![WAGNER, Richard (1813-1883). Autograph music manuscript, cello part for the Columbus Overture, [Magdeburg, c. February 1835], autograph title ('Violoncello Columbus'), the music in 16 staves per page (11 staves on last page), one bar cancelled, pencil emendations (perhaps in another hand) to phrasing and accents of eight bars, three pages, folio (354 x 270mm), the last two on separate leaves backed onto each other with sealing wax (heavy creasing at horizontal fold, minor wear to margins).](https://www.christies.com/img/LotImages/2013/CKS/2013_CKS_01176_0060_000(wagner_richard_autograph_music_manuscript_cello_part_for_the_columbus100051).jpg?w=1)
Details
WAGNER, Richard (1813-1883). Autograph music manuscript, cello part for the Columbus Overture, [Magdeburg, c. February 1835], autograph title ('Violoncello Columbus'), the music in 16 staves per page (11 staves on last page), one bar cancelled, pencil emendations (perhaps in another hand) to phrasing and accents of eight bars, three pages, folio (354 x 270mm), the last two on separate leaves backed onto each other with sealing wax (heavy creasing at horizontal fold, minor wear to margins).
The Columbus Overture was written for a play by Wagner's schoolfriend Theodor Apel, for production at the Magdeburg theatre, at which the 21-year old composer had just been offered the job of conductor. As Wagner recalls in Mein Leben: 'Apart from a little chorus for the Moors banished from Granada leaving their familiar home country and a little orchestral piece at the end, I also composed in exuberant celerity an overture... I sketched the whole thing one evening at Minna's [his future wife, Minna Planer, a leading lady of the Magdeburg troupe] ... The effect of this, alas, rather too hastily executed piece was based on a simple but rather startlingly developed basic idea: the orchestra depicted the ocean as well as the ship upon it ...'. The composition was particularly notable for its deployment of three pairs of differently pitched trumpets. The first performance was at Magdeburg on 16 February 1835; it was performed again (separate from the play, which was a failure) at the Leipzig Gewandhaus on 2 April and then on 2 May at the end of season benefit concert for Wagner as conductor at Magdeburg -- on this occasion the effect of the six trumpets at a performance in a hotel saloon was reportedly almost stupefying. Wagner retained a fondness for the piece, and he took the score with him on his move to Paris in 1841.
The autograph score for the Columbus Overture is lost, though a handful of autograph instrumental parts, such as the present one, have survived. The work was published in 1907 from a copy at the Staatsbibliothek Preussischer Kulturbesitz; the present manuscript shows significant variations from the published text.
The Columbus Overture was written for a play by Wagner's schoolfriend Theodor Apel, for production at the Magdeburg theatre, at which the 21-year old composer had just been offered the job of conductor. As Wagner recalls in Mein Leben: 'Apart from a little chorus for the Moors banished from Granada leaving their familiar home country and a little orchestral piece at the end, I also composed in exuberant celerity an overture... I sketched the whole thing one evening at Minna's [his future wife, Minna Planer, a leading lady of the Magdeburg troupe] ... The effect of this, alas, rather too hastily executed piece was based on a simple but rather startlingly developed basic idea: the orchestra depicted the ocean as well as the ship upon it ...'. The composition was particularly notable for its deployment of three pairs of differently pitched trumpets. The first performance was at Magdeburg on 16 February 1835; it was performed again (separate from the play, which was a failure) at the Leipzig Gewandhaus on 2 April and then on 2 May at the end of season benefit concert for Wagner as conductor at Magdeburg -- on this occasion the effect of the six trumpets at a performance in a hotel saloon was reportedly almost stupefying. Wagner retained a fondness for the piece, and he took the score with him on his move to Paris in 1841.
The autograph score for the Columbus Overture is lost, though a handful of autograph instrumental parts, such as the present one, have survived. The work was published in 1907 from a copy at the Staatsbibliothek Preussischer Kulturbesitz; the present manuscript shows significant variations from the published text.
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