Felix Mendelssohn

Our friend, Felix Mendelssohn, was a most unique individual.  Like Mozart (50 years before him), Mendelssohn was a prodigy, playing piano and violin far earlier than even makes logical sense.  By the time he was 8, we was already performing with orchestras and already dreaming of writing music of his own for them.  His earliest compositions date back to his early childhood.  That’s simply hard for us to imagine today.  But in his day, society was so very different.  His father recognized his son’s unusual talent early and promoted his creativity, and helped him learn to channel his time to maximize his gifts.  School came easy for him, so his free time was entirely taken up with music making. 

Mendelssohn was born right at the end of the Classical period of music.  Mozart, Haydn, and Bach had embodied the Classical and actually made the greatest contributions toward its style of music.  Mendelssohn loved their music, grew up with it, yet in his mind heard “new” sounds.  His approach to both melody and harmony weren’t the same as his predecessors, yet the respect for their more pure structure remained with him always.  He was, we could say, more “contemporary.”  And being independently minded, he experimented without the threat of losing respect from his peers.  He was, quite simply, a bit of a rebel.  Now Robert Schumann, who was born the same year as Felix, was in a similar frame of mind, and the two became fast, lifelong friends because of it.  And they loved to show each other what they were working on, and the kinds of progressions and styles that were motivating them.  Likely they influenced each other greatly.  So there were two, and then three and four, with opera composers like Rossini, orchestral composers like Berlioz, and pianists/composers like Frederic Chopin also helping to lead the charge toward a musical shift.  The Romantic era was being born, bringing to the forefront other now-renowned names like Wagner, Liszt, Verdi, Brahms, and eventually the great Russian composer like Tchaikovsky and Rimsky-Korsakov.  When we think of their music, the mental pictures we have are smoother, more lush, more dramatic, and perhaps more melodic than the music of the previous era with Mozart and Bach. 

So Mendelssohn grew.  Both in stature (though never a large man) and in talent.  His birth had been Jewish, with the entire family contributing to that heritage.  But soon-after they converted to Christianity and Mendelssohn then had the best of both upbringings.  Some of his closest extended family never converted, yet eventually respected him for his greatly-received talent. 

More to come on Mendelssohn’s growing-up years. 

Late in his short (just 38 years), Mendelssohn-Bartholdy (his new Christian name) found great comfort in writing music about God, and even Christ.  His sacred songs and extended works became a huge influence on all his music.  Some of the tenderness and angst we feel in his secular compositions are thought to be related to his understanding of and struggles with his relationship with God.  The older he got, the more his music writing was dedicated to spiritual subjects.  At the pinnacle of his successful career, he was challenged to write an oratorio about one of his favorite old testament stories, that being the story of the prophet Elijah (click here to read the story from the Bible).  It is said that he was moved by Elijah’s strength and courage, but also the drama surrounding his confrontation with the Baal prophets and then later his being carried up into heaven by the very power of God.  That story just had to be told in music and Felix dove into the project, lasting almost 10 years from conception to performance.

Even though his popularity took him on many travels around Europe, Mendelssohn was German and never deviated from feeling it was home.  So ELIJAH was conceived in German and was written to a German text (libretto).  However, when the British heard that he was writing the work, he was asked to perform it as soon as it was completed at the Birmingham Music Festival, a huge annual event attended by all the music and government aristocracy.  So quickly, Mendelssohn invited the help of several friends to design an English libretto based on the German original lyric.  After fussing over details, ELIJAH was finally completed just in time for the annual festival’s opening on August 26, 1846.  The music was still wet, and the orchestra was reading parts that in some cases were still in Felix’s handwriting.  It was a huge ordeal.  The orchestra had 125 players.  The chorus had 79 sopranos (some boys and some women), 60 altos (all boys and men), 60 tenors and 72 basses.  Can we say, “wow”?   Mendelssohn himself conducted, and it is said it was the first time a conductor used a baton.  Following the hugely successful performance, The Times wrote: “the last note of Elijah was drowned in a long-continued unanimous volley of plaudits, vociferous and deafening.  It was as though enthusiasm, long-checked, had suddenly burst its bonds and filled air with shouts of exultation.  Mendelssohn, evidently overpowered, bowed his acknowledgements, and quickly descended from his position on the conductor’s rostrum; but was compelled to appear again, amidst renewed cheers and huzzas.  Never was there a more complete triumph!”  What a review, wouldn’t you say? 

It would then be performed many more times in English before it was ever performed in German, though originally written in that language.  Interesting.  In fact Mendelssohn himself never conducted it in German, because he died the year after its premiere.  Unlike the unfortunate death of Mozart, Mendelssohn died wealthy, with family around him, and successful in the eyes of all his musical colleagues.  Most believe he simply died from exhaustion, having worked hours and hours, sometimes days without sleep, never slowing to ponder his own health, trying to keep up with the demands for his music and his own drive to produce all that was ringing in his mind. 

Four weeks after Easter this year, St. Andrew’s will accomplish something few churches have ever attempted, in presenting this enormous and difficult masterwork.  Our hope is that you, as listener, will not only enjoy the depth, design and brilliance of this music, but that you will also understand how amazing this one-of-a-kind story truly was.  And that if our faith and commitment to our God took on even a portion of the zeal and confidence of Elijah, this world would quickly change, much the same way things changed after Elijah himself altered the faith of the people of his time. 

His story is not only interesting and compelling, but strangely provocative for even those who have never embraced historical music. 

In the weeks ahead, keep checking back to this link to learn more about Mendelssohn’s life and the impact that it had on history, music, and Christianity.