H. Berlioz. Autograph letter signed, to the publisher Heinrich Schlesinger in Berlin, 19 May 1857, apparently unrecorded

Hector Berlioz

Autograph letter signed ("H. Berlioz"), to the publisher Heinrich Schlesinger in Berlin, APPARENTLY UNRECORDED AND UNPUBLISHED 

requesting that he send as quickly as possible through Brandus a vocal score of Gluck's Iphigénie en Tauride with German words, asking him to procure a copy of the chorus of the shades from the third act of Gluck's Alceste, explaining that he needs it to compare it with the version in the French score, stressing that he ask the copyist to check whether the trombones in the score match those of the separate orchestral parts, and writing out by way of footnote the words of the chorus 

...En outre, pardonnez moi de vous donner cette peine, veuillez aller au bureau de copie de l'opéra faire copier en grande partition le choeur des ombres du 3^me acte de l'Alceste de Gluck. Ce morceau est chanté par les Basses et toujours sur la même note...

3 pages, 8vo (20.8 x 13.5cm), annotated by the recipient, with a signed postscript by Gemmy Brandus added at the foot of p.3 of the letter, Paris, 4 rue de Calais, 19 May 1857, some splitting to hinge; together with an unrelated autograph envelope addressed to Schlesinger, postmarked 13 February 1850

A splendid, apparently unknown, letter, uniting one great dramatic writer for the stage with another (Gluck), and written in the middle of the composer's work on his masterpiece, the opera Les Troyens.

A note in the margin of the first page of the letter reveals that the vocal score requested by Berlioz was sent to the composer on 22 May 1857.