Mendelssohn: A Life in Music

by Todd, R. Larry

  Felix had promised to accompany Wilhelm von Schadow on a Dutch holiday in August and, as the departure date drew near, may have determined to use the separation from Cécile to gauge his feelings for her. There was little doubt in Berlin about how he should resolve the issue. As early as July 28, Rebecka was referring to his fiancée, and Fanny, imagining herself as Sancho Panza to Felix’s Don Quixote, offered a host of maxims that might “hasten a favorable decision.” 96 Even Lea approved the union at the end of July, well before she ever met the Souchays. And so, after finishing his stint with the Cäcilienverein, Felix departed Frankfurt with Schadow for Mainz. Boarding a steamship, they continued on to Horchheim and Bonn, where Simrock met Felix for a short conference about Paulus . In Düsseldorf Schadow’s son Rudolph, whom Felix had promised to tutor in Latin, joined the party. Steaming down the Rhine, they reached The Hague at the beginning of August.

  On his doctor’s advice, Felix decided to take a “minor” cure at the nearby resort of Scheveningen. The therapy required three weeks of bathing in the ocean. Each morning, Felix and the Schadows traveled to the beach, where, recalling Meeresstille und glückliche Fahrt , Felix pondered a new overture about the ocean, for he found the “straight green line” as “mysterious and unfathomable as ever.” But the low horizon and dreary sand dunes were prosaic, so that any music they inspired would be in a minor key and traurig . 97 After two weeks, Schadow and his son departed; Felix remained behind “in the deepest solitude” to complete the cure. He sketched and painted, and finished a watercolor, Der klyne Groenmarkt , begun under the supervision of Schadow, who had offered advice about drawing figures. The lively urban market scene, populated by stiff human shapes that seem cut out, betrays for once Felix’s unsure hand, 98 an insecurity he acknowledged by informing Elisabeth Jeanrenaud he was “no learned painter” (kein gelehrter Maler ). 99

  Between daily ablutions Felix wrote to the Jeanrenauds; after his death Cécile destroyed his letters to her but those from Felix to her mother survive. Thus, in a rather servile letter of August 13, he asked Elisabeth if he was vulgar for daring to write without receiving her permission. 100 In correspondence to Berlin he begged his family not to visit Frankfurt and described Cécile as fluent in French and German and unmusical but talented in drawing; to Lea, he promised after returning to Frankfurt to send a flood of details or, if his suit proved futile, nothing at all. 101 To Hiller, Felix pined for news about the Fahrtor and despaired of his isolation. 102

  As it happened, he was not completely cut off. Through J. H. Lübeck, director of the Royal Conservatory in The Hague, Felix met the young Dutch composer Johannes Verhulst (1816–1891), and found his Overture in B minor Op. 2 promising. 103 The English publisher J. Alfred Novello, eager to secure English rights to St. Paul , tracked down Felix in The Hague and visited him the very day he finished revising the final chorus. 104 Preparations were now made for the English premiere under Sir George Smart in Liverpool in October, with Malibran as the leading soprano. Felix asked Klingemann to prepare an English translation, authorized his friend to emend the recitatives as necessary, and even considered collaborating with him on a second oratorio. Among the proposed subjects was Elijah. 105

  During his cure, Felix managed to sprain his foot severely enough to warrant medical “attention” upon his return trip up the Rhine, when he paused in Coblenz to visit his uncle. There, on August 27, Felix had leeches applied to the affected area. He may have recovered by drafting the tremulous love duet “Ich wollt’ meine Lieb’ ergösse sich,” Op. 63 No. 1, to some suggestive verses by Heine. The final strophe reads: “And if in nightly slumber, you have scarcely closed your eyes, my image will still pursue you, into the deepest dreams.” 106 Animating the graceful vocal lines are quivering piano tremolos, which create an aura of expectant longing. On the last day of August, having disembarked in Mainz and completed the last leg of his trip by carriage, Felix was once again at the Fahrtor.

