# Classical music without Mendelssohn?



## Bevo (Feb 22, 2015)

The reason this question is so intriguing to me is because it not only pertains to his contribution in terms of compositions, but also the revivals of past composers music. An example would be a revived interest in Bach. So what are your thoughts here? How would music have changed without this key composer, like his music or not?


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

An interesting subject for speculation. In addition to Bach's choral music, Mendelssohn "resurrected" the long-unplayed Toccata and Fugue in D minor, adding it to his organ recital repertoire, and Beethoven's Violin Concerto and 4th Piano Concerto, both of which had sunk without a trace after their first performances. A third of a century had passed...


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## SONNET CLV (May 31, 2014)

*Classical music without Mendelssohn? *

I would hate to be without the _Hebrides Overture_.
And neither, I suppose, would the Lone Ranger. This is the other familiar classical piece featured on the old "Lone Ranger" TV shows. It wasn't the theme song. We all know what _that_ is. But it was used in scenes where suspense was brewing. It's where I first heard Mendelssohn, well before I knew anything about classical music. But the _Hebrides Overture_ remains my favorite piece by this wonderful composer, and I'm happy I can hear it often. (I count the _Italian_ and _Scottish_ symphonies high on my list of favorite listens, too. As well as the absolutely sublime Violin Concerto.)


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## Bulldog (Nov 21, 2013)

Leaving Mendelssohn's chamber works and lieder aside, I would do just fine without his music. The revival feature is a different matter. Hats off to Mendelssohn for his contributions.


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## janxharris (May 24, 2010)

KenOC said:


> An interesting subject for speculation. In addition to Bach's choral music, Mendelssohn "resurrected" the long-unplayed Toccata and Fugue in D minor, adding it to his organ recital repertoire, and Beethoven's Violin Concerto and 4th Piano Concerto, both of which had sunk without a trace after their first performances. A third of a century had passed...


Wow - I didn't know that about Beethoven's Violin Concerto - have always loved that piece - seems incredible...


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## Madiel (Apr 25, 2018)

In my youth I listened to Mendelssohn's music a lot, nowadays his only work that I really enjoy is the octet for strings.
As for his role in the Bach revival, the way I see it it was bound to happen - with or without Mendelssohn's involvement - Bach's fortune has much to do with his sons who kept circulating his music in musical circles, music by Bach was not performed in public after his death, but thanks to his sons and pupils almost every composer (and certainly all the major ones) and people in the business knew it, so once the concertgoing way of life the way we know it came to life in the 19th century a Bach revival was bound to happen sooner or later, the music was out there, it wasn't forgotten into a vault like it happened to so many other composers' work.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

janxharris said:


> Wow - I didn't know that about Beethoven's Violin Concerto - have always loved that piece - seems incredible...


There are no recorded post-premiere performances of either concerto until Mendelssohn revived them.

Beethoven's 4th piano concerto was premiered (privately) in 1807. It was revived in 1836 by Mendelssohn.

The Violin Concerto premiered in 1806 "The work was revived in 1844, well after Beethoven's death, with a performance by the then 12-year-old violinist Joseph Joachim with the orchestra of the London Philharmonic Society conducted by Felix Mendelssohn."


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## Madiel (Apr 25, 2018)

janxharris said:


> Wow - I didn't know that about Beethoven's Violin Concerto - have always loved that piece - seems incredible...


everything about the 19th century seems incredible when we look at it from a 21th century viewpoint, let me give you just a couple of snippets

- every classical music lover knows about the ¨triumph¨ that was the premiere of Beethoven's ninth symphony, a reality check reveals that its second performance a couple of weeks later went deserted because it was a sunny week-end and people in Vienna preferred vacationing to Beethoven.

- Beethoven ninth premiered in 1824 in Vienna, Milan was a major musical city (and at the time it was part of the Austrian Empire so it had a strong link with Vienna) nonetheless it remained never played there until the end of the century.

I guess our obsession with music would leave flabbergasted our ancestors


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Here's one: The first performance of the Eroica in Italy was 1860, 55 years after its permiere, under the baton of Sgambati. No Internet time in those days!


