Felix Mendelssohn

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"Mendelssohn" redirects here. For other uses, see Mendelssohn
(surname) and Mendelssohn (disambiguation).

Portrait of Mendelssohn by the German painter Eduard Magnus, 1846

Jakob Ludwig Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy [n 1] (3 February 1809 – 4 November

1847), born and widely known as Felix Mendelssohn,[n 2] was a German composer,
pianist, organist and conductor of the early Romantic period. Mendelssohn's
compositions include symphonies, concertos, piano music, organ music and chamber
music. His best-known works include the overture and incidental music for A
Midsummer Night's Dream, the Italian Symphony, the Scottish Symphony,
the oratorio St. Paul, the oratorio Elijah, the overture The Hebrides, the mature Violin
Concerto and the String Octet. The melody for the Christmas carol "Hark! The Herald
Angels Sing" is also his. Mendelssohn's Songs Without Words are his most famous solo
piano compositions.
A grandson of the philosopher Moses Mendelssohn, Felix Mendelssohn was born into a
prominent Jewish family. He was brought up without religion until the age of seven,
when he was baptised as a Reformed Christian. Felix was recognised early as
a musical prodigy, but his parents were cautious and did not seek to capitalise on his
talent. His sister Fanny Mendelssohn received a similar musical education and was a
talented composer and pianist in her own right; some of her early songs were published
under her brother's name and her Easter Sonata was for a time mistakenly attributed to
him after being lost and rediscovered in the 1970s.
Mendelssohn enjoyed early success in Germany, and revived interest in the music
of Johann Sebastian Bach, notably with his performance of the St Matthew Passion in
1829. He became well received in his travels throughout Europe as a composer,
conductor and soloist; his ten visits to Britain – during which many of his major works
were premiered – form an important part of his adult career. His essentially conservative
musical tastes set him apart from more adventurous musical contemporaries such
as Franz Liszt, Richard Wagner, Charles-Valentin Alkan and Hector Berlioz. The Leipzig
Conservatory,[n 3] which he founded, became a bastion of this anti-radical outlook. After a
long period of relative denigration due to changing musical tastes and antisemitism in
the late 19th and early 20th centuries, his creative originality has been re-evaluated. He
is now among the most popular composers of the Romantic era.

Contents

 1Life
o 1.1Childhood
o 1.2Surname
o 1.3Career
 1.3.1Musical education
 1.3.2Early maturity
 1.3.3Meeting Goethe and conducting Bach
 1.3.4Düsseldorf
 1.3.5Leipzig and Berlin
 1.3.6Mendelssohn in Britain
 1.3.7Death
o 1.4Personal life
 1.4.1Personality
 1.4.2Religion
 1.4.3Mendelssohn and his contemporaries
 1.4.4Marriage and children
 1.4.5Jenny Lind
 2Music
o 2.1Composer
 2.1.1Style
 2.1.2Early works
 2.1.3Symphonies
 2.1.4Other orchestral music
 2.1.5Concertos
 2.1.6Chamber music
 2.1.7Piano music
 2.1.8Organ music
 2.1.9Opera
 2.1.10Choral works
 2.1.11Songs
o 2.2Performer
o 2.3Conductor
o 2.4Editor
o 2.5Teacher
 3Reputation and legacy
o 3.1The first century
o 3.2Modern opinions
  4Notes and references
 5Sources
 6Further reading
 7External links
o 7.1Texts
o 7.2Recordings
o 7.3Music scores

Life[edit]
Childhood[edit]

