Felix Mendelssohn (1809-1847) - Bicentennial Celebration!

Started by Expresso, October 09, 2007, 06:22:44 AM

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aligreto

Quote from: OrchestralNut on October 31, 2021, 08:35:38 AM
Glad you enjoyed this set.  :)

I sure did, Ray. You came up trumps once again with your recommendation  ;)  8)

Karl Henning

Celebrated Reformation day with Thos Fey's Fifth
Karl Henning, Ph.D.
Composer & Clarinetist
Boston MA
http://www.karlhenning.com/
[Matisse] was interested neither in fending off opposition,
nor in competing for the favor of wayward friends.
His only competition was with himself. — Françoise Gilot

SonicMan46

Symphonies & String Symphonies - ending up my perusal of recordings in my Felix collection and over the years of culling have ended up w/ duplications of the genres shown below - looking on Amazon there seem to be a lot of other (often partial) options but I've been happy listening to portions of these boxes today - attached reviews are quite good also for those interested.  Please respond if anything in recent years has emerged in these orchestral areas -  8)  Dave

     

kyjo

Here's a recent performance by yours truly and the fantastic pianist Érico Freire Bezerra of Mendelssohn's rather underrated Sonata for Cello and Piano no. 1 in B-flat. It's full of Mendelssohn's trademark pulsating energy and life-affirming spirit, not to mention gorgeous melodies and tight motivic construction: https://youtu.be/KrgPn8Yi0u4
"Music is enough for a lifetime, but a lifetime is not enough for music" - Sergei Rachmaninoff

Florestan

Having spent the whole last week listening only to Mendelssohn's music (mostly chamber works) I can safely say that my appreciation for this (underrated and maligned) genius has deepened. He wrote hauntingly beautiful music with a mastery of form which was peerless in his generation.
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

Roasted Swan

Quote from: Florestan on October 23, 2022, 08:19:06 AM
Having spent the whole last week listening only to Mendelssohn's music (mostly chamber works) I can safely say that my appreciation for this (underrated and maligned) genius has deepened. He wrote hauntingly beautiful music with a mastery of form which was peerless in his generation.

Its curious isn't it!  Back in the late 19th Century for young student British composers Mendelssohn was literally the nonpareil.  After all the TOP prize at the Royal College of Music was called the Mendelssohn prize which allowed the winner to make a pilgrimage to the Leipzig Conservatoire with the goal of coming back with their own work - in effect - sounding more like Mendelssohn than before.  I suppose because on one level his music did reflect the ideals of elegance, grace, form and "taste" to which the 19th aspired.  But somehow along the way, all those attributes became gentrified - in the UK because of the association with Prince Albert and Queen Victoria - and much of the sinew and emotional power that the music also contains fell away in his imitators leaving behind technically accomplished but ultimately rather insubstantial works.  Further down the line Mendelssohn himself was then "blamed" for those stylistic influences even though he'd been dead for decades.  The simple fact is he was one of the 19th Century's great musical geniuses with a genuinely astonishing facility and originality.  Hard not to play the pointless "what if" game and wonder about the music he would have written if granted even another twenty years of life......

Florestan

Quote from: Roasted Swan on October 24, 2022, 12:25:15 AM
his music did reflect the ideals of elegance, grace, form and "taste" to which the 19th aspired.

I think those ideals are of the 18th century rather than the 19th. The latter aspired to quite different things, first and foremost to the expression of personal, private feelings, passions and torments. Think of Schumann, Berlioz, Liszt: elegance, grace, form and taste were their last concern, if they considered them at all. Mendelssohn (and Chopin, for that matter) had an entirely different aesthetic.
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

Roasted Swan

Quote from: Florestan on October 24, 2022, 09:29:33 AM
I think those ideals are of the 18th century rather than the 19th. The latter aspired to quite different things, first and foremost to the expression of personal, private feelings, passions and torments. Think of Schumann, Berlioz, Liszt: elegance, grace, form and taste were their last concern, if they considered them at all. Mendelssohn (and Chopin, for that matter) had an entirely different aesthetic.

I know exactly what you mean but I think in that regard British musical taste rather lagged behind 'modern' Romantics.  Furthermore, it is not that those were the only values to be found in Mendelssohn's music - he is much more than 'just' a polite salon composer - but I think those elements most appealed to the UK audience (as led and dictated by the Royal family) and so were highlighted as "ideals".

