"Snegourotchka" - Autograph Musical Quotation

Uncommon AMQS of the influential Russian composer's Snegourotchka, or The Snow Maiden, penned on a postcard with a scene from "Falstaff." Rimsky-Korsakov has penned three measures of a theme from his favorite opera and dedicated them to Monsieur Patricio Otaño. He has signed boldly at the lower right and dated St. Petersburg, 1907. On the verso, the collector, Ramona Imaz Otaño, has addressed the postcard to herself. One very small smudge and light toning on the corners only; overall in very fine condition. 5.5 x 3.5 inches (13.9 x 9 cm.)

"The Snow Maiden, ... in the splendid Mariinsky production of 1882, won the composer one of his greatest public successes. Rimsky-Korsakov remembered the time of its creation as full of inspiration, one of the happiest periods of his life. The story, a ‘spring tale’ by Aleksandr Ostrovsky – a play in verse laced with artful imitations of folksong texts – had already caught the attention of Tchaikovsky, who had supplied it with incidental music; Rimsky-Korsakov worked intensively on his own version, and completed the vocal score after two and a half months during the summer of 1880. He and his wife usually rented a country home every summer, but this time the situation was especially lucky. For the first time in his life the composer found himself in a ‘true Russian village’. Beautiful surroundings, archaic place-names, berries, flowers and birds – everything was ‘in harmony with my pantheistic mood at the time, and with my fascination in the Snow Maiden plot’, he recalled in his Chronicle." (Marina Frolova-Walker, New Grove.) (13478)

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AMQS

Classical Music

Opera

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