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## MarkW (Feb 16, 2015)

There are maybe a handful of Mendelssohn works I wouldn't want to be without (Octet, MSD Overture, Italian Symphony). In terms of revivals, if it hadn't been Mendelsohn, it would have been others. You can't keep significant music down.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

There is no Mendelssohn that is important to me and not very much that I even listen to. I don't hate his music but I don't find it doing much for me or to me, either. As for his rescuing of music from the past I don't know enough about it or how his role compared with others from his time. But I suspect classical music would not be so different if he had never been. Or maybe we need his to illustrate what is so great about other noted composers?


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## derin684 (Feb 14, 2018)

I like the octet,string quartets and piano trios. Don't usually listen to others.


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## Guest (Aug 2, 2018)

I'd hate to be without the Italian and Scottish symphonies and the overtures.


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## endelbendel (Jul 7, 2018)

Mendelssohn is like Vitamin D, and many are Mendelssohn deprived. Not played enough.


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## BiscuityBoyle (Feb 5, 2018)

Songs without Words is a masterpiece of a miniature cycle, can't believe it hasn't been brought up yet. 

The first piano concerto is gorgeous. He obviously was a great composer, even if I have a personal preference for Weber, who similarly straddles Classicism and Romanticism. Stravinsky loved both of them btw.


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## Bulldog (Nov 21, 2013)

BiscuityBoyle said:


> Songs without Words is a masterpiece of a miniature cycle, can't believe it hasn't been brought up yet.
> 
> The first piano concerto is gorgeous. He obviously was a great composer, even if I have a personal preference for Weber, who similarly straddles Classicism and Romanticism. Stravinsky loved both of them btw.


I haven't brought up Songs without Words because I don't like it much, but we do agree about Weber.


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## Judith (Nov 11, 2015)

Couldn't do without his sublime violin concerto


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## Madiel (Apr 25, 2018)

no love for Elijah?


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## Art Rock (Nov 28, 2009)

A great composer in his own right in my taste. Some of the works that I could not be without are symphonies 3&4, the three main concertos, the overtures, Lieder ohne Worte, lots of chamber music, and (often surprisingly overlooked) the organ sonatas. Two of these (Symphony 3 and the Violin concerto) made my Bulldog-challenge, the 50 personal favourite classical music compositions of all time.


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## Larkenfield (Jun 5, 2017)

Don’t worry, Mendelssohn is in. Even Wagner couldn’t kick him out after stealing and robbing him blind of his inspiration and ideas, such as Wagner’s idea for a bridal march, and not as good. Not Wagner’s finest hour. I could never do without Mendelssohn’s sparkling and effervescent Italian Symphony. It’s a miracle and better than a goblet of champagne.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

Larkenfield said:


> I could never do without Mendelssohn's sparkling and effervescent Italian Symphony. It's a miracle and better than a goblet of champagne.


I don't much care for champagne, either. Even though I generally love sparkling music I seem always to find with his music that I am thinking "I should like this" but it still leave me a little cold. His very early works were more to my taste and are full of invention but they are not that important to me either.


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## SixFootScowl (Oct 17, 2011)

Madiel said:


> no love for Elijah?


One of my favorite Mendelssohn works.


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## larold (Jul 20, 2017)

At least someone mentioned Elijah, no worse than (and maybe better than) the third-greatest oratorio behind Messiah and Israel in Egypt. There are many other Mendelssohn works I would be poorer without including:

-- Symphony 5 "Reformation"
-- Symphony 2 "Lobgesang"
-- Calm Sea and Prosperous Voyage overture
-- Concerto for Piano and Violin
-- Piano Sonata No. 1 Op. 6
-- Piano Concertos 1 and 2
-- The First Walpurgis Night
-- Midsummer Night's Dream

For me Mendelssohn is a composer similar to Mozart: a man for all seasons whose music unearths light and shade in equal amounts. His blood brother Robert Schumann is more the standard romantic dramatist with blaring brass and pounding timpani. I'll take Mendelssohn's subtleties any day.

