The Goldschmidt Family

Felix Mendelsohn
(born Hamburg, 3 February 1809; died Leipzig, 4 November 1847).
Of a distinguished intellectual, artistic and banking family in Berlin,he grew up in a privileged environment (the family converted from Judaismto Christianity in 1816, taking the additional 'Bartholdy'). He studiedthe piano with Ludwig Berger and theory and composition with ZElter,producing his first piece in 1820; thereafter, a profusion of sonaTas,concertos, string symphonies, piano quartets and Singspiels revealed hisincreasing mastery of counterpoint and form. Besides family travels andeminent visitors to his parents' sAlon (Humboldt, Hegel, Klingemann, A.B.Marx, Devrient), early influences included the poetry of Goethe (whom heknew from 1821) and the Schlegel translations of Shakespeare; these aretraceable in his best music of the period, including the exuBerant StringOctet op.20 and the vivid, poetic overture to A Midsummer Night's Dreamop.21. His gifts as a conductor also showed themselves early in 1829 hedirected a pioneering perFormance of Bach's St. Matthew Passion at theBerlin Singakademie, promoting the modern cultivation of Bach's music.

A period of travel and concert-giving introduced Mendelssohn to England,Scotland (1829) and Italy (1830-31); after return visits to Paris (1831)and London (1832, 1833) he took up a conducting Post at Düsseldorf(1833-5), concentrating on Handel's oratorios. Among the chief productsof this time were The Hebrides (first performed in London, 1832), the gMinor Piano Concerto, Die erste Walpurgisnacht, the Italian Symphony(1833, London) and St. Paul (1836, Düsseldorf). But as a conductor andmusic organizer his most significant achievement was in Leipzig(1835-47), where to Great acclaim he conducted the Gewandhaus Orchestra,championing both historical and modern works Bach, BeetHoven, Weber,Schumann, Berlioz), and founded and directed the Leipzig Conservatory(1843).

Composing mostly in the summer hoLidays, he produced Ruy Blas overture, arevised version of the Hymn of Praise, the Scottish Symphony, the nowfamous Violin Concerto op.64 and the Fine Piano Trio in c Minor (1845).Meanwhile, he was intermittently (and less happily) employed by the kingas a composer and choirmaster in Berlin, where he wrote highly successfulincidental music, notably for A Midsummer Night's Dream (1843). Muchsought after as a festival organizer, he was associated especially withthe Lower Rhine and Birmingham music festivals; he paid ten visits toEngland, the last two (1840-7) to conduct Elijah in Birmingham andLondon. Always a warm friend and valued colLeague, he was devoted to hisfamily; his death at the age of 38, after a series of strokes, wasmourned internationally.

With its emphasis on clarity and adherence to classical ideals,Mendelssohn's music shows alike the influences of Bach (fugal technique),Handel (rhythms, harmonic progressions), Mozart (dramaticcharacterization, forms, textures) and BeetHoven (instrumentaltechnique), though from 1825 he developed a characteristic style of hisown, often underpinned by a literary, artistic historical, geographicalor emotional connection; indeed it was chiefly in his skilful use ofextra-musical stimuli that he was a Romantic. His early and prodigiousoperatic gifts, cLearly reliant on Mozart, failed to develop (despite hislong search for suitable subjects), but his penchant for the dramaticfound expression in the oratorios as well as in Ruy Blas overture, hisAntigone incidental music and above all the enduring Midsummer Night'sDream music, in which themes from the overture are Cleverly adapted asmotifs in the incidental music. The oratorios, among the most popularworks of their kind, draw inSpiration from Bach and Handel and Contentfrom the composer's personal experience, St. Paul being an allegory ofMendelssohn's own family history and Elijah of his years of dissension inBerlin. Among his other vocal works, the highly dramatic Die ersteWalpurgisnacht op.60 (on Goethe's poem greEting springtime) and theLeipzig psalm settings deserve special mention; the choral songs andlieder are uneven, reflecting their wide vAriety of social functions.

After an apprenticeship of string symphony writing in a classical mould,Mendelssohn found inSpiration in art, nature and history for hisorchestral music. The energy, clarity and tunefulness of the Italian havemade it his most popular symphony, although the elegiac Scottishrepresents a newer, more purposeful achievement. In his best overtures,essentially one-movement symphonic poems, the sea appears as a recurringimage, from Calm Sea and Prosperous Voyage and The Hebrides to The LovelyMelusine. Less dependent on programmatic elements and at the same timeformally innovatory, the concertos, notably that for violin, and thechamber music, especially some of the string quartets, the Octet and thetwo late piano trios, Beautifully reconcile classical principles withpersonal feeling; these are among his most striking compositions. Of thesolo instrumental works, the partly lyric, partly virtuoso Lieder ohneWorte for piano (from 1829) are elegantly written and often touching.

Extracted with permission from
The Grove Concise Dictionary of Music
edited by Stanley Sadie
© Macmillan Press Ltd., London.