  III

  Frankfurt society had already begun to stir with gossip about Felix and Cécile. On September 9, during a daylong excursion to the spa of Krontal in the Taunus hills north of the city, he proposed to her beneath a canopy of trees and, giddy with excitement, sent word that evening to Berlin of their engagement. Yielding to the matronly will of Cécile’s grandmother, Hélène Souchay, the couple withheld a public announcement until they could pay the mandatory social calls. 107 By September 13 some fifty relatives and friends were endeavoring to maintain the secret. 108 Among the confidantes may have been Chopin, who passed through the city on the 14th. A few days later, it was time for Felix to return to Leipzig to prepare the new season. Dorothea Schlegel saw him off on the 19th and reported that her nephew departed a cheerful bridegroom, untroubled by the new separation from Cécile. 109

  Still, in Leipzig Robert Schumann found Felix utterly bewitched (behext ) by his fiancée and pursued by his sister Rebecka, who had arrived for a visit. He was able to read at sight Schubert’s Piano Trio in B ♭ major at a soirée hosted by Henriette Voigt. 110 Within days Felix was ready to plunge into the new concert season, which opened on October 2 with a featured performance of Beethoven’s Seventh Symphony; according to Rebecka, the Allegretto “droned and sighed with an unbelievable tenderness.” 111 But the landmark event that week took place on October 7 in Liverpool, where Sir George Smart presided from the organ of St. Peter’s Church in the English premiere of St. Paul . Among the soloists were J. Alfred Novello, who sang one of the false witnesses, and Maria Caradori-Allen, who replaced Malibran after she died from complications suffered from a riding accident weeks before in Manchester (on learning of the tragedy, Felix contemplated composing a Requiem for her 112 ). The performance caused a sensation and grossed receipts in excess of £8000. 113 Novello secured the English copyright for 30 guineas and announced the publication of the piano-vocal score, with an English text adapted by William Ball, in mid-November. The full score, a bilingual edition with German and English texts, appeared from Simrock in Bonn. 114

  In Leipzig the new season attracted its share of visiting virtuosi, among them K. J. Lipiński, first violinist of Tsar Nicholas I, and the young pianist Theodor Döhler (1814–1856), then at the start of his international career. On October 29 another pianist, the twenty-year-old William Sterndale Bennett, arrived. Bennett brought his Third Piano Concerto and two lithesome Mendelssohnian overtures, The Naiades and Parisina (after Byron); all three were premiered at the Gewandhaus in the first three months of 1837. In particular, the classical sprites of The Naiades impressed as cousins of Melusine, and Bennett now became perhaps the first of many English composers to emulate Felix’s music. In Leipzig, Bennett joined a circle that enjoyed billiards and daily lunches with Felix, Schumann, and David, and a growing list of Felix’s students. Among these were Camille Stamaty, a Kalkbrenner pupil whom Felix inculcated with German double counterpoint; Walther Goethe, grandson of the poet; and Eduard Franck, younger brother of Hermann. 115

  To Eduard, Felix entrusted a special task—the registration and execution of an organ part newly written for a performance of Handel’s Israel in Egypt in the Paulinerkirche on November 7. Some two thousand Leipzigers crowded into the cold sanctuary to hear this work, for which the various Singvereine of the city united into a chorus three hundred strong (among the choristers were Clara Wieck 116 and Paul Mendelssohn Bartholdy, then visiting his brother). Since the late eighteenth century, Handel arrangements had proliferated with added wind parts that effectively replaced the organ continuo (e.g., Mozart’s arrangements of Acis and Galatea , Messiah , Alexander’s Feast , and Ode for St. Cecilia’s Day , 1788–1790; and I. F. von Mosel’s arrangements of Israel in Egypt , Samson , and Jephtha , 1815–1832). By removing the supplemental winds and reinstating the organ, Felix endeavored to restore Handel’s music; the press seized on the event as reviving a historically informed, authentic performance tradition. From Berlin Fanny observed, “organ and church together in a Handel work haven’t been heard since time immemorial.
” 117 And G. W. Fink argued colorfully for the instrument’s revival: “The organ belongs to Handel’s oratorios. It is well known that Handel himself played it splendidly; his colossal build, full of health and vigor, and his uncommonly large hands enabled him to play as long as necessary coupled manuals without tiring.” 118 Sterndale Bennett was not convinced by the performance, for he found “the orchestra wanted point, and the organist was continually lugging.” 119 But the Berlin Vossische Zeitung hailed Felix for restoring Handel’s score, 120 and the performance was encored on November 17. What is more, Felix’s success motivated the Gewandhaus directors to renew his contract, and raise his salary to 1000 thalers. In exchange, he agreed to add to his yearly duties two church performances. Pleased, Felix wrote Lea that he could not imagine finding for himself a better position elsewhere. 121

