In pursuit of Beethoven manuscripts
Autograph letter signed.
8vo. ¾ p. with integral address panel.
€ 12,500.00
To the Leipzig bookseller, art dealer and publisher Theodor Oswald Weigel about the acquisition of two sets of Beethoven manuscripts. Mendelssohn is quite prepared "to pay the requested sum of 25 Louis d'or for the two volumes of Beethoven manuscripts that I recently saw in your library. However, my means would not allow me to pay a higher price and I would have to refrain from buying if the owners were to change their minds about these conditions. I very much hope this will not be the case, as you informed me of the conditions in your name and I can therefore safely assume that they will remain so [...]".
Mendelssohn owned a whole series of autographs by Beethoven and others, some of which he may have received from Giacomo Meyerbeer's brother Heinrich, the enfant terrible of the family. "Although the Beer and Mendelssohn families did not like each other", a remark by Heinrich Heine in his "Confessions" (published in the "Vermischte Schriften" of 1854) provides a hint "that Heinrich Beer and Mendelssohn knew each other. Thus, it is quite credible that the eccentric Beer gave the score of the 7th Symphony to Felix Mendelssohn; whether he also gave all the other pieces mentioned cannot currently be determined. In any case, Heinrich Beer's collection of autographs, which also included Mozart's 'Abduction from the Seraglio', later belonged to Paul Mendelssohn [Felix's brother], and was expanded by pieces from Bach, which demonstrably belonged to Felix. There is no reference to this collection in the numerous papers left by Felix nor in those of Paul. It can be assumed that Felix gave his autographs to Paul for safe-keeping, as Paul was considered the 'guardian' of the family, not only in financial matters" (cf. Elvers). In 1908, Mendelssohn's Beethoven autographs were acquired by the Royal Library in Berlin through a donation by Ernst von Mendelssohn Bartholdy, Paul's son.
Slight signs of wear.
Rudolf Elvers, Felix Mendelssohns Beethoven-Autographe. In: Carl Dahlhaus et al. (eds.), Bericht über den Internationalen Musikwissenschaftlichen Kongreß Bonn 1970. Kassel, Bärenreiter, [1973], pp. 380-382, at p. 380f.
