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Felix Mendelssohn |
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Felix Mendelssohn was born on 3 February 1809 in Hamburg as the grandson of philosopher Moses Mendelssohn. He is one of the most prominent figures of international music history and the most famous of all the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra’s conductors. Mendelssohn fundamentally reformed Leipzig’s musical life and inaugurated the Bach revival in Germany.
You may be wondering why in Germany the composer (whose parents were simply the Mendelssohns) is usually referred to as Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy. After his Jewish parents had converted to Lutheran Christianity and a rich maternal uncle who owned the Bartholdy estate on the River Spree had left the family his fortune, they decided to add the name Bartholdy to their own to emphasise their adoption of the Christian faith.
At the age of nine, Mendelssohn made his first public appearance as a pianist, together with his sister Fanny (married name: Fanny Hensel). After his family had moved to Berlin, Mendelssohn took music lessons with Carl Friedrich Zelter, who exerted enormous influence on him, acquainting him with the works of Johann Sebastian Bach and introducing him to Goethe in Weimar in 1821.
On 1 February 1827, Mendelssohn’s Symphony in C minor was premièred at the Gewandhaus in Leipzig – his first composition to be performed in the city. At the end of August 1835, when Mendelssohn was 26, he moved from Berlin to Leipzig to succeed Christian August Pohlenz as conductor of the Gewandhaus Orchestra. Remaining in this post for 12 years, he worked hard with Ferdinand David to mould the orchestra into one of Europe’s top ensembles. Mendelssohn successfully campaigned for the orchestra to be placed under the patronage of Leipzig City Council, enabling the musicians to be permanently employed and to receive a fixed salary. Mendelssohn also founded Leipzig Conservatoire of Music (the first college of music in Germany) on 2 April 1843, providing the facilities needed for the more intensive training of young musicians (”Here in Leipzig, the need for a conservatoire is felt intensely.”). The first permanent professors included Ferdinand David, Moritz Hauptmann, Henriette Bünau-Grabau, Karl Ferdinand Becker and Robert Schumann.
In 1845, Mendelssohn and his family moved into a new building at Königstrasse 5 (now Goldschmidtstrasse 12). The music salon in their flat rapidly became a favourite meeting-place for famous contemporaries such as Clara Schumann, Franz Liszt, Hector Berlioz, Niels W. Gade, Joseph Joachim and Ignaz Moscheles. Mendelssohn vigorously promoted their music and conducted premières of their works in the Gewandhaus.
However, Mendelssohn’s greatest contributions to the world of music were his campaigns to revive the works of Handel and Bach. With this in mind he established a special series of performances known as the ”Historical Concerts” (1838) in order to integrate the works of both composers into the regular concert programme. His efforts culminated in a new performance of the St. Matthew Passion on 4 April 1841 at St. Thomas’s Church, its first performance in Leipzig since Bach’s death. Mendelssohn had already performed it in Berlin back in 1829 with the ”Singakademie”, thus launching the great Bach revival.
The erection of the statue of Bach near St. Thomas’s Church, whose financing was organised by Mendelssohn, is another of his important contributions to the city. Apart from symphonies and oratorios, Mendelssohn also composed the music for Shakespeare’s ”Midsummer Night’s Dream” . His ”Scottish Symphony” was greeted with rapturous applause by the Leipzig audience and became a regular fixture on the concert programme following its Leipzig première on 3 March 1842. On 13 April 1843, Mendelssohn was given the freedom of the City of Leipzig.
On 18 March 1847 Mendelssohn conducted his last concert in the Gewandhaus, retiring as its conductor the following day. He had already been battling physical and psychological problems for years. Mendelssohn was only 38 years old when he suffered a severe stroke and died on 4 November 1847 from the consequences of his illness. The memorial ceremony was held on 7 November 1847 at St. Paul’s Church. In the evening, his corpse was transported to ”Dreifaltigkeitsfriedhof” (”Cemetery of the Holy Trinity”) in Berlin by funeral train.
After Mendelssohn’s death, the majority of his oeuvre fell into oblivion. Nevertheless, his popularity in Leipzig never faded, and more monuments have been erected to Mendelssohn in Leipzig than any other composer. However, he was later defamed by the Nazis because of his Jewish roots. Despite the fact that he had been baptised a Protestant, after November 1934 Mendelssohn’s music was not performed in Leipzig for over ten years. The demolition of his statue on the night of 9/10 November 1936 was one of the most appalling incidents of cultural barbarism in Leipzig.
