> What I did was:
>
> $ sudo ln -s /usr/include/freetype2/freetype/config /usr/include/freetype2/config
> $ sudo sed -i 's|/freetype2$|/freetype2/freetype|' /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/pkgconfig/freetype2.pc
> $ ./configure
> $ make
>
> Which gives me a working lilypond 2.19.49. What I didn't try
> previously was the first step, i.e. the symbolic link to the config
> folder.
I don't understand why such links are necessary. It should work out
of the box without *any* links. Have you tried that?
Yep, it builds fine for me once I did "sudo apt install ..." for all the (many) required dependencies. I *think* all I needed to do was "./smart_autoconf.sh" and "make all"
Chris