Felix Mendelssohn notable work St. Paul
Leipzig and Berlin
In Leipzig, Mendelssohn concentrated on developing the town's musical life by working with the orchestra, the opera house, the Thomanerchor (of which Bach had been a director), and the city's other choral and musical institutions. Mendelssohn's concerts included, in addition to many of his own works, three series of "historical concerts" featuring music of the eighteenth century, and a number of works by his contemporaries. He was deluged by offers of music from rising and would-be composers; among these was Richard Wagner, who submitted his early Symphony, the score of which, to Wagner's disgust, Mendelssohn lost or mislaid. Mendelssohn also revived interest in the music of Franz Schubert. Robert Schumann discovered the manuscript of Schubert's Ninth Symphony and sent it to Mendelssohn, who promptly premiered it in Leipzig on 21 March 1839, more than a decade after Schubert's death.A landmark event during Mendelssohn's Leipzig years was the premiere of his oratorio Paulus, (the English version of this is known as St. Paul), given at the Lower Rhenish Festival in Düsseldorf in 1836, shortly after the death of the composer's father, which affected him greatly; Felix wrote that he would "never cease to endeavour to gain his approval ... although I can no longer enjoy it". St. Paul seemed to many of Mendelssohn's contemporaries to be his finest work, and sealed his European reputation.When Friedrich Wilhelm IV came to the Prussian throne in 1840 with ambitions to develop Berlin as a cultural centre (including the establishment of a music school, and reform of music for the church), the obvious choice to head these reforms was Mendelssohn. He was reluctant to undertake the task, especially in the light of his existing strong position in Leipzig. Mendelssohn nonetheless spent some time in Berlin, writing some church music such as Die Deutsche Liturgie, and, at the King's request, music for productions of Sophocles's Antigone (1841 – an overture and seven pieces) and Oedipus at Colonus (1845), A Midsummer Night's Dream (1843) and Racine's Athalie (1845). But the funds for the school never materialised, and many of the court's promises to Mendelssohn regarding finances, title, and concert programming were broken. He was therefore not displeased to have the excuse to return to Leipzig.In 1843 Mendelssohn founded a major music school – the Leipzig Conservatory, now the Hochschule für Musik und Theater "Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy". where he persuaded Ignaz Moscheles and Robert Schumann to join him. Other prominent musicians, including the string players Ferdinand David and Joseph Joachim and the music theorist Moritz Hauptmann, also became staff members. After Mendelssohn's death in 1847, his musically conservative tradition was carried on when Moscheles succeeded him as head of the Conservatory.Choral works
Mendelssohn's two large biblical oratorios, St Paul in 1836 and Elijah in 1846, are greatly influenced by J. S. Bach. The surviving fragments of an unfinished oratorio, Christus, consist of a recitative, a chorus "There Shall a Star Come out of Jacob", and a male voice trio.Strikingly different is the more overtly Romantic Die erste Walpurgisnacht (The First Walpurgis Night), a setting for chorus and orchestra of a ballad by Goethe describing pagan rituals of the Druids in the Harz mountains in the early days of Christianity. This score has been seen by the scholar Heinz-Klaus Metzger as a "Jewish protest against the domination of Christianity".Mendelssohn wrote five settings from "The Book of Psalms" for chorus and orchestra. Schumann opined in 1837 that his version of Psalm 42 was the "highest point that he [Mendelssohn] reached as a composer for the church. Indeed the highest point recent church music has reached at all."Mendelssohn also wrote many smaller-scale sacred works for unaccompanied choir, such as a setting of Psalm 100, Jauchzet dem Herrn, alle Welt, and for choir with organ. Most are written in or translated into English. Among the most famous is Hear My Prayer, whose second half contains "O for the Wings of a Dove", which became often performed as a separate item. The piece is written for full choir, organ, and a treble or soprano soloist. Mendelssohn's biographer Todd comments, "The very popularity of the anthem in England [...] later exposed it to charges of superficiality from those contemptuous of Victorian mores."A hymn tune Mendelssohn – an adaptation by William Hayman Cummings of a melody from Mendelssohn's cantata Festgesang (Festive Hymn), a secular 1840s composition, which Mendelssohn felt unsuited to sacred music – has become the standard tune for Charles Wesley's popular Christmas hymn "Hark! The Herald Angels Sing".
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