untouched. Obvious inaccuracies in the text of the author’s manuscript have been corrected without any additional comment.

Divided into 15 different "series" or genres, the edition will include nearly all the original works of the composer, and his instrumentation of music by Domenico Scarlatti, Beethoven, Schubert, Schumann, Mussorgsky, Rimsky-Korsakov, Johann Strauss, Youmans, Braga, Tishchenko, and others.

25% of the New Collected Works will be made up of previously unpublished material: over 80 of his works are being published here for the first time. Many of these previously unknown works could not be published or performed during the composer's lifetime for ideological reasons.

The fifteen "series" within the edition comprise:
I: Symphonies (vols 1-30)
II: Orchestra Compositions (vols 31-37)
III: Instrumental Concertos (vols 38-49)
IV: Compositions for the Stage (vols 50-67)
V: Suites from Operas and Ballets (vols 68-72)
VI: Compositions for Choir and Orchestra (With or Without Soloists) (vols 73-83)
VII: Unaccompanied Choral Compositions/Arrangements of Russian Folksongs (vols 84-86)
VIII: Compositions for Solo Voice(S) With Orchestra (vols 87-90)
IX: Chamber Compositions for Voice and Songs (vols 91-97)
X: Chamber Instrumental Ensembles (vols 98-105)
XI: Instrumental Sonatas(vols 106-108)
XII: Piano Compositions (vols 109-115)
XIII: Incidental Music (vols 116-121)
XIV: Film Music (vols 122-145)
XV: The Works of Other Composers, Instrumentation by Shostakovich (vols 146-150)