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Absurdly late to be responding to this topic now, but I have just seen it (while searching for something else...).

Did anyone think of checking in the Library or Archive at the Royal Academy of Music for this music? If the composer was a professor there, it seems like a reasonable place to search!

I am very interested in this opera, and have recently acquired a 19th century vocal score which seems a much more sensible thing than the Pfitzner edition published in [1926?]. But I have searched for many months - in vain - for a pre-Pfitzner full score. Does such a thing exist? I assume it must have been printed, as it was a popular opera. Does anyone know of a copy in a library anywhere? Or perhaps a set of parts in an orchestra or theatre library or archive? It is no longer listed in publishers' catalogues, and seems even to have physically disappeared from publishers' Archives!

Surely the world can't be Vampyr-less?

With bared neck I await an onslaught of information!

Cheers
Robin

Many thanks, especially to LATVIAN, for suggestions and names to look out for. Indeed I am familiar with many of those suggested, but my difficulty is especially in finding recordings, or scores of their music.  I am in Croatia several times every year, and even there have great difficulty in finding material, almost all music stores I ever found direct me to the 'folk' section, which is what most people recognise there as being 'classic' but it is invariably rather lugubrious choral folk songs, occasionally with alarming modern, pop orchestrations.  And I have never found a store that sells scores!  I know there is a State Cultural. department that publishes material, but have never found an outlet, or contact information...

I guess I'm not looking in the right places?  These things do exist, surely!

Robin

I am interested ro explore the unknown world (to me at least) of Croatian composers, mainly 19th/early 20th centuries. I have the Symphony and Phantasie Concertante of Dora Pejacević and two operas of Ivo Tijardović,  but (apart from Franz von Suppé) I have not found recordings of anything else... Any suggestions and recommendations?

ROBIN

Yes, WB also did the vocal scores of Edward German's Tom Jones and Merrie England. I know that Bendall had retired from the Guildhall in 1905; perhaps the difficulties that EG was experiencing with WS Gilbert over Fallen Fairies (1909?) made him wary of accepting the work?

I have been interested in Wilfred Bendall for ages but have only ever found a single photograph of him, and that not very clear. Does anyone know of any photographic sources? Anyone know anything about him other than his time as Sullivan's secretary or his professorship at the Guildhall? Anyone have any leads to autograph manuscripts of either his stage works or cantatas etc?

Thanks!
Robin

Henry Hodson composed a setting of The Golden Legend that was published in vocal score by Novello in 1880. Orchestral material was available on hire from the publishers and I believe that the string parts were engraved, although winds brass, percussion and bells might hsve been manuscript. Does anyone know of the whereabouts of any of this material, or a full score?

Dr William Creser, organist of Leeds Parish Church, also set The Golden Legend, in 1885/6, at the same time as Sullivan was composing his version. Does anyone know of Creser's version was ever performed, or if it still exists in manuscript somewhere?

Very interested minds are seeking to know!

Thanks, Sydney, this is great! I look forward to what is to follow. I see that a CD of Algernon Ashton's piano sonatas is on special offer on the Dutton website just at present...

I have searched for this Concerto for the last ten years! To no avail, though, nobody seemed to know anything about it, including Pixis' German biographer. Maybe 7 or 8 years ago a friend in Mannheim (Pixis' home-town) scoured all likely civic and other possibilities there, but - nothing. I then tried to contact the pianist, only to discover that she had recently died, and a director at Vox [Todd Landor?] was unable to assist with information. The orchestra who recorded the piece no longer exists, having merged with another more than 20 years ago, and no record seems to be available for a minor recording session in the 70s...  I tried the conductor, who did not respond to emails, and who might also be deceased by now. Could not get hold of the violinist, but - astonishingly - a member of his family did eventually respond to an email! To say that Mary Louise Boehm took care of all the business, and that after his wife died, Kees Kooper began suffering from loss of memory [Alzheimers?] and eventually had to be cared for; a house-move at about that time resulted in crates of music being stored in the garage of a neighbour (or family-member, I forget the specifics, now...) and that had subsequently been destroyed in a flood. There was no record of what was in the crates... Sounds familiar?

Along the way, I began to wonder if the Concert was, in fact, an original composition, which might account for the lack of Opus number; all this sort of information is scrupulously avoided in the LP sleeve note. That put me on a different track and I eventually discovered the original source in the British Library: it is Pixis' Grand Trio, Nº 6 [in f#-minor] for Piano, Violin and Violoncello, dedicated to Mademoiselle Clara Wieck. This is a 4-movement work, of which the second ('Capriccio') was jettisoned for the Concerto arrangement. I fear I created a disturbance in BL when I found it - I was boisterous for a moment or two!

I still do not know who made the Concerto arrangement - it might have been the composer, but it might as likely have been the recording soloists themselves (the recording company have no records) - or anyone else, who is content to remain anonymous.  I have still not found the score / parts used in the recording (probably destroyed).  So, I am working on my own reconstruction of it; it's too good a piece to simply disappear!

Umm...  If there is no definitive list, is there a sort of 'unofficial' list of items reliably believed to have been lost?  One sometimes hears the comment that "it must have been lost in the fire" without any substantiation other than the fire is a good over-all excuse to explain away anything that the speaker has not thought about or researched... just as the infamous skips piled full of music outside Novellos mythically contained everything that no-one can readily find now.

I am very interested to find out more about the Chappells fire - has it ever been investigated and written up in reliable detail? Is there a written / published history of Chappells, as there is of Novellos? Where does one find information about things like the tunnels and vaults under Bond Street to Hanover Square, and the reputed 'Sullivan Room' - both of which I have heard mentioned, but - again - without details. Fascinating stuff!