Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart: Letter to Maria Anna Thekla Mozart, 23 December 1778
Scope & Content:
Dated Kaisheim, 23 Dec. 1778. Written principally on the recto, with the postscript (Mozart. Briefe und Aufzeichnungen, lines 30-32) on the verso. The bottom right corner, with most of the word ‘C[ousin]’ and Mozart’s signature after the letters ‘W: A’, torn away.
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart: Letter to Maria Anna Thekla Mozart
Scope & Content:
Dated Salzburg, 10 May [1779]. The year, at the head of f. 1r, written as’1709’. A drawing of Maria Anna Thekla Mozart, his cousin, head and shoulders in three-quarter profile, occupies part of f. 2r. On f. 2v is the address (only partly in Mozart’s hand), the words ‘Engel’ and ‘Adieu - Adieu -’...
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart: Letter to Anton Klein; Vienna, 21 May 1785
Scope & Content:
Autograph. Dated at the end, on the verso. Annotated in later hands on both recto and verso. In this well-known letter Mozart puts forward his ideas for German opera. Anderson, The Letters of Mozart [3rd edn.], strangely records the original as ‘formerly in the possession of the heirs of Stefan ...
Jacques Offenbach: Sketches for unidentified works
Scope & Content:
Autograph. Written in ink, with some pencil, mostly on single staves but with some sections in score on up to four staves. In a sketch-book made from leaves or bifolia roughly sewn. Apparently first used, in what is now reverse order, for a sequence of instrumental waltzes, very incompletely ske...
Autograph. Written in ink, on systems of two staves. Tempo direction ‘Moderato, con moto [quaver]’. Title and ‘composé pour l’Album Bellini par Ant. Rubinstein’ at head of recto. The first 15 bars are numbered by the composer, and the numbers used to indicate a repeat of the passage towards the ...
Franz Schubert: Four German Dances for piano (D 146 no.2, 769 no. 1, and 783 Deutsche nos. 1, 2)
Scope & Content:
Autograph. Written in brown ink on systems of two staves. On a single leaf, the dances from D 146 and 769 on the recto, the others on the verso. D 769 no. 1 marked ‘Mit Verschiebung’. Headed ‘Deutsch’, dated 1824, and signed ‘Fr. Schubert M[anu propr]ia’, all at head of recto; signature in light...
Franz Schubert: Dance (‘Deutscher’) in A flat for piano (D 365, no. 2), with the beginning of Evangelium Johannis 6 (D 607)
Scope & Content:
Autograph. Written on recto and verso of a single leaf, as follows: f. 1r. Evangelium Johannis 6, vers. 55-58 (text in German from St. John’s Gospel in Luther’s translation), for voice with figured bass accompaniment; [1818]. Bars 1-33 only. Written in ink, on systems of two staves. Headed ‘Evan...
Franz Schubert: Folder in which Zweig MS 81A (Schubert’s autograph of ‘An die Musik’) was mounted before its presentation to the British Library
Scope & Content:
As follows: f. 1. Portrait of Schubert, lithograph by Josef Teltscher, 1826, published by Mansfeld & Co.; [1829]. The first of the two versions issued by Mansfeld & Co., with below the image a reproduction of Schubert’s signature and the words ‘Ehrenmitglied der Musik-Vereine zu Grätz un...
Franz Schubert: ‘Mirjams Siegesgesang’ (words Franz Grillparzer), for soprano solo, choir and piano (D 942)
Scope & Content:
Autograph full score. Written in dark brown ink; mostly on systems of 6 staves: soloist and chorus sopranos parts on the same stave and marked ‘solo’ or ‘tutti’, systems of 3 staves for passages for soprano solo and piano only. Tempo directions ‘All[egr]o giusto (f. 2r) - Allegretto (f. 4r) - Al...