Berg, Alban

Der Wein. Konzertarie mit Orchester.

[Wien], UE, 1931. 36 x 26.5 cm. 3–56 pp. Original grey boards, green cloth spine (lower joint split but binding intact), typed label on upper cover, preserved in a later fitted wallet of blue boards, cloth spine. Karl Böhm’s working copy. Extremely rare first edition of the full-score, inscribed by Karl Böhm (1968) and extensively marked by him in blue and red pencil. Title-leaf of the reduced score for piano by Erwin Stein (1930) of this concert aria is pasted at end of the volume. It has the following inscription by Berg to Böhm: “Auf Ihr Wohl, mein lieber Doktor Böhm: Den Wein, und wenn’s auch nur ein Österreichischer ist, (Alban Berg) in Darmstadt am 28/II. 31”. In the spring of 1929 Ru¢ena Herlinger Ruzena Herlinger, a Viennese singer of Czech origin, who specialised in contemporary music and had met Berg through the ISCM, approached the composer with the request to write an aria with orchestral accompaniment for her. Frau Herlinger offered the composer a fee of five thousand Austrian shillings, which was very tempting, although the commission involved interrupting work on Lulu. The choice of Baudelaire’s Le Vin, in a German translation by Stefan George, was made by Berg, who started on the piece in late May, completing it on 23 July and the full orchestration a month later. Mosco Carner, Alban Berg (1975), pp. 62–3 & 94–8.

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• Commande nro.: 00848

• libraire: Lowendahl Rare Books Ltd (THAILAND)