Nov 17, 2020 - Sale 2551

Sale 2551 - Lot 89

Price Realized: $ 750
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 800 - $ 1,200
POULENC, FRANCIS. Two items: Typed Letter Signed * Autograph Musical Quotation Signed and Inscribed. The letter, to an editor or publisher ("My dear friend"), in French, inquiring whether he believed French composer Louis Durey would be well received in England, with a postscript requesting him to ensure that the covers are printed with large characters on light gray paper. 2 pages, 4to; short closed separations at folds. The quotation, "Pour Miss O. Coin," eight bars as sung by Thérèse in the first act of Les mamelles de Tirésias, notated on a printed stave, with holograph title and lyrics ("Envolez-vous oiseaux de ma faiblesse"). 3 1/2x8 1/2 inches. Pont-sur-Seine, 30 June 1919; Np, 1956

Additional Details

1919: "Speaking to you about Louis Durey is a pretext to . . . a request . . . .
You of course already know by name this young musician of whom Ravel thinks the highest, that Malipiero admires and whom all those who love music consider to be one of the future assets of the art.
"A string quartet, quite remarkable for the level of its composition, won him this winter a warm reception . . . [from the] cliques of Paris; the Godebskys [Maria Godebska?] among others being completely won over by the amazing technique of this musician who is above all, a sensitive rare thing in our time. Alas, alas, the ears of . . . the publishers haven't been touched . . . . Durand, however, upon earnest urging from Ravel decided to take on the three poems of Petronius but passed over the rest . . . 'because of the appearance of tendencies which I do not even tolerate from Stravinsky . . . .' . . . Would England welcome this young musician; I have no doubt about it . . . .
"Did Parade go to the ballets? if so, what did the English public say about it? and the work of [Manuel de] Falla, for which Picasso had shown me such beautiful maquettes? . . . What's new in London . . . ."