Dear and Beloved F[riend]!
I have not yet given your song a thought, but I will set to work on it at once. Perhaps I shall call on you this afternoon, in order to give you my opinion on the song – I cannot say for certain whether you can rehearse as soon as Monday, but certainly any day after that. You have not the faintest idea how much there is to be done in connexion with a concert of this kind. Only necessity compels me to give it, only necessity forces me to undertake all the irksome duties that such a concert entails –
In haste, your friend
Beethoven