Felix Mendelssohn aged 12 (1821) by Carl Joseph Begas

Felix Mendelssohn was born on 3 February 1809, in Hamburg, at the time an

independent city-state,[n 4] in the same house where, a year later, the dedicatee and first
performer of his Violin Concerto, Ferdinand David, would be born.[4] Mendelssohn's
father, the banker Abraham Mendelssohn, was the son of the German
Jewish philosopher Moses Mendelssohn, whose family was prominent in the German
Jewish community.[5] Until his baptism at age seven, Mendelssohn was brought up
largely without religion.[6] His mother, Lea Salomon, was a member of the Itzig
family and a sister of Jakob Salomon Bartholdy.[7] Mendelssohn was the second of four
children; his older sister Fanny also displayed exceptional and precocious musical
talent.[8]
The family moved to Berlin in 1811, leaving Hamburg in disguise in fear of French
reprisal for the Mendelssohn bank's role in breaking Napoleon's Continental
System blockade.[9] Abraham and Lea Mendelssohn sought to give their children –
Fanny, Felix, Paul and Rebecka – the best education possible. Fanny became a pianist
well known in Berlin musical circles as a composer; originally Abraham had thought that
she, rather than Felix, would be the more musical. But it was not considered proper, by
either Abraham or Felix, for a woman to pursue a career in music, so she remained an
active but non-professional musician.[10] Abraham was initially disinclined to allow Felix to
follow a musical career until it became clear that he was seriously dedicated. [11]
Mendelssohn grew up in an intellectual environment. Frequent visitors to
the salon organised by his parents at their home in Berlin included artists, musicians
and scientists, among them Wilhelm and Alexander von Humboldt, and the
mathematician Peter Gustav Lejeune Dirichlet (whom Mendelssohn's sister Rebecka
would later marry).[12] The musician Sarah Rothenburg has written of the household that
"Europe came to their living room". [13]
Surname[edit]
Abraham Mendelssohn renounced the Jewish religion prior to Felix's birth; he and his
wife decided not to have Felix circumcised, in contravention of the Jewish tradition.
[14]
 Felix and his siblings were at first brought up without religious education; on 21 March
1816, they were baptized in a private ceremony in the family's Berlin apartment by the
Reformed Protestant minister of the Jerusalem Church,[6] at which time Felix was given
the additional names Jakob Ludwig. Abraham and his wife Lea were baptised in 1822,
and formally adopted the surname Mendelssohn Bartholdy (which they had used since
1812) for themselves and for their children.[6]
The name Bartholdy was added at the suggestion of Lea's brother, Jakob Salomon
Bartholdy, who had inherited a property of this name in Luisenstadt and adopted it as
his own surname.[15] In an 1829 letter to Felix, Abraham explained that adopting the
Bartholdy name was meant to demonstrate a decisive break with the traditions of his
father Moses: "There can no more be a Christian Mendelssohn than there can be a
Jewish Confucius". (Letter to Felix of 8 July 1829).[16] On embarking on his musical
career, Felix did not entirely drop the name Mendelssohn as Abraham had requested,
but in deference to his father signed his letters and had his visiting cards printed using
the form 'Mendelssohn Bartholdy'.[17] In 1829, his sister Fanny wrote to him of
"Bartholdy [...] this name that we all dislike".[18]
Career[edit]
Musical education[edit]
Mendelssohn began taking piano lessons from his mother when he was six, and at
seven was tutored by Marie Bigot in Paris.[19] Later in Berlin, all four Mendelssohn
children studied piano with Ludwig Berger, who was himself a former student of Muzio
Clementi.[20] From at least May 1819 Mendelssohn (initially with his sister Fanny)
studied counterpoint and composition with Carl Friedrich Zelter in Berlin.[21] This was an
important influence on his future career. Zelter had almost certainly been recommended
as a teacher by his aunt Sarah Levy, who had been a pupil of W. F. Bach and a patron
of C. P. E. Bach. Sarah Levy displayed some talent as a keyboard player, and often
played with Zelter's orchestra at the Berliner Singakademie; she and the Mendelssohn
family were among its leading patrons. Sarah had formed an important collection of
Bach family manuscripts which she bequeathed to the Singakademie; Zelter, whose
tastes in music were conservative, was also an admirer of the Bach tradition. [22] This
undoubtedly played a significant part in forming Felix Mendelssohn's musical tastes, as
his works reflect this study of Baroque and early classical music.
His fugues and chorales especially reflect a tonal clarity and use of counterpoint
reminiscent of Johann Sebastian Bach, whose music influenced him deeply.[23]
Early maturity[edit]

