Ladies with Brass - part 2

The herald trumpet has been an symbolic icon of music since ancient times. It is often depicted as the instrument of choice for angels. Surely that is what the photographer had in mind when he arranged two young ladies and young man to point their three trumpets to the sky in this German postcard. The caption tells us that they are the -

 Oliveira Trio - Musical Virtuosen auf verschiedenen Instrumenten.
~ Musical virtuoso on different instruments.

Peter Paul Rubens (1577–1640)
Angel Blowing a Trumpet
Source: The Morgan Museum

The trio was frei, that is available, in September at the address of the Walhalla Theater in Magdeburg, Germany. The year is not recorded but this style of postcard is typical of others printed from 1905-1910.

Some lady trumpeters, like this musician named Olly Marietta, added a Renaissance fashion to the herald theme with a beautiful elaborate costume. Unfortunately in era of sepia tone postcards we can only guess the color, but I would think there is lots of gold thread. Fräulein Marietta adds a detailed caption.

Instrumental künstler und Virtuosin

Instrumental artist and virtuoso

Original Musical Ausstattungs Act auf 7 verschiedenen Instrumenten

Original musical outfit Act on 7 different instruments 

Inhaberin des Kunst Diploms und der Goldenen Medaille fur hervorragende Leistungen in der Musik 

Proprietor of Art diploma and the Gold Medal for excellence in music

If you look closely, her straight trumpet, like those of the Oliveira Trio, has three small valves to add length to the instrument which would allow more notes to be played. Essentially this is the length of a normal B-flat trumpet if it was assembled without the plumbing bends. She must have been a very talented musician to play so many different instruments, which must have been a changeable number as she left the space blank on the caption and wrote the numeral 7 by hand.

This ladies brass trio has three regular piston valve cornets, but they have dressed themselves in matching 18th century style costumes complete with powdered wigs. The caption tells us they are the

 Königs Cornet a Piston Trio
Charlotte, Margarete, and Melani 

Presumably they are sisters, but possibly not German but French, as the brass instrument tradition in Germany used rotary valve trumpets while the French used piston valves. Again we can only speculate about color, but gold embroidery on white satin would look nice.

The back of the postcard is dated 26.7.15 from Berlin Lichterfelde. There is an additional stamp for the Lazarett Johanniter Siechenhaus which was the Hospital of St. John hospice. I can't translate this but it could be the writing of a soldier recovering from wounds or illness. It also suggests that the Königs Cornet a Piston Trio performed at the hospital and if they were French they may have come from the Alsace region which was then part of Germany.





UPDATE: Thanks to the great research of Susanna Rosalie (see the comment below) I can add two more images of the young ladies of the Königs Cornet a Piston Trio and a translation of the message. The writer of this postcard was indeed a soldier and his name was Leonhard Rech. He was writing to his sister, Mina Rech. 

He wrote:
Liebes Schwesterchen!
Ich will dir doch auch einmal
auf deine beiden Kärtchen
antworten und dir viele
Grüße senden in der Hoff-
nung, daß ich bald einmal
zu Euch komme. Viele
Grüße Leonhard

Dear little sister!
I want to finally
answer your two cards
and wish to send you many
greetings in the hope
that I will come to you soon.
Many greetings Leonhard

She found his name in the list of German casualties for the war 1914-1919.  

6 January 1917: Rech, Leonhard,*7 March 1894 Stauf, until now been wounded, deceased.

Source: Wikimedia

Source:  Universität Osnabrück

Wetterfahne auf der Kirche in Nietleben
Source: Wikimedia.org

This is my contribution to Sepia Saturday
click the link for more angelic ladies.