United States or Kiribati ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
The special date of August 28th, on which "Lohengrin" will be performed, cannot be but favourable to it. To speak truth, I should not be allowed to put so extraordinary a. work on the stage in the ordinary course of the theatrical season. Herr von Zigesar has fully realized that "Lohengrin" must be an event.
At this moment, dearest friend, after having closed the letter already, I begin to feel a doubt whether you have received my last letter, which I sent you about eighteen days ago. I am uncertain because you make no mention of its contents, which were A letter from me to Zigesar.
Herr von Zigesar has today written to Tichatschek to ask him to sing "Lohengrin" here on February 26th, and has offered him a fee of fifty louis d'or, an unheard-of sum for Weymar. I sent Tichatschek the part soon after the first performance of "Lohengrin" here, and hope that he will give us the pleasure of complying with our request.
For the fete of the Grand Duchess I shall conduct "Iphigenia in Aulis," which Herr von Zigesar has got for me from Dresden, and this in spite of the opposition, from want of intelligence or evil intention, which I shall have to encounter. Herr von Luttichau has declined all responsibility for the loan of your score, and I have boldly undertaken to be answerable to you for it.
I thank you with all my heart for the thanks you proffer me. Once for all, number me in future amongst your most zealous and devoted admirers; far or near, count on me and dispose of me. Herren Zigesar, Genast, and Biedenfeld have described to you in detail the impression which your masterpiece has made on our public.
Lastly, if the latter should be the case, will you ask Herr von Zigesar to send three hundred francs of the sum to Belloni in Paris, in settlement of a tailor's bill falling due July 15th, and remit the balance of two hundred francs to me at Zurich as soon as possible?
Apart from this, I have good hope that Herr von Zigesar, from whom I enclose a few lines, will be able to send you in a few days one hundred thalers, independently of the honorarium for "Lohengrin," which will be about thirty louis d'or. Your "Lohengrin" will be given under exceptional conditions, which are most favourable to its success.
Our dear, foolish Zigesar always writes to me, "Ew. Wohlgeboren," etc. I wish he would leave that alone. I am sorry when, in his kindness towards me, I stumble over this kind of powder and pigtail business. May God bless you, not the "god of Buckeburg." You are right in retiring into solitude now and then; without that men like us cannot exist. Greet the Princess most cordially.
This nasty bargaining about twopence-halfpenny in the matter of cuts is repulsive to me; but Genast remains a fine, brave fellow. Behold, my paper is at an end, and I have done nothing but gabble. I have many and more important things to write to you about. Lord, forgive me! I am not in a mood for it today. I shall soon write again. My best greetings to Zigesar.
This last point is, in my opinion, the most important of all, for it is not only the singers and the orchestras that must be brought up to the mark to serve as instruments in the dramatic revolution, which you so eloquently describe in your letter to Zigesar, but also, and before all, the public, which must be elevated to a level where it becomes capable of associating itself by sympathy and intelligent comprehension with conceptions of a higher order than that of the lazy amusements with which it feeds its imagination and sensibility at our theatres every day.
Word Of The Day