First page of the manuscript of Mendelssohn's Octet (1825) (now in the US Library of Congress)

Mendelssohn probably made his first public concert appearance at the age of nine,
when he participated in a chamber music concert accompanying a horn duo.[24] He was a
prolific composer from an early age. As an adolescent, his works were often performed
at home with a private orchestra for the associates of his wealthy parents amongst the
intellectual elite of Berlin.[25] Between the ages of 12 and 14, Mendelssohn wrote
12 string symphonies for such concerts, and a number of chamber works.[26] His first
work, a piano quartet, was published when he was 13. It was probably Abraham
Mendelssohn who procured the publication of this quartet by the house of Schlesinger.
[27]
 In 1824 the 15-year-old wrote his first symphony for full orchestra (in C minor,
Op. 11).[28]
At age 16 Mendelssohn wrote his String Octet in E-flat major, a work which has been
regarded as "mark[ing] the beginning of his maturity as a composer." [29] This Octet and
his Overture to Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream, which he wrote a year later
in 1826, are the best-known of his early works. (Later, in 1843, he also wrote incidental
music for the play, including the famous "Wedding March".) The Overture is perhaps the
earliest example of a concert overture – that is, a piece not written deliberately to
accompany a staged performance but to evoke a literary theme in performance on a
concert platform; this was a genre which became a popular form in musical
Romanticism.[30]
In 1824 Mendelssohn studied under the composer and piano virtuoso Ignaz Moscheles,
who confessed in his diaries[31] that he had little to teach him. Moscheles and
Mendelssohn became close colleagues and lifelong friends. The year 1827 saw the
premiere – and sole performance in his lifetime – of Mendelssohn's opera Die Hochzeit
des Camacho. The failure of this production left him disinclined to venture into the genre
again.[32]
Besides music, Mendelssohn's education included art, literature, languages, and
philosophy. He had a particular interest in classical literature[33] and
translated Terence's Andria for his tutor Heyse in 1825; Heyse was impressed and had
it published in 1826 as a work of "his pupil, F****" [i.e. "Felix" (asterisks as provided in
original text)].[34][n 5] This translation also qualified Mendelssohn to study at the Humboldt
University of Berlin, where from 1826 to 1829 he attended lectures on aesthetics
by Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, on history by Eduard Gans, and on geography
by Carl Ritter.[36]
Meeting Goethe and conducting Bach[edit]
In 1821 Zelter introduced Mendelssohn to his friend and correspondent, the
writer Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (then in his seventies), who was greatly impressed
by the child, leading to perhaps the earliest confirmed comparison with Mozart in the
following conversation between Goethe and Zelter:
"Musical prodigies ... are probably no longer so rare; but what this little man can do in
extemporizing and playing at sight borders the miraculous, and I could not have
believed it possible at so early an age." "And yet you heard Mozart in his seventh year
at Frankfurt?" said Zelter. "Yes", answered Goethe, "... but what your pupil already
accomplishes, bears the same relation to the Mozart of that time that the cultivated talk
