WAGNER RICHARD (1813-1883) - Lot 246

Lot n° 246
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Estimation :
6000 - 8000 EUR
WAGNER RICHARD (1813-1883) - Lot 246
WAGNER RICHARD (1813-1883) L.A.S. "Richard Wagner", Dresden, September 14, 1843,[to Dr. August SCHMIDT, publisher of the Allgemeine Wiener Musikzeitung, Vienna]; 2.5 pages in-4 filled with a small tight script; in German. Important letter about the success of Rienzi and the Ghost Ship in Dresden. Nothingzi had been created in Dresden on October 20, 1842; on January 2, 1843, it was the turn of the Ghost Ship (Der Fliegende Hollander). Ludwig Spohr conducted The Ghost Ship in Cassel in May. The Allgemeine Wiener Musikzeitung only reported Rienzi on 7 and 9 February 1843, accusing Wagner of massacring the voices, which caused a replica of a Dresden musician, while Schmidt's editorial was aggressive towards Wagner. Without publishing Wagner's protest letter, responding point by point to the criticisms made of him, Schmidt included a very formal open response in the October 5 issue.] As he does not regularly read the gazettes, Wagner has just learned of the animosity that his pen pal's journal has used to damage his reputation as a young artist. He does not conceive that a German musician should be treated so harshly at one time and - as far as the newspaper is concerned - a place where German art is so pitifully neglected, in favour of foreign art, despite a happy and successful performance; he is convinced that the inspiration for Rienzi's detailed accounts was an unscrupulous friend, a vain rival... In any case, Wagner certainly did nothing to personally harm his correspondent, and to provoke in the newspaper a refutation of which he ignores the real author, and that his Schmidt accompanied his observations with the most incriminating ones... However, he is convinced that a very good work, as soon as it is born in an unmutilated form, is as little prevented by baseless journalistic attacks from being gradually recognized as a mediocre piece is by the support of the press, however zealous it may be; also, what the Council of Journalism decides is indifferent
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