Beschreibung:

PUCCINI, Giacomo (1858-1924). Large portrait photograph (by Giacomo Brogi Florence) signed and inscribed TO HIS PUBLISHER GIULIO RICORDI, 'al mio carissimo Giulio Ricordi queste prime note Toscane (eh fosser l'ultime!) con affetto vero e duraturo il suo affezionatissimo Giacomo Puccini' ('... these first notes of Tosca (would that they were the last!) ...'), Torre del Lago, 15 October 1896, with a magnificent long musical quotation from the overture to Tosca , comprising thirteen bars in short score, 210 x 280mm (slightly faded, minor abrasions, corners bumped), framed and glazed.
PUCCINI, Giacomo (1858-1924). Large portrait photograph (by Giacomo Brogi Florence) signed and inscribed TO HIS PUBLISHER GIULIO RICORDI, 'al mio carissimo Giulio Ricordi queste prime note Toscane (eh fosser l'ultime!) con affetto vero e duraturo il suo affezionatissimo Giacomo Puccini' ('... these first notes of Tosca (would that they were the last!) ...'), Torre del Lago, 15 October 1896, with a magnificent long musical quotation from the overture to Tosca , comprising thirteen bars in short score, 210 x 280mm (slightly faded, minor abrasions, corners bumped), framed and glazed. An exceptionally early quotation from Tosca . Puccini had signed the contract for the work in August 1895, and Luigi Illica had produced a first version of the libretto in 1896: a protracted redrafting process, and the composer's preoccupation with performances of La Bohème in 1897, meant that a satisfactory libretto was not completed until the following year -- the opening page of the autograph of Tosca is dated January 1898. As the present quotation indicates, however, the overture was already fully-formed in the composer's mind at a much earlier stage.