And perhaps it should be stated that he did all this in one of the shortest lifetimes (38 years) of any major classical composer, just a few years more than Mozart's 35.


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## Bulldog (Nov 21, 2013)

larold said:


> His blood brother Robert Schumann is more the standard romantic dramatist with blaring brass and pounding timpani. I'll take Mendelssohn's subtleties any day.


Being critical of other composers to promote one of your favorites is in bad form; there's no reason for it.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

larold said:


> For me Mendelssohn is a composer similar to Mozart: a man for all seasons whose music unearths light and shade in equal amounts. His blood brother Robert Schumann is more the standard romantic dramatist with blaring brass and pounding timpani. I'll take Mendelssohn's subtleties any day.


Comparing Mendelssohn to the temperamentally and aesthetically very different Schumann, calling them blood brothers even, seems like setting up a straw man to make your man look bigger. But it doesn't work for Schumann plumbed depths that Mendelssohn couldn't even imagine and flew to heights that make Mendelssohn's music seem earthbound. I think the true comparison goes the wrong way for your argument. By all means enjoy and value Mendelssohn as a unique and spirited voice with many gifts. But ...


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Just to say I adore Mendelssohn's music. He wasn't the greatest composer but he wrote some simply superb works with great tunes and great entertainment value. I mean, when you think he wrote the Octet and the Overture to MND as a teen he was certain more developed than Mozart at that stage. One criticism is that his music never really developed on from there but did it need to? He wrote superb music which has thrilled millions in spite of the horrible anti-semitic abuse hurled at it. Of course, one reason for his music not 'developing' might have been his championing of other people's music - such as Bach's great passion. His constant over-work probably contributed to his early death. So what music lover can't feel grateful to him?


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## Bulldog (Nov 21, 2013)

DavidA said:


> One criticism is that his music never really developed on from there but did it need to?


No need at all, but it would be a good thing for any composer, no matter how advanced he/she was before adulthood.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Larkenfield said:


> Don't worry, Mendelssohn is in. Even Wagner couldn't kick him out after stealing and robbing him blind of his inspiration and ideas, such as Wagner's idea for a bridal march, and not as good. Not Wagner's finest hour. I could never do without Mendelssohn's sparkling and effervescent Italian Symphony. It's a miracle and better than a goblet of champagne.


To my knowledge the only thing Wagner stole from Mendelssohn was the arpeggio motif from his "Fair Melusine" overture, which became the "Rhine" motif in the _Ring._ I hardly think that the two composers' wedding marches have anything to do with each other.

Wagner actually thought highly of Mendelssohn's work even while criticizing it for lacking a certain profundity. He isn't alone in feeling that way, but however anyone feels about him there are few who would dispute Mendelssohn's mastery. At the very least, I'd rate his octet, his piano trios, his cello sonatas, his _Midsummer Night's Dream_, his string quartets and his "Italian" and "Scottish" symphonies among the masterpieces of early Romanticism. I'm afraid _Elijah_ (which I've sung more than once) leaves me a little cool - it's that intangible air of "Victorian" propriety that others have commented on - and _St. Paul_ grabs me even less.


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## Manxfeeder (Oct 19, 2010)

Without him, Jenny Lind's glorious premiere in England singing her aria from Elijah wouldn't have happened.

Oh, wait. She blew him off. Never mind.


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## lluissineu (Dec 27, 2016)

I think Mendelssohn is a great composer and a great orchestrator, apart from having been The one who rediscovered Bach.

In a recent program of The spanish radio devoted to Sir Thomas Beecham and his visit with The RPO to The nazi Germany, apart from this anecdote:

At the Berlin concert, when he saw Hitler applauding, Beecham turned to the orchestra and said, "The old bugger seems to like it!" The remark went out on the radio across Europe. Had Beecham really forgotten that the concert was being Broadcast

Beecham was said to Have insisted on visiting the Mendelssohn Statue in Leipzig and when he finally got it, he discovered that The statue han been removed because of the jewish origin of The composer.


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