Photo Researchers/Getty Images
Listen to the episode!
Symphonies, overtures, Songs Without Words, oratorios with words, and one of the greatest violin concertos ever written—tune in this week for Felix Mendelssohn, Part Two!
Howdy, howdy, howdy! I’m Solomon Reynolds, and this is: Saturday Morning Car Tunes! This morning…
Felix Mendelssohn is one of Germany’s greatest composers. By the time he was 20, his style was already fully formed, combining Bach’s counterpoint, Mozart’s grace, and Beethoven’s drama. To learn more about art and culture, he took a Grand Tour of Europe. While traveling around the islands of Scotland, he was inspired to write his Hebrides Overture.
What does a song without words sound like? Felix may have first thought about it in a game he played with his older sister Fanny where they would add words to famous piano pieces. This is one of the first Songs Without Words he wrote.
Mendelssohn never wrote a successful opera, but he was still a talented dramatic composer. He did write two popular oratorios. (An oratorio is like a religious opera without all the wigs and costumes.) This is from his oratorio St. Paul.
Mendelssohn’s first published works were chamber pieces, written for small groups of instruments instead of a full orchestra. His Piano Trio No. 1 is some of the best chamber music he wrote. Does this theme sound familiar to you?
Remember Mendelssohn’s Grand Tour of Europe? When he went to Rome, it inspired his “Italian” Symphony No. 4, “the most sportive piece [he] composed.” What do you think sportive means?
And Scotland’s castles and bagpipes inspired Mendelssohn’s “Scottish” Symphony No. 3.
Mendelssohn’s Violin Concerto is one of the most important in history and influenced many other composers. He made the soloist the main character in a story, who brings up musical ideas and interacts with the orchestra’s response.
Mendelssohn’s music is so famous, you’ve probably heard it outside the concert hall… like at a wedding!
Or even at Christmas time! This carol was adapted from music Mendelssohn wrote for a cantata.
Mendelssohn puts you on the mend!
I’m Solomon Reynolds. I write and produce Saturday Morning Car Tunes with research assistant Carolina Correa and audio engineer Stephen Page, only on Classical California. Tune in—or out of your car—next Saturday morning!
