Ruggiero LEONCAVALLO (1858-1919) Italian composer. L.A.S., Milan November 14, 1894; 2pages in-4; in French. Superb praise of Gounod.Leoncavallo is happy to "publicly express the boundless admiration I have for the great French master. [...] We have not mourned enough the enormous loss that Art and France have made in this true genius, pure as diamond, who was able to assert his powerful personality by determining both a school and the new character of music in France. For Gounod is the oak from which sprang the two astonishing branches known as Bizet and Massenet. Two true masters, two very original individualities [...] but who bear the family traits of such a glorious common father! As for the work, "let the poor technicians seek out the master's processes and prove by dint of subtleties that the real glory lies not with Michelangelo in painting the Last Judgement, but with the merchant who sold him such an excellent quality of red or blue!... I, small as I am, judge only by the enthusiasms that are wrung from my artist's soul"... He wishes every musician to write "something like that Faust which so greenly surpasses the thousandth at the opera!