MENDELSSOHN-BARTHOLDY, FELIX. (1809-1847). German composer. ALS. (“Felix MB”). 1p. 4to. Düsseldorf, July 6, 1835. To his close friend, Hanoverian diplomat KARL KLINGEMANN (1794-1870). On the same sheet as our letter are an ALS of Mendelssohn’s sister, REBECKA LEJEUNE-DIRICHLET (1811-1858; “Rebecka Dirichlet”) and an LS dictated by the sibling’s father, ABRAHAM MENDELSSOHN BARTHOLDY (1776-1835, “AMBy”) and written in Rebecka’s hand. In German with translation.

“The day after my previous letter was sent, my mother suddenly fell ill, and the first attacks were so terribly violent that we were all very worried. She has improved since then, thank God, and is now recovering visibly, but it was a terrible time. It seems to have been the same ailment she suffered from last year, a rush of blood to the heart and head; the great excitement of the journey and the music festival, the heat, the many strangers, finally an accident or rather an accident with the carriage during a drive may have been the causes – now, as I said, she is better again and our fears were, thank heaven, unfounded. But my parents will certainly not be able to travel for another 6 weeks, so I will accompany them to Berlin, of course, because after such an anxious time I need to see them calmly settled in their old surroundings before I can feel independent again. What Beckchen will do is still undecided, she is expecting Dirichlet here during this time. So everything has changed in the last few days since I wrote to you, I have now completely moved into the Breidenbacher Hof [hotel in Düsseldorf], so that I can see for myself the progress of the improvement, and during the few hours that Mother is now allowed to sit on the sofa, to be with her. Father and Beckchen want to write to you themselves.

I received your short letter the day before yesterday with the pleasant news that you are to buy the Händel for me; what else is there for me to remember? I take it kindly that they should give me such a beautiful, useful gift, and that you are managing the matter. My belated letter requesting information or the purchase of an Erard instrument has long been in your hands, so you know how it relates to my silence, and most of your questions have already been answered in it. I will probably receive your reply again before you have these lines; in that case I will write to you again straight away so that we can get back on track with our letter and reply. I will stop writing for today, because you can probably tell that I am not really in the mood to write. Fortunately, there is no longer any cause for concern, but after such a fright it takes me quite a while before I can be as cheerful as usual, and so my heart is still desperately prosaic. Hopefully, this will soon pass as the last trace of these worrying days and so I can hopefully write you the next monthly letter again as usual. Farewell until then, my regards to Rosen. Your Felix MB”

[Mendelssohn’s sister, Rebecka writes:] “Your last letter to Berlin did not have to travel far; when it arrived, Felix was sitting next to me at the breakfast table and handed it to me. Since then we have had all sorts of experiences, very eventful, brilliant days in Cologne, then here again, funny, then worrying times, and now we are quiet again, my parents will hopefully soon start thinking about their return journey with Felix, and tomorrow I am waiting for Dirichlet, with whom I am thinking of going to the seaside resort in Ostend at the end of the month; if we cannot find a place there or somewhere in the region or on the Rhine by October where we can meet, we will hardly be able to find ourselves in each other’s vicinity again any time soon, and you cannot deny that we have done the first from Berlin to Ostend, do the second. Could we not meet by the sea? But that is just a suggestion.

I am sorry that I did not write to you earlier from Cologne or from here, as you want a description of the party; now I cannot quite think my way back into it without imagining it as the cause of mother’s illness, perhaps it will come back to me later, or I will tell you about it when we meet. I do not think you can get an idea of a Rhenish music festival any more than you can get an idea of a Swiss glacier if you have not seen either; the trip will stay with me for life. By the way, I like the whole way of life here very much, and Felix is a completely different person than in Berlin; although he is getting closer to us now and there is not much occasion for practicing music here, I am still sorry that he is leaving the area, even if it is only for the sake of Woringen, he will not easily find such a house again and you such a house friend. I still have a mail day to Berlin and bid you farewell; but as my Walter [her young son] says, goodbye. We are thinking of spending some time in Godesberg after the seaside resort. Write to me either from the end of the month to Ostend, Hôtel des Bains, or even more certainly to Aachen to Mrs. Lejeune Auf dem Büchel, to forward to me. So I hope to see you again. Rebecka Dirichlet”

