Missa Pro Organo - INSCRIBED PRESENTATION COPY TO HIS PUPIL NADINE HELBIG

Roma: Autografia di P. Manganelli. 1879. First. Missa Pro Organo l / Lectarum Celebrationi Missarum  / Adjumento Inserviens / ---- / Messe Pour Orgue / Servant D'Accompagnement à La Celebration Des Messes Basses. [S. 264]. 4to.  [Title]; 1-17; publisher's page [vb].  Lithographed. [PN] P. 556. M.  Disbound score, inscribed on the title page in ink to his pupil Nadine Helbig (1847-1922):  "Madame N. Helbig / son très affectionné serviteur / Janvier 80 à Rome. / F. Liszt." Light foxing, gatherings separating along spine with small tears and binding remnants to edge, overall in fine condition.  Very rare, only 2 copies recorded by Worldcat (Herzogin Anna Amalia Bibliothek- Klassik Stiftung Weimar and University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign). 

Bound together with "Choräle," privately printed (presumed Rome, no printed place or publisher, composer credit), a collection of Liszt's ca. 1870s piano arrangements of sacred settings for his friend Cardinal Gustav Hohenlohe-Schillingsfürst, paginated 2-19 pp, including Vexilla Regis, Crux ave benedictam, Jesu Christe Die funf Wunden, Meine Seel' erhebt den Herrn, Es segne uns Gott, O Lamm Gottes!, O Haupt voll Blut und Wunden, Nun ruhen alle Wälderm, and Nun danket alle Gott! Foxing throughout, else fine. Very rare, no copies recorded in Worldcat.

Together with an albumen photograph of a portrait bust sculpture of Liszt, inscribed to verso by George W. Ford, translated from the French, "Received from Madame N. Helbig, student and good friend of Liszt's, at the Villa Lante (Gianicolo, Rome) on the 24 of March, 1919, after having played on the Pleyel offer by Liszt to his student and good friend, consecrated by Wagner, Grieg, Tchaikovsky,"; and by an unidentified individual (Gaston ?), also dated 24 March, 1919, translated from the French, "One of the listeners and sincere friend of the performer, in recognition of the great artistic emotion felt on this occasion."

With the exception of the Mass and the Requiem, Liszt's later religious compositions did not appear in commercially available printings and are thus of the greatest rarity.  The resigned mood of Liszt's Roman period also corresponded to a withdrawal from the business of publishing: "I am little interested in publishing them; for they do not fit into the music commonly used and sold...why, therefore, market them." When he composed new versions of choir works for the organ, like the present Missa, he did so initially for performance on the organ in smaller churches. But even this forum became too large as the communal playing of music with Cardinal Gustav Hohenlohe-Schillingsfürst (1823-1896) in the Villa d'Este grew increasingly influential on the later works.  In 1865, the Cardinal had given Liszt initial consecration and he took care of the aging composer.  A piano and a harmonium were brought to the Villa d'Este where the hours of playing music together increasingly took on the character of private prayer sessions.  The Missa Pro Organo (1879) began as a 1848 mass for a male choir and was previously exhaustively revised in 1869. The composer went back to this later version when composing the present organ mass for use during the reading of the silent mass. The score is dedicated to to the Princess Sayn-Wittgenstein. (20594)

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