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The composer’s original text, as distinct from an editor’s addition.
Appears in editorial notes (original, orig., in original edition) to set the composer’s or first edition’s reading against an editor’s change; usually printed as a footnote or in brackets.
Abbreviations: orig.
When you edit or arrange music, record original readings so that your changes stay transparent and performers can judge them; a short footnote is enough. In historical repertoire, original readings may involve instruments or notation that differ from modern practice, such as horns crooked in different keys. When a note says original, the main text above it is the editor’s reading, not the source’s.
Debussy, Trois Chansons de Bilitis, “La Chevelure”, piano, m. 12: the edition’s notes “in original edition, printed as crotchet” and “in original edition, top note of chord is F” record the first print’s readings.
Original is one of 1755 terms in the Gradus musical dictionary: the words, abbreviations and instrument names that appear in printed scores, plus the vocabulary composers use to talk about them.
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