Ludwig van Beethoven, "Mignon", Gesang für Singstimme und Klavier op. 75, Nr. 1, Überprüfte Abschrift

Improvements to Goethe

Two different handwritings are essentially recognizable in this strange copy of the Lied "Kennst du das Land" op. 75 no. 1: one is unknown to us and the other is Beethoven's. The unknown handwriting seems rather stilted, the owner does not seem as used to writing music as Beethoven does. So it does not belong to a professional copyist. Beethoven gives us a hint as to the identity of the person who copied the Lied. At the bottom of the first page he writes the following, adding his signature: "Nb. Die Verschönerung der Fraülein Therese in diesem Lied hat der Autor gewag[t] an des Tages licht zu befördern". (NB the author has dared to bring to light the improvements made to the Lied by Fraülein Therese.) According to this the copy was made by Therese Malfatti (1792-1851). Beethoven got to know the Malfatti family at the end of 1809, possibly only in spring 1810. He soon fell in love with the young Therese, to whom he also taught the piano. In summer 1810 he even harboured plans to marry her. In a summer letter to Therese towards the end of May 1810, he encouraged her to practise the piano, "In view of your other occupations do not forget the piano or even music in general, you have such a talent for it". He also recommended Goethe to her, "You will soon receive other compositions from me, although you should not complain about difficulties - have you read Goethe's Wilhelm Meister, Shakespeare as translated by Schlegel? In the country one has so much trouble that it might be agreeable to you if I sent you these works." Perhaps Beethoven had sent her his setting of "Mignon" to encourage her to practise the piano and at the same time to get her acquainted with Goethe's "Wilhelm Meister", maybe even suggesting she did the copy shown here. Therese was obviously not up to this task. Even on the first page she made several mistakes in the piano accompaniment - among the many mistakes there were smaller ones, which Beethoven possibly did not notice and therefore did not correct. On leaf 2r (image 3) she makes mistakes when writing the text underneath the music - to such an extent that the wrong text is carried over on to the next page. There are further smaller copying errors in the musical text which Beethoven corrects. On leaf 3r (image 5) Therese has lost such interest in the task that she leaves the left hand in the piano part to Beethoven, who writes it from here onwards. From leaf 3v (image 6) onwards Beethoven writes the complete musical text - on the last two pages only the text is in Therese's hand. Was Beethoven ironically(?) referring to the quality of the copy when he wrote on the first page that the "the author has dared to bring to light the improvements made to the Lied by Fraülein Therese". In Therese Malfatti's defence it must be said that Beethoven had probably sent her one of his famously illegible autograph scores, which was possibly so full of corrections that it was no longer recognizable. Not an easy task for an inexperienced copyist! (J.R.)