Florestan

Quote from: Roasted Swan on October 24, 2022, 01:52:21 PM
I know exactly what you mean but I think in that regard British musical taste rather lagged behind 'modern' Romantics.  Furthermore, it is not that those were the only values to be found in Mendelssohn's music - he is much more than 'just' a polite salon composer - but I think those elements most appealed to the UK audience (as led and dictated by the Royal family) and so were highlighted as "ideals".

I get your point now --- and agree.
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

Jo498

The (post)Mendelssohn style has been called "academic" afterwards because German conservatoires, especially Leipzig produced epigonal composers who wrote similarly. So it's a bit unfair because it's hardly Mendelssohn's fault that people imitated him later on.
To me it seems that in hindsight we might have a distorted idea of the (mid)19th century. It was in no way mainly a competition between classicist and "modern"/"neudeutsche". Italian and French opera and also Chopin were orthogonal to this debate. And the "classicism" was dominant; not only in "backwaters" like Britain. Spohr lived 12 years longer than Mendelssohn, Moscheles until 1870 etc.
Tout le malheur des hommes vient d'une seule chose, qui est de ne savoir pas demeurer en repos, dans une chambre.
- Blaise Pascal

Florestan

Quote from: Jo498 on October 25, 2022, 04:55:06 AM
To me it seems that in hindsight we might have a distorted idea of the (mid)19th century. It was in no way mainly a competition between classicist and "modern"/"neudeutsche". Italian and French opera and also Chopin were orthogonal to this debate. And the "classicism" was dominant; not only in "backwaters" like Britain. Spohr lived 12 years longer than Mendelssohn, Moscheles until 1870 etc.

+ 1.

Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

SonicMan46

Reposting - left the post below in the purchases thread yesterday - found the Markovina 12-disc set for half price on JPC for those interested?  Dave :)

Quote 

Hi Andrei - will be interested in your thoughts on Markovina in her 12-disc box of Felix's piano pieces - recently I bought 6 CDs of Howard Shelley doing his piano works (from BRO for half price a disc) - own her in the big CPE Bach box - so Ana-Marija vs. Howard in Mendelssohn - who is the winner?  Thanks for any comments by you or others - Dave :)

ADDENDUM: a MusicWeb Review prompted me to search out a good price on the Markovina 12-disc set which I found at JPC (see attachment below) for 25 Euros - price for me was $21 USD + shipping; so 50% off and have no idea how long the sale will last? 

Florestan

Quote from: SonicMan46 on October 25, 2022, 06:55:52 AM
Reposting - left the post below in the purchases thread yesterday - found the Markovina 12-disc set for half price on JPC for those interested?  Dave :)

Hi, Dave, sorry for the belated reply. I will post my thoughts in the listening thread as soon as I start listening.

There is also a Roberto Prosseda set which claims to be complete but has only 10 discs and that includes the music for piano 4-hand, so I went for Markovina. Actually, in the booklet she thanks Prosseda for his helpful assistance so I presume her is truly the most complete set currently available. AFAIK, Shelley has 6 cd and Martin Jones (which I also have) only 4, so they are far from being complete.
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

SonicMan46

Quote from: Florestan on October 25, 2022, 07:56:44 AM
Hi, Dave, sorry for the belated reply. I will post my thoughts in the listening thread as soon as I start listening.

There is also a Roberto Prosseda set which claims to be complete but has only 10 discs and that includes the music for piano 4-hand, so I went for Markovina. Actually, in the booklet she thanks Prosseda for his helpful assistance so I presume her is truly the most complete set currently available. AFAIK, Shelley has 6 cd and Martin Jones (which I also have) only 4, so they are far from being complete.

