Autograph letter signed in full to impresario [Charles?] Wagner

2 pp. Quarto. Dated Lyon, March 19, 1926. In black ink on lavender paper. In French (with translation).

Vallin needs the orchestral score for a Pergolesi aria, and believes that the "Association" may procure it without inconvenience. She notes that she cannot do a rehearsal in full voice on April 1, the date when she will sing Louise at the Opéra-Comique.

"I have the orchestral score for the aria from Messiah (And You Zion) by Handel, but not that for Pergolesi. I do not know whether one can find it at Ricordi or at Costallat. I remember having sung it at Ste. Mozart and at auditions with orchestra at the homes of fashionable people. Therefore it cannot be too difficult to obtain it. But since I will not return to Paris from Brussels until Sunday the 28th, I cannot possibly take the time for this research... "

Slightly worn; creased at folds; remnants of former mount to left edge of recto and lower blank portion of verso. French soprano Ninon Vallin "studied in Lyons and made her début in 1912 as Micaëla with the Opéra-Comique, where she continued to sing throughout her career in a repertory that included Mimì, Mignon, Louise, Manon and Carmen. At La Scala (1916-17) she sang Mignon, Wolf-Ferrari's Susanna and the Princess (Marouf). She first appeared at the Teatro Colón, Buenos Aires, in 1916 as Gounod's Marguerite, returning there regularly for 20 years. In 1920 she made her Opéra début as Thaïs. She appeared at San Francisco (1934) and Monte Carlo (1943). Her repertory also included the three Hoffmann heroines, as well as Alcestis, Mélisande and Countess Almaviva, which she sang in 1946 at the Opéra-Comique. Vallin was a distinguished interpreter of mélodies, as her excellent records confirm, including many Hahn songs and arrangements by Joaquín Nin of Spanish folksongs, in both cases with the composer as accompanist. Her many operatic recordings reveal the distinctive flavour of her voice and her inborn sense of style that did not preclude impassioned involvement with the music in hand, all heard at their best in her complete Werther with Georges Thill." Martin Cooper, et al. in Grove Music Online.