Mendelssohn
was almost certainly the most successful musician of the 19th century.
His career showed none of the reverses, disappointments and delays
that were the rule for the other great Romantic composers; indeed,
it was precisely the overwork and exhaustion to meet the demands for
his presence, his performances and his compositions that led to his
untimely death at the age of 38.
The most
intensely busy time of his life was ushered in by his appointment
in 1835 as the administrator, music director and conductor of the
Leipzig Gewandhaus concerts. In very short order, he raised the quality
of musical life in Leipzig to equal that of any city in Europe, and
in 1842 he founded the local Conservatory to maintain his standards
of excellence. (The school was to be the most highly regarded institution
of its kind in the world for the next half century.) In 1841, he was
named director of the Music Section of the Academy of Arts in Berlin,
a cultural venture newly instituted by King Frederick of Prussia,
which required him not only to supervise and conduct a wide variety
of programs but also to compose upon royal demand -- the incidental
music which complements his dazzling 1826 Overture to A Midsummer
Night's Dream was sparked by one of Frederick's requests.
Mendelssohn
toured, guest conducted and composed incessantly, and on March 28,
1837 took on the additional responsibilities of family life when he
married Cécile Jeanrenaud. "A conscientious chronicle of Mendelssohn's
next few years [after 1835] would merely weary the reader," noted
the late George Marek in his fine biography of the composer. "It would
link work with more work, string success after success, place tribute
next to tribute, and enumerate an ever larger register of acquaintances
and friends."
Mendelssohn
won a tiny hiatus from the press of his accumulating duties when he
took a leave of absence from his post at the Gewandhaus during the
1844-1845 season. His friend Niels Gade, the Danish composer and conductor
who is generally acknowledged as the founder of the modern school
of Scandinavian composition, was engaged as his replacement. Before
his sabbatical began, however, Mendelssohn had to fulfill a commitment
to conduct the London Philharmonic Society Orchestra in a series of
concerts during the late spring of 1844. He arrived in England in
May, and proposed to perform there Schubert's C major Symphony (No.
9, "The Great"), which he had given its premiere at the Gewandhaus
five years before, but the players derided the lengthy and difficult
finale so uproariously that he withdrew the work, and refused to serve
up his own popular Ruy Blas Overture to the London audiences
as recompense. The rest of his English engagement, however, created
the spectacular success that marked each of his other eight visits
to that country: he conducted Beethoven's Violin Concerto with Joachim
as soloist, presented the whole of his recent Midsummer Night's
Dream music, served as solist in his own G minor Piano Concerto,
and participated in endless rounds of social engagements and chamber
music soirées.
Mendelssohn
returned to Germany in July to conduct a music festival in Zweibrücken.
The balance of the summer was spent in rest and composition at his
home in Frankfurt, his main project at that time being the completion
of his long-gestating Violin Concerto for the concertmaster of the
Gewandhaus Orchestra, Ferdinand David. He fulfilled some obligations
in Berlin during the autumn, most notably a performance of his oratorio
St. Paul given on the order of King Frederick, and then announced
that he was cutting back significantly on his duties at the Academy.
By the beginning
of 1845, he had finally managed to clear his schedule sufficiently
to devote himself to composition, and he made significant progress
on Elijah, scheduled for its premiere at the Birmingham Festival
the following year, and completed the String Quintet in B-flat major
(Op. 87) and the C minor Trio (op. 66). In the autumn, the King of
Saxony convinced him to return to his post at the Gewandhaus. His
frantic pace of life was reactivated; he was dead within two years.
Except for the F minor String Quartet (Op. 80), the C minor Trio was
the last important chamber work of Mendelssohn's career.
-- Richard E. Rodda
