The family however was musically talented and gave Schubert a start. Of low birth (his grandfather was a peasant, mother – a house maid), and very short, nicknamed “little mushroom”. It’s what a great symphony should sound like.įranz Schubert was a Viennese, from birth to death. To a light and soothing serenade in triple time, and back. The music alternates between dark and restless, switches We will return to the incidental music later, right now it’s time to introduce his ViolinĬoncerto in E – the most popular concerto ever written for violin. Pure magic… all from a 17 yo kid with unruly hair. Re-statement, false endings, more fairies, Scene depicting a jubilant and unrestrained dance. Transcendence into the dream, it immediately
If you follow the overture, the orchestration alone is impressive. Particularly in Germany – where the Jews spoke a native language adapted from In those post Napoleonic decades the pressure on well to do Jewish families However Felix kept Mendelssohn in his double With a name like that it’s difficult to pass for aīartholdy, of near relations. Son of little Menachem is what the family name stood At 17, Mozart wrote conventional true to form high quality classical pieces – that pale by comparison with the youthful vigor, passion and sensuality in this piece.ĭid Mendelssohn add an assortment of incidental music to the play, including the famous Wedding March, but the glorious overture remained the At the age of 17, being already an accomplished musician he composed an overture to A Midsummer Night’s Dream.Ī most wonderful piece of music, all magic and enchantment. Watercolor by Mendelssohn (later in life)īest to reconcile Lutheran beliefs, which he nominally followed, with hisįelix spoke fluent English and worshiped Shakespeare. Male child with dark shoulder-length hair curling at the ends, wearing a darkĬotton shirt, body half-turned to left but subject’s head facing viewer Felix at 12 yo
(nevertheless, the Nazis toppled his statue, see below)Īll four children received musical education with well The price for all this – father, Abraham, renounced Judaism and deliberately had Felix not circumcised. The family moved to Berlin where the Mendelssohn’s salon was a meeting place of Europe’s musicians, artists, and scientists. The four children – Fanny, Felix, Paul, Rebecka received the finest education possible. The Mendelssohn’s home was a model of cultural and artistic fitness, they even had a regularly issued family newspaper on the wall. Protestantism – no doubt for purely socio-economic reinforcement. The family quietly took on the Lutheran brand of His Grandfather was Moses Mendelssohn, a well know Jewish philosopher his father, Abraham Mendelssohn was a highĮchelon banker, on mother’s side, the Bartholdy’s were another prominent and Jew could get in those post Napoleonic years.īorn into a prominent family in Hamburg and raised within the finest