L.van Beethoven. First edition, second issue of the Ninth Symphony op.125 [full score], Mainz & Paris, [c.1827]

BEETHOVEN, LUDWIG VAN

Sinfonie mit Schluss-Chor über Schillers Ode "An die Freude" für grosses Orchester, 4 Solo- und 4 Chor-Stimmen, [op.125: full score], Mainz & Paris: B. Schotts Söhnen [Antwerp: A. Schott], [c.1827]

first edition, second issue of the Ninth Symphony, 226 pages, folio (c.33.2 x 25 cms), engraved title bearing the royal arms of Friedrich William III, engraved music, plate number 2322 (some corrected from 2321 and lacking altogether on pp.172 & 191), a good clear pressing, no subscribers' list, metronome markings to 3rd and 4th movements only, p.207 begins "frech", nineteenth-century boards, ownership inscription to title ("Georg Zöphel Leipzig, im Herbst 1896"), worn, lacking calf spine, title working loose (trace of wrapper)

This is a good clear copy of the full score of the most influential symphony of the nineteenth century, the model for Berlioz, Wagner, Bruckner and Mahler. It contains some of the metronome markings that Beethoven added after the first issue appeared (they were sent to Schott in a letter of 13 October 1826 (BGA 2223; Anderson no.1535)). Here however, the first two movements lack any metronome markings and, at the start of the fourth movement, the marking is 96 (instead of 66). The faster marking was published by Schott in December 1826 and repeated by Beethoven in his letter to Moscheles in London on 18 March 1827 (Anderson no.1566).

LITERATURE:

Beethoven Werkverzeichnis (2014) I, p.819; cf Hoboken 502 and Fuld, p.563.

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