BEETHOVEN LUDWIG VAN (1770-1827). - Lot 203

Lot 203
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BEETHOVEN LUDWIG VAN (1770-1827). - Lot 203
BEETHOVEN LUDWIG VAN (1770-1827). autograph musical manuscript, Neue Liebe, Neues Leben, [1798-1799, Vienna]; 2 pages of one oblong sheet 22.5 x 31 cm First sketch of the lied Neue Liebe, neues Leben, WoO 127, preceded by the first eight bars of the 4th and last movement of his first String Quartet in F major, Op. 18 No. 1. The lied Neue Liebe, neues Leben, (op. 75 no. 2) was composed on a poem by GOETHE, at the end of 1798. We have here the first draft of the lied with the sung text (song and lyrics), with sometimes the bass and some intermediate piano passages - this version differs by several variants from the one printed in 1809. At the head of the sheet, Beethoven has noted, on the first staff, the first eight bars of the 4th and last movement of the first String Quartet in F major, op. 18, no. 1 (composed between 1798 and 1800, and published in 1801), giving the part for the 1st violin with the theme-chorus of triplets. This lied (WoO 127) was published about ten years after this draft by Simrock in Bonn in 1808, at the head of the III Deutsche Lieder, apparently without the composer's permission. Beethoven then reworked this lied in 1809 (the manuscript of this second version is kept in the Beethoven-Haus in Bonn [Bodmer Br 106]), and this new version was published in Leipzig in 1810 by Breitkopf & Härtel in the Sechs Gesänge (op.75, no.2). "It is the monologue of a lover who is so upset by the encounter with a new love that he no longer knows where he stands: his temptation is to flee from what makes him a stranger to himself" (E. Brisson). Beethoven changed the order of Goethe's poem, repeating stanzas 1 and 2 before the third and final stanza. On the first page, we can read the beginning of the lied: " Herz mein Herz, was soll das geben? "..., followed by the 2nd stanza: " Fesselt dich die Jugendblüte, [...Will ich rasch mich ihr entziehen"... The page ends with the words: "hält das liebe"; the lied continues on the reverse side: "liebe, lose Mädchen mich so wider Willen fest"... And the lied ends with the 4th and 5th lines: "Liebe, Liebe, laß mich los Liebe, Liebe, laß mich los". After a phrase from the piano, abbreviated by an "etc.", Beethoven takes up the end of the song. After a phrase from the piano, abbreviated by an "etc.," Beethoven repeats the end of the 1st stanza: "Ach, wie kamst du nur dazu," then the 2nd stanza: "Fesselt die Jugendblüte"... The sheet ends with these verses from the 3rd stanza: "nicht zerreißen läßt, das liebe liebe lose"... At the head of the sheet, we note this ancient inscription: "Dem Schluss von seinem letzten Septuor als Motto für den Text", which has led to the assumption that this was a reference to a private performance, in which, in addition to this lied, the finale of the recently composed Septet would have been used (see Max Unger, "'Neue Liebe, neues Leben: Die Urschrift und die Geschichte eines Goethe-Beethoven-Liedes", in Zeitschrift für Musik 103 (1936, pp. 1062). The manuscript is written in brown ink on oblong paper with 16 staves, on the front and back of the sheet, with erasures and corrections, and some repeats, totalling 170 bars. This sheet was originally the first of a two-sheet set, once in the collection of Baroness Anna von Gleichenstein, sister of Therese Malfatti (Beethoven's friend and probable dedicatee of the Letter to Elise), and which was later divided. This first folio, in the archives of the publisher Schott in Mainz, was sold at Sotheby's in London (6 December 2002, n° 14). [For the second folio, see below].
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