7 minute read
WHAT YOU ARE ABOUT TO HEAR
Mendelssohn (1809-1847)
Symphony No 4 in A ‘Italian’, Op 90 (1833, revised 1834)
Allegro vivace
Andante con moto Con moto moderato
Saltarello (Presto)
A Midsummer Night's Dream, Incidental Music, Op 61 (1842)
Overture (Op 21 – 1826)
No 1 Scherzo
No 2 Fairies’ March
No 3 Song with Chorus
No 5 Intermezzo
No 7 Notturno
No 9 Wedding March
No 13 Finale
His grandfather was Moses Mendelssohn, one of Germany’s most influential Enlightenment thinkers. His father Abraham was one of Berlin’s most successful bankers. As a child, he mingled with Europe’s cultural and intellectual elite – think scientist and explorer Alexander von Humboldt, philosopher GWF Hegel, even superstar writer Johann Wolfgang von Goethe – at the family house in central Berlin.
With an early immersion in music, painting, literature and philosophy, it’s probably no surprise that Felix Mendelssohn would go on to become a polymath himself – as a gifted visual artist, a talented linguist, and of course a celebrated musician. He began composing at 11, wrote twelve String Symphonies between the ages of 12 and 14, and created his adored Octet at 16 and his Midsummer Night’s Dream Overture at 17 (we’ll return to that piece shortly). He would also go on to become a noted conductor and pianist, influential music director of the historic Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, and founding director of the Leipzig Conservatoire, still going strong today.
For tonight’s music – or at least most of it – we return to Mendelssohn’s earlier years, however. We begin with Mendelssohn as a gap-year traveller in his early 20s. It was more like three gap years, in fact, off and on between 1829 and 1831, and it’s probably fairer to describe his travels as excursions in the tradition of a Grand Tour, in which a wealthy young man completed his education by ticking off the cultural highlights of Europe. Mendelssohn began – unconventionally – with a three-week visit to Scotland in
1829, which inspired both his 'Hebrides' Overture and his ‘Scottish’ Symphony. But, encouraged by both Goethe and his composition teacher Carl Friedrich Zelter, he set off for the more traditional destination of Italy in October 1830. He spent ten months in the country, making his way from Venice to Naples via Bologna, Florence and Rome, then back home again through Genoa and Milan.
If his Scottish trip had been about brooding landscapes, swirling mists and blood-soaked history, his Italian trip, as he wrote home to his parents, was about light, sunshine and happiness: ‘This is Italy! And now has begun what I have always thought to be the supreme joy in life. And I am loving it.’
He devoted time during his travels to planning what he called ‘the jolliest piece
IfhisScottishtriphad beenaboutbrooding landscapes,swirlingmists andblood-soakedhistory, hisItaliantrip,ashewrote hometohisparents, wasaboutlight,sunshine andhappiness
I have ever done’ in a letter to his sister Fanny, completing his ‘Italian’ Symphony back home in Berlin on 13 March 1833. It was an immediate success at its premiere in London two months later. (Its designation as No 4, incidentally, is misleading: Mendelssohn wrote and premiered the piece several years before his Second and Third Symphonies. It’s only numbered as his Fourth because it was published after those later works.)
Mendelssohn described the Symphony as ‘blue sky in A major’, and it’s a bright optimism that’s encapsulated in the first movement’s bounding opening theme, though the movement’s central development section brings in somewhat darker, more impish material. The slow second movement was inspired by religious processions that Mendelssohn witnessed in Rome: it contrasts a noble melody in the woodwind and violas with a plodding bassline, slipping away at its conclusion as if the procession has moved into the distance. Following an elegant third-movement minuet (complete with distant horn calls in its gently martial trio section), Mendelssohn closes with a finale that blends two breathless Italian dances: the Roman saltarello (which gives the movement its name) and the Neapolitan tarantella. The ‘Italian’ is one of very few symphonies that begins in the bright positivity of the major and ends in the more serious minor (often the journey is the other way round: just think of Beethoven’s Fifth). The finale’s whirling energy, however, alongside a melancholy memory of the Symphony’s opening melody just before the end, ensures a propulsive, somewhat delirious conclusion.
In a childhood immersed in culture, politics and science, it’s probably no surprise either that the young Mendelssohn should develop a passion for Shakespeare. He and his sister Fanny would act out favourite scenes from the Bard’s plays, and when the family acquired a new German translation of A Midsummer Night’s Dream in 1826, its stories of lovers and fairies, spells and transformations immediately captured the 17-year-old’s imagination. So much so that he quickly set about transforming the play into music, completing his A Midsummer Night’s Dream Overture on 6 August the same year.
The Overture is intended for the concert hall rather than the theatre, and doesn’t set out to tell the play’s story. Nonetheless, its magical opening chords invite listeners into a world of magic and mystery, complete with the braying of
Bottom the ass and the scampering of fairy feet.
It was 16 years later that the mature composer was requested by King Frederick William IV of Prussia to provide incidental music for a production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream at his palace in Potsdam. Incorporating his existing Overture into what was now a theatrical setting, Mendelssohn also set about reusing the musical themes he’d concocted as a teenager into the broader scope of an evening-long entertainment. There are 14 numbers in all, including the Overture and grand Finale, from which we’ll hear the most substantial ones tonight.
