Translating the world’s most comprehensive specialist book on musical notation from English into German posed an unexpectedly broad range of challenges, even for Jens Berger, a seasoned musicologist. He needed to navigate competing terminological traditions of centuries-old musical publishers based in Leipzig and Vienna without offending either. He had to rewrite an entire chapter from scratch because German brass bands are so utterly different from their English counterparts. And how on earth was he supposed to do all this when much of the source material was only available on 1990s Acorn files?

In his talk, Jens Berger will discuss the balance between research and creativity in the context of this specialist translation project and share his views on the role of specialist audiences.

Followed by a Q&A.