Felix Mendelssohn (1809-1847) - photo 1

Felix Mendelssohn (1809-1847)

Lot 53
11.12.2024 00:00UTC +00:00
Classic
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CHRISTIE'S
AuctioneerCHRISTIE'S
Event locationUnited Kingdom, London
Buyer Premiumsee on Website%
ID 1349713
Lot 53 | Felix Mendelssohn (1809-1847)
Estimate value
£ 2 500 – 3 500
Felix Mendelssohn (1809-1847)
Autograph letter signed ('Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy') to [Wilhelm] Taubert, London, 14 June 1844
In German. One page, 273 x 225mm. Provenance: Sotheby's, 6 December 1991, lot 130.

Writing from London with instructions for the performance of his music for Racine's Athalie. 'Have the overture copied immediately and played as beautifully as possible. Have the final chorus (which appears instead of the last act in the Berlin score) copied and rehearsed only if the performance (as I half suspect) is not so imminent as I was told ... I have only been able to give you an outline of the melodrama on a separate sheet, I do not have the German version; please take the French version and the translation and arrange the score there according to these suggestions ... It was no pleasure completing this work in the terrible rush of my season here; I have to play or conduct in public every day, sometimes twice a day'.

Mendelssohn's incidental music for Racine's Athalie was commissioned by Friedrich Wilhelm IV of Prussia for a private performance at his theatre in Potsdam – one of a series of commissions which also yielded the music for A Midsummer Night's Dream. In the event, the first private performance of the music for Athalie was not until 1 December 1845, with the first public performance on 8 January 1846. Mendelssohn here writes from the midst of his hectic eighth British visit, when he conducted five of the Philharmonic concerts in London. The composer and conductor Wilhelm Taubert (1811-1891) was assistant conductor and accompanist for Berlin court concerts.
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SW1Y 6QT London
United Kingdom
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11.12.2024 – 11.12.2024
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