Felix Mendelssohn is rightly regarded as one of the greatest composers of the early Romantic Era.
- The incidental music to A Midsummer Night's Dream is a masterpiece from start to finish. The Overture
was originally written when Mendelssohn was just 17, and includes themes for the fairies, the royal court of Athens, the four lovers, and the tradesmen (including a "braying" motif for when Bottom is given a donkey's head). Fifteen years later, he wove the content of the overture into a full set of musical cues for Shakespeare's play, of which the two most famous are the flighty Scherzo between Acts I and II and the Wedding March between Acts IV and V, awesomeness of epic proportions (especially in its original version for full orchestra). There's a reason it has become a standard wedding recessional in many countries. - Mendelssohn's Violin Concerto in E minor is half an hour of concentrated awesome. The first movement is full of moments of high drama, particularly in a coda in which the tempo and tension are ratcheted up further with every measure as the music gallops toward a grim final chord. In a masterstroke, the first bassoon holds its final note from the first movement to lead straight into the peaceful second movement, in which Mendelssohn's gift for melody is on full display. But the instant things settle into a serene conclusion, the soloist plays another transitional passage to lead into a vivacious finale that is all joy and good humour.
- The Hebrides Overture (AKA Fingal's Cave) is a brilliant piece of thematic music, perfectly portraying the turbulent seas and mysterious caves of its namesake island group on the Atlantic coast of Scotland. The opening few phrases came into Mendelssohn's head almost as soon as he saw the colourful basalt pillars of Fingal's Cave on the island of Staffa, so powerful were their effect on him, and this power comes through in every note in the music itself.
- Another one of Mendelssohn's more notable concert overtures is the similarly maritime-themed Calm Sea and Prosperous Voyage, based on material by Goethe. It is a piece that really lives up to its name, beginning with an almost motionless introduction that subtly hints at the rhythmic pattern of the much faster main theme, which begins after the music slowly but surely builds up into a wild and wonderful commotion of sound. The overture ends with a particularly satisfying coda, beginning after a series of dramatic drumbeats which ushers in a triumphant fanfare that signifies the arrival of the voyagers' destination, and ending in the exact same way as the overture began — in serenity and contentment.
- Though the symphony as a musical form was at something of a low ebb for most of Mendelssohn's life, his own contributions to the symphonic canon are among the best of the post-Beethoven, pre-Brahms era.
- Symphony No.3 in A minor (Scottish) was started on the same walking tour of Scotland that produced the Hebrides overture, with his initial inspiration coming from a visit to the ruins of Holyrood Chapel in Edinburgh. While it had a much longer gestation period (thirteen years), the end result was worth the wait, with first and third movements that evoke images of the wild moors and heaths of the Scottish countryside, while the second and fourth movements are inspired by Scottish dances (the second in particular is based on the Scotch snap), all making for a superb musical love letter to Scotland.note
- Also inspired by European travels is Symphony No.4 in A major (Italian), which was ultimately finished before No.3. Inspired by the life and colour of Italy, Mendelssohn opens with an infectiously lively sonata allegro, moves on to a solemn slow movement inspired by the sight of a religious procession near Naples, and after a graceful minuet, he rounds things off with a furious saltarello, an Italian jumping dance; surprisingly, the finale abandons A major in favour of A minor, but is so adrenaline-charged that it never feels like a Downer Ending or even a Bittersweet Ending.
- Mendelssohn had an uneasy relationship with his father's decision to convert the family from Judaism to Lutheranism, but that didn't stop him from composing the excellent Symphony No.5 in D major (Reformation)note in honour of the 300th anniversary of the Augsburg Confession in 1830. The finale, built around the melody of the familiar hymn tune "Ein feste Burg ist unser Gott" ("A Mighty Fortress Is Our God") by Martin Luther, is especially moving.
- Symphony No.3 in A minor
- The climactic chorus of the cantata Die erste Walpurgisnacht (a setting of a poem by Goethe), in which a plucky band of German pagans frightens off their Christian oppressors with Torches and Pitchforks in order to celebrate their May Day revels in peace, is made of concentrated awesome, as is the moving hymn (to Odin!) that concludes the piece. It's hard not to think of the Reality Subtext added by Mendelssohn's complex relationship to his Jewish heritage.