[In Rebecka’s hand:] “Father writes My dear friend, you were, are and will unfortunately remain a bad sinner; as you say yourself, you had time and money to spare, you had no lack of desire, and yet you did not come to Cologne. And yet you would have been delighted in many ways and afterwards would have given us the most beautiful description of everything we witnessed, for all the comforts and “snugs” of London can neither drive the German out of you and still less suppress the poet. And so I do not despair of meeting you at a Rhenish music festival on the Rhine in the near future. But we are now sitting here in Düsseldorf waiting for my wife's full recovery so that we can then return to Berlin and enjoy the wonderful days we spent on the Rhine, which Felix and Rebecka have probably written to you about in the above. Mr. Taylor brought the Scotts here for Felix, and I thank you for it. If you ever write to Felix again, tell him something about Goldschmidt, about his Paris plans, I hear nothing from him. Commend me to him and to Moscheless’ house, and farewell. My wife, who is not yet supposed to write, sends you her most loving greetings.

[Abrahm Mendelssohn Bartholdy writes:]

Yours, from the heart

AMBy” [Abrahm Mendelssohn Bartholdy]

In the spring of 1829 Mendelssohn visited Klingemann, a young diplomat and close friend from Berlin residing in London. Klingemann introduced Mendelssohn to England’s grand salons and cultivated society enabling the 20-year-old composer to make many important musical contacts. With Klingemann he traveled north through the Scottish Highlands, a trip that inspired his Scottish Symphony and a voyage to the island of Staffa and its Fingal’s Cave, which led to his Hebrides Overture.

In May 1833, Mendelssohn premiered his Symphony No. 4 at Düsseldorf’s Lower Rhine Music Festival, and his success was such that after the festival Mendelssohn became that city’s music director, though he left this position in 1835 following his appointment as conductor of the celebrated Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, where he not only raised the standard of orchestral playing, but made Bach’s beloved city the center of Germany’s musical world. Mendelssohn again directed the Lower Rhine Music Festival in 1835, the year being discussed in our letter, and again in 1836, 1838, 1839, 1842, and 1846.

In our charming letter, Mendelssohn mentions the esteemed French piano manufacturer Erard and refers to Klingemann’s efforts to translate for Mendelssohn George Frideric Handel’s 1749 oratorio Solomon, originally written in and performed in English. In 1835, on short notice, Mendelssohn produced some arias from Solomon with Klingemann’s translations, which were badly performed by the Berlin Sing-Akademie. “Mendelssohn could not perform his own edition of Solomon until June 1835, for the Rhenish Music Festival at Cologne. Since he had lost Klingemann’s translation, the latter prepared a new German translation from memory. For this performance which Mendelssohn conducted himself he also wrote an organ part,” (“Mendelssohn and Handel,” The Musical Quarterly, Wolff, Sanders and Eitel). Incidentally, for the 1835 festival in Cologne, Mendelssohn’s other sister, composer and pianist Fanny Mendelssohn, acted as choirmaster.

Like her more famous brother and sister Fanny, Rebecka (who Mendelssohn affectionately calls “Beckchen”) was also musically talented and performed her siblings’ lieder with the Sing-Akademie. In 1832, she married mathematician Peter Gustav Lejeune Dirichlet (1805-1859), to whom she was introduced by Alexander von Humboldt, and their homes in Berlin and Gottingen were central to these cities’ musical lives, becoming settings for musical performances by Clara Schumann, Johannes Brahms and Joseph Joachim. Rebecka affectionately discusses her brother, other family members and mentions Mendelssohn’s close friend, Czech-Jewish composer Ignaz Moscheles (1794-1870), whose daughter was married to German diplomat and scholar Georg Rosen (1821-1891). Friedrich Rosen (1805-1837) Georg’s brother and a scholar of Sanskrit and chair of oriental languages at London University, became Klingemann’s brother-in-law after he married Rosen’s sister in 1845.

Rebecka also mentions Düsseldorf judge Ferdinand von Woringen (1798-1896), who helped secure Mendelssohn’s invitation to conduct the 1833 Lower Rhine Music Festival. Mendelssohn dedicated the second volume of his Lieder ohne Worte (Songs without Words) to his daughter Elisa von Woringen and the third volume to another daughter Rosa von Woringen.

Rebecka has also penned a letter on behalf of her father, Abraham, the son of philosopher Moses Mendelssohn and a wealthy Berlin banker, who died four months after signing our letter. His wife, Lea (née Salomon) Mendelssohn Bartholdy (1777-1842), was a pianist and a prominent figure in the musical life of Berlin who oversaw her children’s musical education.

Written on a large, folded sheet with the address panel intact and neatly penned by Mendelssohn. In overall fine condition. A lovely letter with the added words and signatures of the composer’s beloved sister and father.