Winterberger will accompany it on
a Physharmonica of the organ genus. On the same evening (Monday)
the concert for the benefit of the Pension Fund will take place
at the theater: Singer and Pruckner will play at it, and two of
my Symphonic Poems - "Les Preludes" and "Hungaria" (Nos. 3 and 9)-
-will be given.
On the 14th September at latest I shall get to Vienna, and I will
write to Haslinger more definitely about it. Meanwhile will you
please tell Haslinger, as I cannot write to him until the concert
in the Hungarian theater is over.
. - . I expect to leave here before the end of next week.
God be with you and with your
F. L.
At the rehearsal this morning I was told that you have got such
an excellent article on the Mass in the Wanderer. I suppose you
sent the number to Weymar? If possible let me have one here also.
163. To Louis Kohler
Bravo, dear friend, for the three very graceful and charmingly
conceived melody-dialogues! I have pleasure in them, and am
certain of the success of this charming selam. [Meaning a musical
bouquet.] As an old laborant [Worker in a laboratory] at piano
music allow me merely to lay before you a slight alteration in
the two bars before the return of the motive (No. I). According
to my conception one bar more would have a beneficial effect
there, thus: -
[Here Liszt writes out a 5-measure excerpt of piano music]
If you agree with this version, write me simply Yes to the
address of Richard Wagner, Zeltweg, Zurich. I shall get there
next Sunday, and stay some days with our great friend. At the
beginning of November I shall be back in Weymar.
Hearty greetings from yours in all friendship,
F. Liszt
Stuttgart, October 8th, 1856.
In No. 3 (in the first two bars) the F seems to me the right
sound in the bass, and that was what you had first written: -
[Here, Liszt illustrates with a musical score excerpt]
instead of: -
[Here, Liszt illustrates with another musical score excerpt]
Will you leave these little alterations to me in the proof?
164. To Dr. Gille, Councillor of Justice at Jena
[An ardent friend of Liszt's, a promoter of musical endeavors, a
co-founder and member of the Committee (General Secretary) of the
Allgemeine Deutsche Musikverein, is at the head of the Liszt
Museum in Weimar, and lives in Jena, where he is Prince's Council
and Councillor of Justice.]
Zurich, November 14th, 1856
My very dear Friend,
I am heartily rejoiced at the honorable proof of the sympathy and
attachment of our Circulus harmonicus Academiae Jenensis, which
was prepared for me for the 22nd October by your kindness, and I
give you my warmest thanks for it, begging you to be so good as
to pass them on also to our friends Stade and Herr Schafer, whose
names strengthen the diploma.
It touches me deeply that you join the Gran Basilica and my
"Missa Solemnis" in this diploma. You may be sure, dear friend,
that I did not compose my work as one might put on a church
vestment instead of a paletot, but that it has sprung from the
truly fervent faith of my heart, such as I have felt it since my
childhood. "Genitum, non factum" - and therefore I can truly say
that my Mass has been more prayed than composed. By Easter the
work will be published by the Royal State Printing Office at the
cost of the Government, thanks to the kind instructions of His
Excellency Minister von Bach, and I am looking forward to the
pleasure of presenting one of the first copies to the Circulus
harmonicus. The Mass has been given a second time at Prague since
I left, and, as Capellmeister Skraup writes, "with increasing
interest"; a couple more performances, in Vienna, etc., are
pending.
Pray excuse me, dear friend, for not having sent you my thanks
sooner. Your letter found me in bed, to which I am still confined
by a somewhat protracted illness, which will delay my return to
Weymar some weeks. Next week I am to begin to get out into the
air again, and I hope to be able to get away in about ten days.
At the beginning of December I shall be at Weymar, and shall then
soon come to you at Jena. -
I shall have a great deal to tell you verbally about Wagner. Of
course we see each other every day, and are together the livelong
day. His "Nibelungen" are an entirely new and glorious world,
towards which I have often yearned, and for which the most
thoughtful people will still be enthusiastic, even if the measure
of mediocrity should prove inadequate to it! -
Friendly greetings, and faithfully your
F. Liszt
165. To Dr. Adolf Stern in Dresden
[Poet and man of letters, now professor at the Polytechnikum at
Dresden, a member of the Committee of the Allgemeine Deutsche
Musikverein since 1867.]
Very Dear Sir and Friend,
A long and protracted illness has kept me in bed for a fortnight
past - and I owe you many apologies for my delay in sending you my
warmest thanks for the very kind remembrance with which you
adorned the 22nd of October. The beautiful poem, so full of
meaning, and soaring aloft with its delicately powerful flight,
goes deeply to my heart, and my dreams hear the charm of your
poetry through Lehel's magic horn tones! Perhaps I shall be able
shortly to tell you what I have heard, when the disjointed sounds
have united in shaping themselves harmoniously into an artistic
whole, from which a second part of my Symphonic Poem "Hungaria"
might well be formed.