Moreover, following the foundation of East Germany, Socialist critics were not entirely at ease with the composer due to his upper middle-class family. But after German reunification, the ”International Mendelssohn Foundation” was founded on 12 October 1991 at the initiative of Kurt Masur. Thanks to the commitment of its members, the house where Mendelssohn lived and died was reopened again on 4 November 1997 as a cultural meeting place. The building houses the only Mendelssohn Museum in the world, his famous music salon, a library and the University of Leipzig’s Institute of Musicology. Moreover, another old tradition has been revived for, just as in Mendelssohn’s day, there are now concerts in the music salon every Sunday again. |
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Anecdote
Mendelssohn rarely lost his composure. However, one incident which tried his patience to the limit took place while he was conducting a Beethoven concert. The audience was listening raptly, but during a pause in the music a woman with a strident, sing-song Saxon accent proclaimed loudly to her friend (not to mention the whole concert hall and Mendelssohn too): ”… and I always cook them with sauerkraut!” |
Guided tour
Leipzig’s guides run a special tour entitled ”Leipzig – City of Music: Bach, Mendelssohn, Robert and Clara Schumann”. It lasts two hours and familiarises visitors with the life and works of famous composers in Leipzig. To book, please call: +49 (0)341 710 4230 |
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On the trail of Felix Mendelssohn in Leipzig |
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Where Mendelssohn lived …
- Lurgensteins Garten at Dittrichring (as of 1837)
- Mendelssohn House, Goldschmidtstrasse 12 (as of 1845, the house where he lived and died)
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… and worked
- Leipzig Conservatoire
- The Gewandhaus
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Monuments and plaques
- Mendelssohn statue, Augustusplatz 8 (in front of the Gewandhaus), larger-than-life statue by Joachim Jastram, unveiled on 10 March 1993 – the first new monument to be erected in Leipzig after German reunification
- Mendelssohn statue by Werner Stein in front of the old Gewandhaus, unveiled on 26 May 1892 (demolished by the Nazis on the night of 9/10 November 1936 and later melted down)
- Mendelssohn bust by Walter Arnold, in the park near the junction of Karl-Tauchnitz-Strasse and Harkortstrasse, bronze, unveiled on 4 November 1947
- Memorial window in St. Thomas’s Church (southern side), 1997, by Gottfried von Stockhausen
- Mendelssohn bust in the garden of Mendelssohn House, Goldschmidtstrasse 12, bronze with green patina, 31 October 1997, by Felix Ludwig
- Commemorative plaque and medallion with a portrait of Mendelssohn in relief at the entrance to Mendelssohn House
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Streets, squares and buildings
- Mendelssohnstrasse (since 1864; renamed Anton-Bruckner-Allee 1935–45)
- Felix Mendelssohn College of Music and Theatre, Leipzig, Grassistrasse 8
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Museums
- Mendelssohn House was opened on 4 November 1997 as a museum. The renovated 9-room flat has been re-created to show the rooms where the family lived and worked.
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Achievements
- Foundation of Leipzig Conservatoire (1843)
- Midsummer Night’s Dream, overture, Leipzig première on 21 February 1833)
- ”Paulus” (Leipzig première on 16 March 1837 at St. Paul’s Church)
- Piano Concert in D minor (world première on 19 October 1837)
- 42nd Psalm (world première on 1 January 1838)
- Scottish Symphony in A minor (world première on 3 March 1842)
- Elias (1846, Birmingham, Leipzig première on 3 February 1848 under Nils W. Gade)
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Events
- Mendelssohn Festival at Leipzig Gewandhaus, 30 October – 7 November 2004, 31 October – 6 November 2005, 31 October – 12 November 2006,
- Sunday concerts in the Mendelssohn House
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Contact |
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Internationale Mendelssohn-Stifting e.V. (International Mendelssohn Foundation)
Goldschmidtstrasse 12
04103 Leipzig
Tel: +49 (0)341 127 0294 |
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Information on Leipzig and events: |
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Leipzig Tourismus und Marketing GmbH
Richard-Wagner-Str. 1
D-04109 Leipzig
Phone: +49 (0)341 710 4260
Fax: +49 (0)341710 4271/ 4276
e-mail: info@ltm-leipzig.de
Internet: www.leipzig.de |
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Important links |
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