Ludwig van Beethoven: Music to ‘Egmont’ (text Johann Wolfgang von Goethe), op. 84: sketch for op. 84, no. 1, Clärchen’s song ‘Die Trommel gerühret’
Scope & Content:
Autograph. Written in ink on the recto and in pencil on the verso of a single leaf. Sketched mostly on single staves, with the text written above or beneath. The leaf has a vertical fold, and the sketches in pencil occur on the right half only of the verso. Later marginal annotations comprise: i...
Ludwig van Beethoven: Music to ‘Die Ruinen von Athen’ (text A. von Kotzebue), op. 113: [no. 5], Off-stage Music for wind band
Scope & Content:
Autograph condensed score. Written in ink on systems of four staves. Tempo direction ‘assai Allegro ma non troppo’ (f. 1r). Headed ‘No 6’ and ‘Harmonie auf dem Theater’ in upper margin of f. 1r. Passage of 2 bars struck through on f. 1r; 1 bar struck through on f. 2v, but with note underneath to...
Letter from Ludwig van Beethoven to Dr. Johann Bihler
Scope & Content:
[Baden, Summer, 1813]. Written in ink, addressed ‘Hr. von Bihler’ on the verso. An irregularly trimmed leaf, with bottom right hand corner, which presumably carried Beethoven’s signature, cut away.
Autograph. Written in ink and pencil. The entries on ff. 1r-2r comprise accounts of expenses on the journey from Bonn to Vienna, [1792]; the remainder is taken up with memoranda and accounts entered in Vienna. The first entries on f. 1r and another on f. 2r are not in Beethoven’s hand. A number ...
Ludwig van Beethoven: Copies by Beethoven of the text of five poems from ‘Morgenländische Blumenlese’ by Johann Gottfried Herder, with brief observations on nature by Beethoven
Scope & Content:
Autograph. Written in ink and pencil. The leaves have been folded twice, marking out two or four compartments to which Beethoven has restricted his notes on the last page. Contents as follows: f. 1r, Herder: ‘Die laute Klage’. With indications of metre added in pencil above the text. Published...
Vincenzo Bellini: ‘Bianca e Fernando’, opera in two acts (libretto Felice Romani, after D. Gilardoni), 1828: autograph sketch for ‘O contento desiato’, the final section of Filippo’s aria in Act I
Scope & Content:
Vocal line only, written in ink on a single stave, with the words beneath for the opening section and at the end. The role is for basso cantante, and though here originally written without clef or key signature, is notated in G in the bass clef; a soprano C clef has been inserted before it in a ...
Alban Berg: ‘Lulu’, opera in three acts (libretto, the composer after Frank Wedekind), 1929-1935: Prologue, written out for presentation to Arnold Schoenberg, to whom the work is dedicated, on his 60th birthday
Scope & Content:
Autograph full score. Written in ink, with bar lines in pencil, on systems of up to 24 staves. Marked ‘Attacca [crochet] = 80-90’ (f. 3r). The Prologue, consisting of the opera’s first 85 bars, occupies ff. 3r-10v; f. 11r has the next four bars, after the rise of the curtain, in score in pencil,...
Luigi Boccherini: Thematic catalogue of 58 works ceded to the publisher Ignace Pleyel, with notarial certificate; Madrid, 14 November 1796
Scope & Content:
Autograph. Written in ink; on paper with legal stamps, showing the seal of Charles IV and the year, at the top of ff. 1r and 2v. As follows: f. 1r and v. Thematic catalogne, headed ‘Catalogo delle opere da me Luigi Boccherini cedute in tutta Proprietá al Sig[no]r Ignazio Pleyel’ (f. 1r), with,...
Johannes Brahms: Piano Concerto no. 2 in B flat, op. 83, 1881: reduction of tutti passages from movements II, III and IV, for the published solo piano score (issued July 1882)
Scope & Content:
Autograph. Written in ink on systems of two staves on both sides of a single leaf. The passages concerned are, on the recto: movement II, bars 200-203, apparently the conclusion of a passage begun on another leaf; movement III, bars 1-22; movement IV, bars 39-47; and on the verso:- movement IV, ...
