I want you to read the enclosed letter, dear Master, and return it to me. I felt obliged to reply that T.’s claims and statements were justified (but for him the whole thing would have been passed over); that is, that the public is used to his absence of legato and mezza di voce, and that he will presumably be succeeded later by another Walther von Stolzing.
Bronsart writes that Hülsen, who has forbidden him to proceed with rehearsals of the Meistersinger for the present, is going to leave it to Count Platen in Dresden to pull the chestnuts out of the fire. Quite right too, in my opinion.
The ninth performance of the Meistersinger went very well in parts. Richter took first horn after he had played the organ. Fräulein Stehle excellent; Sigl not in such good voice, but sang the couplets without mistakes and in correct tempo. Kindermann dragged and went wrong a good deal (had to beat time on my desk once or twice), but, all the same, did respectably well. Hammered his last to perfection. Orchestra very intelligent. House overflowing at somewhat reduced prices (galérie noble, two florins thirty; parquet, two florins—here that still counts as dear). On Sunday the 13th, Iphigenia in Aulis; on Sunday the 20th, Flying Dutchman with Fräulein Gungl, thoroughly drilled by me, as Senta.
Source: Letters of Hans von Bülow to Richard Wagner, Cosima Wagner, His Daughter Daniela, Luise von Bülow, Karl Klindworth, Carl Bechstein, ed. Richard Count Du Moulin Eckart, trans. Hannah Waller, ed. Scott Goddard (Alfred A. Knopf, 1931), No. 290