Béla Bartók. Autograph letter signed to Klára Gombossy, 4 March 1916, partially published, ABOUT HIS OWN MUSIC

Béla Bartók

Remarkable autograph letter signed, with Bartók's monogram ("ᗺB"), to Klára Gombossy, PARTIALLY PUBLISHED, ABOUT HIS OWN MUSIC

recalling a concert in Berlin given seven years earlier, at which he conducted the Scherzo from his Second Orchestral Suite, op.4, describing that experience and discussing the music itself, pointing out its innovations, further referring to European music, concerts and audiences in the West, also discussing western concerts and audiences, criticizing contemporary tastes, describing a concert in Holland and a composition he is working on, with detailed observations as to its structure, stating in conclusion that audiences only want to hear the types of music that they have heard many times before

...Még csak annyit, hogy ez a "Scherzó" igazán nem rosz munka (valamit rövidíteni kell rajta - még - lehet mert nem jelent meg - ; de ez nem lényeges); csak az a "hibája", - hogy olyan is van benne, ami mások zenéjéből még nem ismeretes.  Már pedig a "bourgeois" olyan csodalény amely mindig olyat akar hallani amit már sokszor hallott. Soha ujat...

[Just to say, that this "Scherzo" is really not a bad work (it needs shortening somewhat - this is possible because it has not yet been published - but this isn’t important); its only "fault" is that it also contains things which are not yet known from the music of others.  However a "bourgeois" [person] is such a wondrous creature that he always wants to hear things he has already heard many times.  Never anything new!]

8 pages, 18.9 x 13.6cm, written on the blank pages of a printed programme for an orchestral concert on 2 January 1909 organised by Feruccio Busoni ("Orchester-Abende...veranstaltet von Feruccio Busoni..."), with a postscript by Bartók in pencil on the cover, apologising for not having responded to a previous letter, no place, 4 March 1916, central horizontal crease, ink blot to upper cover obscuring some words in red crayon apparently by Bartók

A STUNNING LETTER CONTAINING SOME OF BARTÓK'S ONLY RARELY EXPRESSED VIEWS ON HIS OWN MUSIC.

In this letter to his muse at the time (1916), Klára Gombossy, Bartók describes in detail his conducting of the Scherzo movement from his Second Orchestral Suite op.4, which took place at a concert in Berlin in 1909 (the only occasion that Bartók conducted the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra), as well as revealing his views on the work. Such commentaries, as Lászlo Vikárius has observed, are of unique importance, since the composer was typically rather reticent on the subject of compositional details other than general formal schemes, tonal relationships and the like.

LITERATURE:

János Demény, ed. Bartók Béla levelei (Budapest, 1976), p.143 [there dated 'after 2 January 1909']; László Vikárius, 'Intimations through Words and Music. Unique sources to Béla Bartók's Life and Thought in the Fonds Denijs Dille (B-Br)', Revue Belge de Musicologie, vol.lxvii (2103), pp.186ff.

PROVENANCE:

Formerly in the collection of the composer's son, Peter Bartók (1924-2020)