from Felix Mendelssohn: A Life in Letters

To Wolf Graf Baudissin

Leipzig, Sunday, March 22, 1840

Esteemed Count,

Liszt, Hiller, and i would like to play Bach’s Triple Concerto in D Minor with orchestral accompaniment in a (private) concert at the Gewandhaus which I have arranged. It happens, however, that the parts, which were here earlier, are no longer in Leipzig, and hence my request to you, if you could send me yours tomorrow (Monday) on the train (naturally if there are duplicates then the duplicates as well- the more the better). I hope that you will receive this letter by tonight; in that case it would be best for me if you could have them entrusted to the conductor before six o’clock tomorrow morning with instructions to bring them to me immediately after the first train arrives. If that is impossible for you, there would still be enough time if they came on the second train, but then the conductor would have to bring them to the Gewandhaus, not to the apartment, for our performance is to begin at six in the evening, and the train will not arrive until six-thirty.

Dare I make so bold as to request that you yourself do us the honor of attending on such short notice? But the performance was not set until late yesterday evening. We plan to play several of my overtures and Psalms, the Schubert Symphony, and lastly the concerto, should by virtue of your generosity we receive the parts. If only you yourself would come!

Please excuse these very hasty lines. The mail is leaving, and I am forced to write in the middle of a large number of people.

With deepest respect, Your Excellency’s most faithful

Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy