The unusual life-achievements of the brilliant Johannes Piersig stand without question — except that he was not a composer. Undoubtedly his intervention in Karg-Elert’s B.A.C.H. work not only shortened it but also distorted the proportions of its several parts. He supplied a profusion of performance directions and footnotes, which call to mind the worst examples by Straube. And surely he has also endeavoured to patch up those parts of the composition which have been dismembered by him, by means of his own connecting passages. For in his version, the choicest ideas of Karg-Elert stand beside the most trivial non-music, which in no event can have originated from the Leipzig Master.

I have cleaned up {literally: ‘purified’} and ordered anew the work from the suspect Piersig ingredients. Whenever the version printed here could not be represented in its original form, no longer are there any improper additions. The original manuscript is lost; Karg-Elert’s highest opus number does not exist in its original form. As far as the fugue is concerned,
I have constructed the present version from the organ fugue {from Piersig’s edition?} and from the fugue of the Harmonium Sonata, Op. 46, which is comparable in substance.
I am conscious of the fact that many other solutions could have been carried out. I have sacrificed with much regret some bars which most probably are genuine Karg-Elert, but which would unfortunately not blend meaningfully after the elimination of Piersig’s material.
I would particularly like to thank Mr. Heinrich Schwaab, son-in-law and legal successor to Karg-Elert, for authorising me to produce this new version of opus 150. It was given its première in his presence on 21st September 1996 in St. Paul’s Church, Ulm.
Velbert-Langenberg, in May 1999, Wolfgang Stockmeier.”

What then of this new version? Dr. Stockmeier states he has no access to an original, so that he must use his considerable knowledge of Karg-Elert in trying to decide what is “genuine” and what is not. One does not doubt his ability; nevertheless, to put out a version on that basis is surely questionable. Moreover, if large sections have already been removed (Piersig claims by Karg-Elert in the composer’s revision, more perhaps by Piersig as asserted in 1981), one can hardly reinstate these without original manuscripts. Indeed, the above preface shows that even more material has now been pruned during the “re-ordering”. Piersig’s 1936 letter to Sceats shows his respect for Karg-Elert and states the belief that the “revised version” of opus 150 in his possession “represents the composer’s final intentions”. Combining these, it seems entirely logical that this version would be the one published by Hinrichsen in 1938. Are the remarks in 1981 by a sick man then to be taken so literally? I shall subsequently present some fragments of evidence that Piersig was cautious with his edition, trying to convey Karg-Elert’s wishes even when he felt slight “improvements” were appropriate. These are the actions of a friend and supporter of the composer, even after death, not those of a vandal who is supposed to have corrupted an important work radically.

The greatest changes, by far, in this new version occur in the text preceding the fugue. The sequence is altered a good deal; this is very skilful so that most cuts are smooth. But why do that? On what basis can one determine what order Karg-Elert had in mind? Is Dr. Stockmeier saying that Piersig not only removed passages and interpolated his own, but also changed the sequence of the original material? He writes in the preface that “many other solutions” are possible, so perhaps that is the inference. A list of these follows later.

The fugue is much closer to Piersig’s version. In his preface, Piersig writes of the desirability of making
“a few adjustments, such as octave-transpositions”
if one is using a classical instrument; this is indeed needed and the Stockmeier edition has done so in the belief that such an organ is the norm nowadays —
a major improvement on the Piersig edition. So, the fugue provides a substantial gain, although a major deletion is carried out at the end and two new bars written as replacement for an entire page.

What is different?  I think the following covers most items:-
P3/1/1 (i.e., Piersig/Hinrichsen page 3, line 1 group, bar 1) = S1 (i.e., Stockmeier/Möseler bar 1): first BACH statement — pedal fifths removed. Second BACH statement — deleted entirely; yet Piersig goes to the trouble of having the octave pedals printed with the upper voice in smaller font and also in parentheses, implying this is his modification of Karg-Elert, not a supplement of his own invention. The harmonies are indeed bizarre; does Dr. Stockmeier regard that as an example of “non-music” which
Karg-Elert could not have written?
P3/1/2=S2: first note A natural (Piersig) or A flat (Stockmeier), with B flat ending the previous bar — yet the former would suit BACH as the last two notes, completing the name, appear at the end of the bar.
P7/2/4=S63: Piersig bar immediately preceding this one plus the first two crotchets here are deleted by Stockmeier.
P10/3 deleted: cut from P10/end 2=S100, to P13/1/2=S101.
P13/3/1—2=S106—7: Piersig bass manual notes transferred by Stockmeier to the pedal, with some alteration of last chord.
P13/end 3=S110: cut to P11, top of page=S111.
P12 end of page=S136: cut to P19/4/3=S137 (Presto).
P21/5/end 3=S182: cut to P15, top of page=S183 (very abrupt change).
P17, end of page=S222: cut to P19, top of page=S223 (also rather abrupt).
P19/4/2 pause=S238 pause: cut to fugue — P24, top of page=S239.
P35/4/1=S373 — last beat of bar rewritten to match the earlier content of this bar and to alter it from a brief cadence, then all P36 is deleted and replaced by two bars: S374—5, as ending. S374 contains an exceptionally brutal dissonance which resolves into the tonic major chord alone in S375. Piersig’s last chord has the added 6th and 9th, hardly unusual in Karg-Elert’s music, abolished in the new version.
Apart from the small fragments thus removed, these changes delete: P10/3, P13/4 and all P14 (10 bars), all P18 (20 bars), P21/5/4 to the end of P23 (20 bars) and all P 36 (11 bars, 2 replacement bars instead).