of a grown-up person bears to the prattle of a child." [37]
Mendelssohn was invited to meet Goethe on several later occasions, [38] and set a
number of Goethe's poems to music. His other compositions inspired by Goethe include
the overture Calm Sea and Prosperous Voyage (Op. 27, 1828), and the cantata Die
erste Walpurgisnacht (The First Walpurgis Night, Op. 60, 1832).[39]
In 1829, with the backing of Zelter and the assistance of the actor Eduard Devrient,
Mendelssohn arranged and conducted a performance in Berlin of Bach's St Matthew
Passion. Four years previously his grandmother, Bella Salomon, had given him a copy
of the manuscript of this (by then all-but-forgotten) masterpiece. [40] The orchestra and
choir for the performance were provided by the Berlin Singakademie. The success of
this performance, one of the very few since Bach's death and the first ever outside
of Leipzig,[n 6] was the central event in the revival of Bach's music in Germany and,
eventually, throughout Europe.[42] It earned Mendelssohn widespread acclaim at the age
of 20. It also led to one of the few explicit references which Mendelssohn made to his
origins: "To think that it took an actor and a Jew's son to revive the greatest Christian
music for the world!"[43][44]
Over the next few years Mendelssohn travelled widely. His first visit to England was in
1829; other places visited during the 1830s included Vienna, Florence, Milan, Rome
and Naples, in all of which he met with local and visiting musicians and artists. These
years proved to be the germination for some of his most famous works, including
the Hebrides Overture and the Scottish and Italian symphonies.[45]
Düsseldorf[edit]
On Zelter's death in 1832, Mendelssohn had hopes of succeeding him as conductor of
the Singakademie; but at a vote in January 1833 he was defeated for the post by Carl
Friedrich Rungenhagen. This may have been because of Mendelssohn's youth, and
fear of possible innovations; it was also suspected by some to be attributable to his
Jewish ancestry.[46] Following this rebuff, Mendelssohn divided most of his professional
time over the next few years between Britain and Düsseldorf, where he was appointed
musical director (his first paid post as a musician) in 1833. [47]
In the spring of that year Mendelssohn directed the Lower Rhenish Music Festival in
Düsseldorf, beginning with a performance of George Frideric Handel's oratorio Israel in
Egypt prepared from the original score, which he had found in London. This precipitated
a Handel revival in Germany, similar to the reawakened interest in J. S. Bach following
his performance of the St. Matthew Passion.[48] Mendelssohn worked with the
dramatist Karl Immermann to improve local theatre standards, and made his first
appearance as an opera conductor in Immermann's production of Mozart's Don
Giovanni at the end of 1833, where he took umbrage at the audience's protests about
the cost of tickets. His frustration at his everyday duties in Düsseldorf, and the city's
provincialism, led him to resign his position at the end of 1834. He had offers from both
Munich and Leipzig for important musical posts, namely, direction of the Munich Opera,
the editorship of the prestigious Leipzig music journal the Allgemeine musikalische
Zeitung, and direction of the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra; he accepted the latter in
1835.[49][50]
Leipzig and Berlin[edit]