Thanks Andrei - as stated, I'm about to get Markovina, which was shipped today from Germany - great bargain at JPC for that set - also have owned the 6 CDs of Shelley which I may cull out - have a nice 2-CD set of all the Songs w/o Words performed by Daniel Gortler (reviews attached for those interested).  Dave :)

 

Florestan

Quote from: SonicMan46 on October 25, 2022, 09:26:37 AM
Thanks Andrei - as stated, I'm about to get Markovina, which was shipped today from Germany - great bargain at JPC for that set - also have owned the 6 CDs of Shelley which I may cull out - have a nice 2-CD set of all the Songs w/o Words performed by Daniel Gortler (reviews attached for those interested).  Dave :)

 

I have about 10 complete sets of SWO and several selection discs but I'm always game for a new (to me) set or disc. Will investigate the Gortler, thanks for the tip.
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

Todd



Holy smokes!  This is the first time I've listened to Mendelssohn's Elijah, and it knocked my socks off.  I've long known his Lobgesang, which has its moments, but this is something else.  The first couple movements are dramatic and gripping, and then all heaven breaks loose.  The great Paul McCreesh, one of my favorite living conductors, sought to reconstruct the 1846 premiere and assembled massive forces and a massive organ and everything hits with maximal force in Help, Lord!  It nearly out Mahlers Mahler.  Things then settle into a fairly direct oratorio, with solo bits, nice accompaniment, superb transparency, and so forth.  But one always wants the next echt-melodramatic musical wallop to arrive, which it does in Yet doth the Lord see it not and over and over.  The biblical texts all work well in the composition, indicating no little thoughtfulness in the selection process.  As performed, this is a suitable stand-in for an historical-ish opera.  I kind of wish I would have listened to it years ago.

Everyone performs their parts well, the chorus does superb work, and the organ shakes the foundation.  I know there are other recordings out there, so I may very well try another.  And now that I tried McCreesh in 19th Century fare, that Berlioz Requiem he did seems mighty inviting.

A purchase of the year.
The universe is change; life is opinion. - Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

People would rather believe than know - E.O. Wilson

Propaganda death ensemble - Tom Araya

Dry Brett Kavanaugh

Never been a Mendelssohn fan, but discovered his piano works and love them except for Songs Without Words. I think I like the recordings below. Some are near complete and some others are selected works.
I checked Frith (Naxos) and Markovina (Hanssler) as well, but the former is rough and the latter is loud. Also, Doomin Kim, no color.















Todd

Quote from: Dry Brett Kavanaugh on February 03, 2023, 09:08:25 AM

Prosseda's complete Mendelssohn is good enough for what it is that I have no reason to consider other complete sets.


Quote from: Dry Brett Kavanaugh on February 03, 2023, 09:08:25 AM

This Chamayou disc is easily the best all-Mendelssohn piano recording I've heard.  It would be dandy if he recorded more.
The universe is change; life is opinion. - Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

People would rather believe than know - E.O. Wilson

Propaganda death ensemble - Tom Araya

Florestan

#198
Quote from: Dry Brett Kavanaugh on February 03, 2023, 09:08:25 AMNever been a Mendelssohn fan,

Always been a Mendelssohn fan but in a superficial sort of way. Curiously enough, during the last year I've been reexploring his oeuvre and, to my surprise, I discovered that I enjoyed his music much more than Schumann's. I guess it's the same process by which, as times goes by and I get older, I enjoy Mozart's music much more than Beethoven's, Haydn's music much more than Mahler's and operettas, be they Viennese or French, much more than Wagner's music (okay, in this one I'm cheating, I never enjoyed Wagner's music).


Quotebut discovered his piano works and love them except for Songs Without Words.

Well, they are his most celebrated and cherished piano works for a reason --- but I do agree that there is more to his pianistic oeuvre than just SWO and many of the non-SWO works are real gems.

QuoteI checked Frith (Naxos) and Markovina (Hanssler) as well, but the former is rough and the latter is loud.

I went for the Markovina set because it's the most complete set available and I love her CPE Bach set. The lady seems to be doing only labors of love. I'm greatly tempted by her Hugo Wolf set as well.

I am halfway through it (the Mendelssohn set, that is) and I confess I am puzzled by your description of it as being "loud". I listen exclusively through earbuds and never ever did I feel the slightest urge to adjust the volume. I am really puzzled.
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

Dry Brett Kavanaugh

Todd, Girod is colorful and vivacious. Meyer is sharp and jazzy, if a little fast. I want to hear your critique.
Florestan, it seems to me that the performance in question is not very sensitive or careful. She keeps pushing the door even when pulling it is desirable/prettier.