The Scherzo and subsequent Fairies March’ lead us from Act I into Act II, and from the world of squabbling humans into the mystery, intrigue and danger of the fairy kingdom, complete with a fairy march – listen out for tinkling triangle and cymbals – announcing the arrival of Fairy King Oberon. The choral song ‘Bunte Schlangen’ (or ‘You spotted snakes’ in Shakespeare’s original) introduces the second scene of Act II, as the retinue of Fairy Queen Titania sings songs and incantations to protect her while she sleeps. They fail to spot Oberon, however, as he drips flower juice into Titania’s closed eyes, so that she’ll fall in love with the first thing she sees once she wakes.
Inachildhoodimmersedinculture,politicsand science,it’sprobablynosurpriseeitherthattheyoung MendelssohnshoulddevelopapassionforShakespeare. HeandhissisterFannywouldactoutfavouritescenes fromtheBard’splays,andwhenthefamilyacquired anewGermantranslationofAMidsummerNight’s Dreamin1826,itsstoriesofloversandfairies, spellsandtransformationsimmediatelycaptured the17-year-old’simagination.
We jump to the end of Act II for the Intermezzo, whose unsettled music depicts the inner turmoil of Hermia, one of the quartet of human lovers lost in the fairy forest, who thinks her intended Lysander has abandoned her. The four human lovers sleep to the gentle Notturno that follows, intended for the break between Acts III and IV.
By far the incidental music’s most famous number – doubtless heard at millions of marriage ceremonies worldwide since Mendelssohn created it in 1842 – is the Wedding March, which anticipates the triple marriage of humans Hermia and Lysander, Helena and Demetrius, and Hippolyta and Theseus. Mendelssohn’s incidental music closes with fairy monarchs Oberon and Titania leading the choral Finale in blessing the house of the human couples. The Finale ends as the Overture began, as the work’s four magic chords return to provide a hushed, calming backdrop to Puck’s famous ‘If we shadows have offended’ farewell.
© David Kettle
Mendelssohn (1809-1847)
A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Incidental Music
Erster Elfe
Bunte Schlangen, zweigezüngt!
Igel, Molche fort von hier!
Dass ihr euren Gift nicht bringt, in der Königin Revier!
Chor der Elfen
Nachtigall, mit Melodei sing in unser Eiapopeia, Dass kein Spruch, Kein Zauberfluch
Der holden Herrin schädlich sei. Nun gute Nacht mit Eiapopeia!
Zweiter Elfe
Schwarze Käfer, uns umgebt Nicht mit Summen, macht euch fort! Spinnen, die ihr künstlich webt, Webt an einem andern Ort!
Erster und Zweiter Elfen
Macht euch fort!
Chor der Elfen
Nachtigall, mit Melodei sing in unser Eiapopeia, Dass kein Spruch, Kein Zauberfluch
Der holden Herrin schädlich sei. Nun gute Nacht mit Eiapopeia!
Erste Elf
Alles gut! Nun auf und fort!
Einer halte Wache dort!
First Fairy
You spotted snakes with double tongue, Thorny hedgehogs, be not seen; Newts and blind-worms, do no wrong, Come not near our fairy queen.
Choir of Fairies
Philomel, with melody
Sing in our sweet lullaby; Never harm, Nor spell nor charm, Come our lovely lady nigh; So, good night, with lullaby.
Second Fairy
Weaving spiders, come not here; Hence, you long-legg'd spinners, hence! Beetles black, approach not near; Worm nor snail, do no offence.
First and Second Fairies Get away!
Choir of Fairies
Philomel, with melody
Sing in our sweet lullaby; Never harm, Nor spell nor charm, Come our lovely lady nigh; So, good night, with lullaby.
First Fairy
Hence, away! now all is well: One aloof stand sentinel.
Chor der Elfen
Bei des Feuers mattem Flimmern, Geister, Elfen, stellt euch ein!
Tanzet in den bunten Zimmern manchen leichten Ringelreihn!
Singt nach seiner Lieder Weise, Singet, hüpfet, lose, leise!
Erste Elfe
Wirbelt mir mit zarter Kunst
Eine Not’ auf jedes Wort; Hand in Hand, Mit Feengunst, Singt und segnet diesen Ort!
Chor der Elfen
Bei des Feuers mattem Flimmern, Geister, Elfen, stellt euch ein!
Tanzet in den bunten Zimmern manchen leichten Ringelreihn!
Singt nach seiner Lieder Weise, Singet, hüpfet, lose, leise!
Nun genung, Fort im Sprung, Trefft ihn in der Dämmerung!
Finale
Choir of Fairies
Through the house give glimmering light By the dead and drowsy fire; Every elf and fairy sprite
Hop as light as bird from brier; And this ditty, after me, Sing and dance it trippingly.
First Fairy
First, rehearse your song by rote, To each word a warbling note. Hand in hand, with fairy grace, Will we sing, and bless this place.
Choir of Fairies
Through the house give glimmering light By the dead and drowsy fire; Every elf and fairy sprite
Hop as light as bird from brier; And this ditty, after me, Sing and dance it trippingly. Trip away; make no stay; Meet me all by break of day.
