Autograph Musical Quotation From The Composer's Opera, Samson Et Dalila, Signed "C. Saint-SaëNs" And Dated 1906 SAINT-SAËNS, Camille 1835-1921 Autographs & Manuscripts,New Arrivals

4 measures from Act II. Notated in black ink on an ivory album leaf, 133 x 203 mm. Very minor remnants of adhesive to upper corners of verso. Samson, an opéra in three acts and four tableaux to a libretto by Ferdinand Lemaire, was first performed in Weimar at the Grossherzogliches Theater on 2 December 1877. "His technique is unmistakably operatic, both in the skilful deployment of a large orchestra and in the application of motifs. At the time of Samson et Dalila Saint-Saëns still admired Wagner enormously, and the influence of Der fliegende Holländer and Lohengrin can be heard in the strong closing scene of Act 2. Echoes of Berlioz's L'enfance du Christ and Les Troyens are also to be heard, and the work treads paths marked out by Meyerbeer and Gounod too. . It is certainly his most imaginative opera score, and it reveals an instinct for theatrical emotion that any opera composer would be proud of. It allows us to savour some of the brilliance and intellectual vigour that even his enemies admired." Hugh Macdonald in Grove Music Online.