Rachmaninov, Sergei

comprising four bars for piano from the lyrical Moderato theme in third movement, here marked "espessivo" and notated with a key signature of 2 flats, in black ink, 1 page;  together with other autograph quotations signed and inscribed to Mason, including by Fritz Kreisler (the main theme from the first movement of Beethoven's Violin Concerto, Boston, 10 January 1905), Vincent d'Indy, the opening of the first movement of Poeme des montagnes, ['Le chante des bruyères'], with a few minor divergences from the published score, Boston, November 1905), C.M. Loeffler ("Poëme païen" for chamber ensemble), Felix Weingartner (from his song 'Du bist ein Kind' from 12 Lieder op.28), Enrique Fernández Arbós ("Tango"), Henry Hadley (from Azora), Reginald de Koven (Prelude from The Canterbury Pilgrims), Osip Gabrielovich (from Chopin's Sonata, op.35), Melba (the proverb "They say What they say? Let them say?"), Sigismond Stojowski, Mischa Livitzki, Ernest Schelling, George W. Chadwick, Arthur Shepherd, Rudolf Ganz, William Shakespeare, Harold Bauer and others, including the ensembles the Zoellner Quartet (quotation from Debussy's String Quartet), and the Kneisel Quartet  

83 leaves, versos blank, oblong 4to (c.18 x 22.5cm), in the album of Henry Lowell Mason (1864-1957), many discreetly captioned by Mason, red half roan, gilt lettered, with his bookplate, Boston, 1903-1916, joints and corners worn

Condition is described in the main body of the cataloguing, where appropriate
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Rachmaninov wrote out this famous melody on the occasion of his first important concert in America, playing this work with the Boston Symphony under Max Fiedler.  The critics were unanimously dismissive: even the programme note had warned that "the concerto is of uneven worth. The first movement is labored and has little marked character".  Yet, in a poll reported in the London Daily Telegraph in 2011, Rachmaninov's Second Piano Concerto was voted as the most popular classical work of all time.  This melody, which is found at Figure 31 of the final movement, provided the basis for the 1945 Frank Sinatra song Full Moon and Empty Arms ("covered" by Bob Dylan in 2014).  The first owner of this album ran the piano manufacturers Mason & Hamlin, whose instruments are praised by several of the contributors.  The hymn-composer Lowell Mason (1792-1872) was his grandfather.