Der Rosencavalier (Komödie für Musik) ... Op. 59. Autograph musical manuscript full score. [?]1910-11

Large folio (400 x 300 mm.). 1 page. The opening 15 measures of the first act of the opera, Notated on the recto of the first leaf of a bifolium in black ink on 32-stave paper with watermark "Papeteries de Leysse pres Chambrey = F."

With autograph titling, signature, and annotation "Erster Aufzug. Einleitung" and "Stürmisch bewegt" to head of page and with a dedicatory inscription to the director of the Paris Opéra and Opéra Comique, Jacques Rouché (1862-1957) to foot, signed and dated Garmisch, 10 January 1937.

Some light browning and staining to lower margin; remnants of sewing thread to spine. In very good condition overall. Mueller von Asow I, 467. Trenner 227.

Der Rosenkavalier, a comic opera in three acts to a libretto by Hugo von Hofmannsthal, was first performed on 26 January 1911 in Dresden at the Königliches Opernhaus with great success, quickly entering the international repertory.

"The music glories in Hofmannsthal's text, which satisfied Strauss like nothing before. It was cheerful and knowing, fluent and down-to-earth, and yet made room for sumptuous effects and some elevated intensity. His 'symphonic' facility got full scope, but also his modern penchant for inserting chamber-scale music amid his opulent orchestral tapestries. In all previous operas (at least since Monteverdi's time), if there was dialogue with the quick cut-and-thrust of sophisticated conversation it was set as recitative, or else in formal ensembles; but such conversations make the very texture of Der Rosenkavalier, and here Strauss outdoes Wagner with dramatic music in which distinctions between recitative, arioso and formal set pieces are continuously blurred. Unaccompanied lines may have as much lyrical force - and even as much weight in the musical argument - as the big tunes, and Strauss tacks mercurially between those modes. Again and again he invests the uttered words with the poignant sense of their unspoken sub-text, and in unstinting sympathy with each of Hofmannsthal's characters. With this opera, Opera itself reached a new level of endeavour." David Murray in Grove Music Online.