Post by Slinger on Nov 29, 2016 22:41:11 GMT
I couldn't let this pass without remark, as I am (you may have noticed) a huge Mahler fan.
Mind you, He could have got a copy that wasn't scribbled on, plus the score for Symphony #1 as well for £19.76 on ebay
[Gustav Mahler's] finished manuscript of the second symphony sold this morning at Sotheby’s for £3.9 million ($4.5m), to which the buyer will have to add a premium of around 15%. The total paid was £4,546,250.
This is by far the highest sum ever paid for a music manuscript. The previous record was held by a Schumann symphony, sold for £1.5 million in 1994.
The manuscript dates to 1888-1894 and runs to 232 pages. Mahler's alterations indicate how the piece evolved over time.
It comes from the personal collection of American entrepreneur Gilbert Kaplan, who acquired it in 1984.
Kaplan saw a performance of the Second Symphony at New York's Carnegie Hall in 1965, an experience that left him awestruck.
He later explained: "Zeus threw the bolt of lightning. I walked out of that hall a different person".
In the years to come he made it his life's mission to learn to conduct it.
He would go on to perform the piece well over 100 times all around the world - never once conducting any other work.
Simon Maguire, Sotheby's senior books & manuscripts specialist, comments: "No complete symphony by Mahler, written in the composer's own hand, had ever been offered at auction, and probably none will be offered again.
"This was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to acquire a manuscript of truly outstanding historical importance."
This is by far the highest sum ever paid for a music manuscript. The previous record was held by a Schumann symphony, sold for £1.5 million in 1994.
The manuscript dates to 1888-1894 and runs to 232 pages. Mahler's alterations indicate how the piece evolved over time.
It comes from the personal collection of American entrepreneur Gilbert Kaplan, who acquired it in 1984.
Kaplan saw a performance of the Second Symphony at New York's Carnegie Hall in 1965, an experience that left him awestruck.
He later explained: "Zeus threw the bolt of lightning. I walked out of that hall a different person".
In the years to come he made it his life's mission to learn to conduct it.
He would go on to perform the piece well over 100 times all around the world - never once conducting any other work.
Simon Maguire, Sotheby's senior books & manuscripts specialist, comments: "No complete symphony by Mahler, written in the composer's own hand, had ever been offered at auction, and probably none will be offered again.
"This was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to acquire a manuscript of truly outstanding historical importance."