  At the subscription concerts Felix introduced several new compositions during his second season, including Ferdinand Hiller’s Overture on Shakespeare’s As You Like It , and symphonies by the Dresden Hofkapell-meister K. G. Reissiger and two Stuttgart musicians, P. J. von Lindpaintner and Bernhard Molique. There were performances of “prize” symphonies by Franz Lachner and the violinist Johann Strauss (Sr.), then undertaking European and Russian tours to establish himself as a composer of dance music. Perhaps the most unusual offering was a “symphony” based upon Beethoven’s Kreutzer Sonata, a work Felix knew especially well. The score of this oddity, premiered on March 2, 1837, has not survived, but its Hamburg creator, Eduard Marxsen, later won fame as the teacher of Johannes Brahms. Of Felix’s own music only two overtures (Opp. 21 and 27) and the Piano Concerto, Op. 25 received performances, although he also appeared as the soloist in J. S. Bach’s Concerto in D minor and Beethoven’s Fourth and Fifth (Emperor ) Piano Concertos. The last was not without rehearsal difficulties, especially in the closing bars, where Beethoven limited the orchestral accompaniment to pianissimo timpani strokes. Dissatisfied with the ensemble playing, Felix dismissed the timpanist Grenser in favor of the theology student E. G. B. Pfundt, who subsequently joined the orchestra and, indeed, became the “first timpanist in all of Germany.” 122

  While Felix was preoccupied at the Gewandhaus, Fanny returned to serious composition. Citing Goethe’s “demonic influence” that she claimed Felix held over her, she began composing in the spring of 1836 several piano pieces, of which she finished seven by late October and dispatched with Paul and Albertine to Leipzig. 123 Songlike, they approach the tuneful lyricism of Felix’s Lieder ohne Worte . By November she was contemplating publication but came into conflict with the two most important men in her life: “With regard to my publishing I stand like the donkey between two bales of hay. I have to admit honestly that I’m rather neutral about it, and Hensel, on the one hand, is for it, and you, on the other, are against it. I would of course comply totally with the wishes of my husband in any other matter, yet on this issue alone it’s crucial to have your consent, for without it I might not undertake anything of the kind.” 124 On Fanny’s birthday Felix praised her new compositions 125 and, as we shall see, later alluded to some in his own piano miniatures but could not bring himself to support her entering the lists as a “professional” composer. This issue would haunt the final ten years of Fanny’s life.

  Eager to see Cécile, Felix gave on December 12, 1836, his last concert of the year, which culminated with the finale of Beethoven’s Fidelio . Having kept silent about his fiancée, Felix now sat down at the piano and gleefully improvised on Beethoven’s music for Schiller’s lines “Wer ein holdes Weib errungen, stimm’ in unsern Jubel ein” (“He who has won a virtuous wife, may he join in our rejoicing”), which erupts in a festive choral Allegro midway through the finale. As Max Müller, son of the poet and a chorus member, explained, “That was his confession to his friends, and then we all knew.” 126 The next day Felix departed for Frankfurt and soon was making the rounds of the Jeanrenauds’ relatives and friends. Incredibly, he counted 170 such obligations; Fanny calculated that at twenty a day, the “superhuman task” 127 would consume more than an entire week. At the Fahrtor Felix celebrated a joyful Christmas, in contrast to the dark depression of the previous year. He gave Cécile an album teeming with autographs of literary and musical celebrities, including Goethe, Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven, 128 and thus brought her to the threshold of his world of art. Hiller contributed a love duet, Spohr a short Lied, and Fanny two Lieder decorated with vignettes by her husband. 129 Felix offered a watercolor of Amalfi (inspired by his 1831 Italian sojourn, plate 11 ), and four compositions, including three Lieder from Op. 34, then being readied for publication, and, appropriately, the Duet ohne Worte for piano, Op. 38 No. 6. On the last day of the year, he wrote from Leipzig to Lea of his complete contentment with Cécile and genuine happiness reminiscent of his childhood years. 130