The composer's study in Mendelssohn House, a museum in Leipzig

In Leipzig, Mendelssohn concentrated on developing the town's musical life by working

with the orchestra, the opera house, the Thomanerchor (of which Bach had been a
director), and the city's other choral and musical institutions. Mendelssohn's concerts
included, in addition to many of his own works, three series of "historical concerts"
featuring music of the eighteenth century, and a number of works by his
contemporaries.[51] He was deluged by offers of music from rising and would-be
composers; among these was Richard Wagner, who submitted his early Symphony, the
score of which, to Wagner's disgust, Mendelssohn lost or mislaid. [52] Mendelssohn also
revived interest in the music of Franz Schubert. Robert Schumann discovered the
manuscript of Schubert's Ninth Symphony and sent it to Mendelssohn, who promptly
premiered it in Leipzig on 21 March 1839, more than a decade after Schubert's death. [53]
A landmark event during Mendelssohn's Leipzig years was the premiere of his
oratorio Paulus, (the English version of this is known as St. Paul), given at the Lower
Rhenish Festival in Düsseldorf in 1836, shortly after the death of the composer's father,
which affected him greatly; Felix wrote that he would "never cease to endeavour to gain
his approval ... although I can no longer enjoy it".[54] St. Paul seemed to many of
Mendelssohn's contemporaries to be his finest work, and sealed his European
reputation.[55]
When Friedrich Wilhelm IV came to the Prussian throne in 1840 with ambitions to
develop Berlin as a cultural centre (including the establishment of a music school, and
reform of music for the church), the obvious choice to head these reforms was
Mendelssohn. He was reluctant to undertake the task, especially in the light of his
existing strong position in Leipzig.[56] Mendelssohn nonetheless spent some time in
Berlin, writing some church music, and, at the King's request, music for productions
of Sophocles's Antigone (1841 – an overture and seven pieces) and Oedipus at
Colonus (1845), A Midsummer Night's Dream (1843) and Racine's Athalie (1845).[n 7] But
the funds for the school never materialised, and many of the court's promises to
Mendelssohn regarding finances, title, and concert programming were broken. He was
therefore not displeased to have the excuse to return to Leipzig. [58]
In 1843 Mendelssohn founded a major music school – the Leipzig Conservatory, now
the Hochschule für Musik und Theater "Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy".[n 8] where he
persuaded Ignaz Moscheles and Robert Schumann to join him. Other prominent
musicians, including the string players Ferdinand David and Joseph Joachim and the
music theorist Moritz Hauptmann, also became staff members.[59] After Mendelssohn's
death in 1847, his musically conservative tradition was carried on when Moscheles
succeeded him as head of the Conservatory.[60]
Mendelssohn in Britain[edit]
Mendelssohn first visited Britain in 1829, where Moscheles, who had already settled in
London, introduced him to influential musical circles. In the summer he
visited Edinburgh, where he met among others the composer John Thomson, whom he
later recommended for the post of Professor of Music at Edinburgh University.[61] He
made ten visits to Britain, lasting about 20 months; he won a strong following, which
enabled him to make a good impression on British musical life. [62] He composed and
performed, and also edited for British publishers the first critical editions of oratorios of
Handel and of the organ music of J. S. Bach. Scotland inspired two of his most famous
works: the overture The Hebrides (also known as Fingal's Cave); and the Scottish
Symphony (Symphony No. 3).[63] An English Heritage blue plaque commemorating
Mendelssohn's residence in London was placed at 4 Hobart Place in Belgravia, London,
in 2013.[64]
His protégé, the British composer and pianist William Sterndale Bennett, worked closely
with Mendelssohn during this period, both in London and Leipzig. He first heard Bennett
perform in London in 1833 aged 17.[65][n 9] Bennett appeared with Mendelssohn in concerts
in Leipzig throughout the 1836/1837 season. [67]
On Mendelssohn's eighth British visit in the summer of 1844, he conducted five of the
Philharmonic concerts in London, and wrote: "[N]ever before was anything like this
season – we never went to bed before half-past one, every hour of every day was filled
with engagements three weeks beforehand, and I got through more music in two
months than in all the rest of the year." (Letter to Rebecka Mendelssohn Bartholdy,
Soden, 22 July 1844).[68] On subsequent visits Mendelssohn met Queen Victoria and her
husband Prince Albert, himself a composer, who both greatly admired his music. [69][70]
Mendelssohn's oratorio Elijah was commissioned by the Birmingham Triennial Music
Festival and premiered on 26 August 1846, at the Town Hall, Birmingham. It was
composed to a German text translated into English by William Bartholomew, who
authored and translated many of Mendelssohn's works during his time in England. [71][72]

Mendelssohn's gravestone at the Dreifaltigkeitsfriedhof

On his last visit to Britain in 1847, Mendelssohn was the soloist in Beethoven's Piano
Concerto No. 4 and conducted his own Scottish Symphony with the Philharmonic
Orchestra before the Queen and Prince Albert. [73]
Death[edit]
Mendelssohn suffered from poor health in the final years of his life, probably aggravated
by nervous problems and overwork. A final tour of England left him exhausted and ill,
and the death of his sister, Fanny, on 14 May 1847, caused him further distress. Less
than six months later, on 4 November, aged 38, Mendelssohn died in Leipzig after a
series of strokes.[74] His grandfather Moses, Fanny, and both his parents had all died
from similar apoplexies.[75][n 10] Although he had been generally meticulous in the
management of his affairs, he died intestate.[77]
Felix's funeral was held at the Paulinerkirche, Leipzig, and he was buried at
the Dreifaltigkeitsfriedhof I in Berlin-Kreuzberg. The pallbearers included Moscheles,
Schumann and Niels Gade.[78] Mendelssohn had once described death, in a letter to a
stranger, as a place "where it is to be hoped there is still music, but no more sorrow or
partings."[79]