F. Delius. Manuscript full score of "The Magic Fountain"

Frederick Delius

Manuscript full score of the three-act opera The Magic Fountain

a fair-copy manuscript, written apparently by four scribes, in brown ink, on systems of varying length, original manuscript headings only to Acts 1 and 2 ("Der Wunderborn. Oper in 3 Akten Text und Musik von Fritz Delius. Aus dem Englischen von Emma Klingenfeld. Akt I...II. Akt."), the text in German, containing some later pencil annotations, with a number of erasures and corrections

75, 64 and 88 pages, large folio (42.3 x 41.2cm), the reverse of p.65 of Act 3 unpaginated and blank, the leaves, and occasionally intact bifolia, loose, 34-stave paper, the score loosely contained within publisher's printed boards for Elgar's Symphony no.1, op.55, no place or date [1895 or later], browned, some fraying to edges, some old repairs with translucent adhesive tape 

A substantial contemporary manuscript of a major score by Delius.

Composed between 1894 and 1895, to a libretto by Delius himself, The Magic Fountain was not performed at all while the composer was alive, despite being offered to Prague and Weimar in the 1890s. A performance was contemplated by Beecham in 1953, but in the event not undertaken. It is possible that a number of pencil entries in the score relate to this aborted performance. The first staged performance took place as late as 1997, at the Kiel Opera House.

Some sketches and drafts, as well as the autograph full score, are preserved in the British Library (MS Mus. 1745/1/6; MS Mus. 1745/2/7 and MS Mus. 1745/2/10).

Not in Threlfall, or under the entry for DCW 2.