Music

Contact Alex Day or Donovan Rees

We stock a range of antiquarian music, books on music, manuscripts and autographs, with an emphasis on early printed editions and manuscript scores of important composers.

Recent catalogues have included one of a very few surviving lifetime manuscripts of Scarlatti's harpsichord sonatas; a remarkable collection of vocal and instrumental music from the library of the duchesse de Berry; and inscribed first editions of works by Berg, Janacek, Poulenc, Rimsky-Korsakov, Schumann, Shostakovich, Stravinsky and Vaughan Williams.
  1. [SAINT-LAMBERT, Monsieur de.]

    ‘Les principes du clavecin contenant...

    Namur, 1743–4.

    Manuscript copy of Saint-Lambert’s celebrated...

    £6750

  2. [VOGEL, Johann Christoph.]

    Démophon.

    [France (probably Paris), c. 1787.]

    A contemporary scribal manuscript of Johann...

    £5250

  3. RAMEAU, Jean-Philippe.

    Zoroastre, tragedie, mise en musique par...

    Paris, Boivin, Leclair, Castagneri and...

    First edition; rare. Despite a strong cast...

    £5000

  4. VERHEYEN, Pierre Emmanuel.

    Requiem mass in C minor.

    [Flanders, c. 1810.]

    A very grand unpublished Requiem mass in...

    £4750

  5. COLLIN DE BLAMONT, François.

    Les festes grecques et romaines, ballet...

    Paris, Jean-Baptiste-Christophe Ballard, 1723.

    First edition of the first ‘Ballet-héroïque’,...

    £3500

  6. [PLAYING CARDS.]

    Cartes Magiques Musicales. 1001 Danses...

    Paris, Bass, c. 1830.

    The complete Piquet deck of these rare...

    £3000

  7. [ADOLPHUS, Prince, later Duke of Cambridge.]

    Manuscript collection of fifty-four songs...

    [Hanover?, 1796.]

    The seventh son of George III and Queen...

    £2850

  8. ARISTIDES, Aelius.

    Orationum tomi tres, nunc primum latine...

    Basel, Peter Perna and Heinrich Petrus, 1566.

    First edition in Latin, a remarkable copy...

    £2750

  9. [CHANSONS.]

    Manuscript collection of arias, chansons,...

    [France (Nantes?), c. 1795.]

    A fascinating manuscript collection of...

    £2400

  10. D’URFEY, Thomas.

    Wit and Mirth: or Pills to purge Melancholy;...

    Pearson for J. Tonson, 1719 [– 1720].

    The first complete edition, second issue...

    £2250

  11. CAVALCANTI, Bartolomeo.

    La retorica … divisa in sette libri,...

    Venice, Gabriel Giolitto, 1559.

    Second edition, published in the same year...

    £2250

  12. GOUNOD, Charles François.

    A volume of ten songs bound together, all...

    London, 1870–3.

    Ten of Gounod’s London-published songs,...

    £2000

  13. ‘CHAFF, Gumbo’ [pseud. Elias HOWE].

    The Ethiopian Glee Book; a Collection of...

    Boston, Elias Howe, 1848 [– 1849].

    First editions of all three parts – a...

    £2000

  14. PLAYFORD, John.

    Psalms & Hymns in solemn Musick of foure...

    London, Printed by W. Godbid for J. Playford,...

    First edition of the first harmonised Psalter...

    £1850

  15. CLARI, Giovanni Carlo Maria.

    Manuscript score of a collection of six...

    Italy, mid-eighteenth century.

    A collection of secular madrigals for two...

    £1800

  16. ESSER, [Karl?] Michael, Ritter von.

    Sei Quartetti per due violini viola, e...

    [Venice, Marescalchi e Canobbio, 1774?]

    First edition, very rare, of a complete...

    £1750

  17. TOLSTOY, Lev Nikolaevich.

    Живой Трупъ. Драма въ...

    Moscow, A. Ia. Petrov, [1911].

    One of the earliest printings of Tolstoy’s...

    £1750

  18. [CONGREGAZIONE DELL’ORATORIO DI ROMA.]

    Sammelband of fourteen libretti.

    Rome, 1765–1768.

    A sammelband of rare devotional libretti...

    £1750

  19. BLANKENBURG, Quirinus Gerbrandszoon van.

    Elementa musica of niew licht tot het welverstaan...

    The Hague, Laurens Berkoske, 1739.

    First edition, very scarce.

    £1500

  20. MENDELSSOHN-BARTHOLDY, Felix. 

    Symphonie No. 3, componirt und Ihrer Majestät...

    Leipzig, Breitkopf & Härtel, [1843]. 

    First edition of Mendelssohn’s ‘Scottish’...

    £1500