  IV

  Early in 1837 Felix put the finishing touches on two new works for Breitkopf & Härtel, the six Gesänge , Op. 34, and six Preludes and Fugues for piano, Op. 35. At least four of the songs (Nos. 1, 2, 3, and 5) had been composed before Felix met Cécile, and he now reordered them into a collection on themes of idealized love, separation, and yearning that anticipated the lovers’ imminent marriage. To suggest his new familial bonds, Felix dedicated the opus to Cécile’s older sister Julie and opened it with a simple, Old German Minnelied that G. W. Fink recognized was more appropriate for domestic music making than the concert hall. 131 The text addresses a “tender maiden” whose eyes shine more brightly than the sun. The song must have been a favorite of Cécile; on a copy inserted into her album, Felix appended a note commemorating the evening of December 22, 1836, spent blissfully with the Jeanrenauds in Frankfurt.

  Among the other Gesänge are two Klingemann settings, a robust Frühlingslied (No. 3, Spring Song), with images of swelling buds, and Sonntagslied (No. 5, Sunday Song), in which a protagonist hears wedding bells from the solitude of his room. Far and away the most successful songs are two Heine settings (Nos. 2 and 6) and Felix’s rendition of one of the Suleika poems attributed to Goethe, but now known to be by Marianne von Willemer (No. 4). In December, Fanny had set the same poem for Cécile, which may have inspired Felix to craft his own. Suleika, separated from her lover, implores the moist west wind, depicted by restless arpeggiations in the piano, to convey the message that his love is her life, his presence a joyful feeling (suggested by a turn from E minor to E major). Of the Heine settings, No. 2, Auf Flügeln des Gesanges (“On Wings of Song”) became Felix’s most celebrated song. Here the piano arpeggiations impress as tranquil ripples, as the lilting vocal line transports a beloved to the Ganges and to dreams beneath its shading palm trees. The Reiselied (No. 6) also speaks of dreams, in this case deceptive musings. A nocturnal rider gallops to his beloved’s house only to be brought back to reality by an oak tree. The dramatic narrative of the horseman, the imagined wind, baying dogs, and reunion with his lover is no more than “a pleasant self-delusion taking place within the framework of a continuous, stormy reality.” 132 The energetic opening piano figure, a dissonant, biting chromatic tremolo, serves as musical metaphor for naturalistic tone painting but also the errant imagination of the protagonist ( ex. 10.6 ).

  Ex. 10.6 : Mendelssohn, Reiselied , Op. 34 No. 6 (1837)

  In the case of Op. 35, Felix produced his most substantial piano work. To create this homage to the Well-Tempered Clavier , he first compiled five separate fugues from 1827 to 1835 (Nos. 1–5). Early in 1835 he wrote Thomas Attwood of a plan to dedicate to him a cycle of etudes and fugues 133 and began coupling the fugues with prefatory, etudelike pieces. But by October 1836 Felix had adopted Bach’s term, Praeludium , and was crafting preludes for the fugues. It appears that he rewrote at least three preludes (Nos. 2, 3, and 6) and left the rejected pieces for posthumous publication as the Drei Präludien , Op. 104a. 134 In November 1836 he finished the missing sixth prelude and fugue, and on January 22, 1837, played through the complete set for Schumann. 135

  The decision to preface the f
ugues with preludes reinforced the Bachian character of the opus, as did perhaps the contribution of a somewhat improbable ally. In March 1836 Felix received the dedication of Carl Czerny’s Op. 400, a collection of preludes and fugues with a rather leaden, academic title—The School of Playing Fugues and of Performing Polyphonic Compositions and of Their Particular Difficulties on the Pianoforte in 24 Grand Exercises . 136 Here Felix found twelve paired Bachian preludes and fugues, in order of increasing complexity, from two- to three- and four-part writing. Like Czerny, Felix explored Bach’s technique of linking individual preludes to fugues by means of motivic and harmonic references. Thus in No. 1, the melodic line of the prelude adumbrates the contours of the fugal subject; and in No. 4, the melodic leap of a fourth in the prelude (E ♭ –A ♭ ) likewise prepares the return of that interval in the fugue ( ex. 10.7a, b ). Like Bach, too, Felix arranged his compositions in a tonal plan, though not the traditional pairing of parallel major and minor keys. Instead, Felix devised an innovative scheme alternating between minor and major tonalities, with three sharp keys followed by three flat keys (e–D–b–A ♭ –f–B ♭ ).