My Dear Rufus,
I hope December finds you in good health. Roger keeps me informed, to the extent that he can, about your life over the past few months as I haven’t received any mail from you.
I hear that your mother has not been well but mustered the strength to sit in on a few numbers in your recent Carnegie Hall Christmas concert. Please send her my love and warm embraces.
I’m glad that you have taken my advice to take time off from your obsessive touring to compose. I am also happy to hear that you have taken my advice to produce your own album. Now, clean up your notational skills and begin notating everything you write from now on. No, you don’t need to notate those sleepy guitar-based cowboy songs, but your sophisticated piano-based songs should all be notated. If you really think you are of the lineage of Cole Porter and George Gershwin, leave behind a notated legacy for people to play themselves as they did. Don’t give it to someone else. If you feel insecure about it, take a few lessons with someone there in New York. This is a must.
In November, I finally kicked that nasty opium habit. Harriet said she would never speak to me again if I didn’t stop. God, it was painful but I’m glad to be on the other side of that nasty but alluring dragon. I am in a much better frame of mind now to continue our orchestration lessons and will do so in my next post to you.
Love to Bjorn and your family,
H. Berlioz
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