Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 16.djvu/18

Rh 8 MENDELSSOHN of studying either the countless treasures which form the chief glory of the great city or the manners and customs of modern Romans. He attended, with insatiable curiosity, the services in the Sistine Chapel ; and his keen power of observation enabled him to throw much interesting light upon them. His letters on this subject, however, lose much of their value through his incapacity to comprehend the close relation existing between the music of Palestrina and his contemporaries and the ritual of the Roman Church. His Lutheran education kept him in ignorance even of the first principles of ordinary chanting ; and it is amusing to find him describing as enormities peculiar to the papal choir customs familiar to every village singer in England, and as closely connected with the structure of the &quot;Anglican chant&quot; as with, that of &quot;Gregorian music.&quot; Still, though he could not agree, in all points, with Baini, the greatest ecclesiastical musician then living, he fully shared his admiration for the Improperia, the Miserere, and the cantus planus of the Lamentationes and the Exultet, the musical beauty of which he could understand, apart from their ritual significance. In passing through Munich on his return in October 1831, he composed and played his pianoforte concerto in G minor, and accepted a commission (never fulfilled) to compose an opera for the Munich theatre. Pausing for a time at Stuttgart, Frankfort, and Diisseldorf, he arrived in Paris in December, and passed four pleasant months in the renewal of acquaintances formed in 1825, and in close intercourse with Liszt and Chopin. On February 19, 1832, the overture to A Midsummer Night s Dream was played at the conservatoire, and many of his other com positions were brought before the public ; but he did not altogether escape disappointments with regard to some of them, especially the Reformation symphony, and the visit was brought to a premature close in March by an attack of cholera, from which, however, he rapidly recovered. On the 23d of April 1832 he was again in London, where he twice -played his G minor concerto at the Philharmonic concerts, gave a performance on the organ at St Paul s, and published his first book of Lieder ohne Worte. He returned to Berlin in July, and during the winter he gave public performances of his Reformation symphony, his concerto in G minor, and his Walpur- gisnacht. In the following spring he paid a third visit to London for the purpose of conducting his Italian symphony, which was played for the first time, by the Philharmonic Society, on the 13th of May 1833. On the 26th of the same month he conducted the performances at the Lower Rhine festival at Diisseldorf, with such brilliant effect that he was at once invited to accept the appointment of general-music-director to the town, an office which included the management of the music in the principal churches, at the theatre, and at the rooms of two musical associations. This post he willingly accepted, and it formed a stepping-stone to a far more important one. Before entering upon his new duties, Mendelssohn paid a fourth visit to London, with his father, returning to Dusseldorf on the 27th of September 1833. His influence produced an excellent effect upon the church music and in the concert-room ; but his relations with the management of the theatre were not altogether pleasant ; and it was probably this circumstance which first led him to forsake the cultivation of the opera for that of sacred music. At Diisseldorf he first designed his famous oratorio St Paul, in response to an application from the Cacilien-Verein at Frankfort, composed his overture to Die schone Melusine, and planned some other works of importance. He liked his appointment, and would probably have retained it much longer had he not been invited to undertake the permanent direction of the Gewandhaus concerts at Leipsic, and thus raised to the highest position attainable in the German musical world. To this new sphere of labour he removed in August 1835, opening the first concert at the Gewand haus, on the 4th of October, with his overture Die Meeresstille, a work possessing great attractions, though by no means on a level with the Mid-summer Night s Dream, The Isles of Fingal, or Melusine. Mendelssohn s reception in Leipsic was most enthusiastic ; and under their new director the Gewandhaus concerts prospered exceedingly. Meanwhile St Paul steadily pro gressed, and was first produced, with triumphant success, at the Lower Rhine festival at Dusseldorf, on May 22, 1836. On October 3 it was first sung in English, at Liverpool, under the direction of Sir George Smart ; and on March 16, 1837, Mendelssohn again directed it at Leipsic. The next great event in Mendelssohn s life was his happy marriage, on March 28, 1837, to Cecile Charlotte Sophie Jeanrenaud, whose amiable disposition, surpassing beauty, and indescribable charm of manner endeared her to all who knew her. The honeymoon was scarcely over before he was again summoned to England to conduct St Paul, at the Birmingham festival, on September 20th. During this visit he played on the organ at St Paul s and at Christ Church, Newgate Street, with an effect which exercised a lasting influence upon English organists. It was here also that he first contemplated the production of his second oratorio, Elijah. Passing over the composition of the Lobgesang in 1840, a sixth visit to England in the same year, the scheme for the erection of a monument to Sebastian Bach, and other events on which space does not permit us to enlarge, we find Mendelssohn in 1841 recalled to Berlin by the king of Prussia, with the title of Kapellmeister. Though this appointment resulted in the production of Antigone, CEdipus Coloneus, Athalie, the incidental music to the Midsummer Night s Dream, and other great works, it proved an endless source of vexation, and certainly helped to shorten the com poser s life. In 1842 he came to England for the seventh time, accompanied by his wife, conducted his Scotch symphony at the Philharmonic, again played the organ at St Peter s, Cornhill, and Christ Church, Newgate Street, and was received with all possible honour by the queen and the prince consort. He did not, however, permit his new engagements to interfere with the direction of the Gewand haus concerts ; and in 1843 he founded in Leipsic the great conservatoire which soon became the best musical college in Europe, opening it on April 3, in the buildings of the Gewandhaus. In 1844 he conducted six of the Philhar monic concerts in London, producing his new Midsummer Night s Dream music, and playing Beethoven s pianoforte concerto in G with extraordinary effect. He returned to his duties at Berlin in September, but happily succeeded in persuading the king to free him from his most onerous engagements, and his delight at this relief was un bounded. After a brief residence in Frankfort, Mendelssohn returned to Leipsic in September 1845, resuming his old duties at the Gewandhaus, and teaching regularly in the conservatoire. Here he remained, with little in terruption, during the winter, introducing his friend Jenny Lind, then at the height of her popularity, to the critical frequenters of the Gewandhaus, and steadily working at Elijah, the first performance of which he con ducted at the Birmingham festival, on August 26, 1846. The enthusiastic reception of this great work is well known. Unhappily, the excitement attendant upon its production, added to the irritating effect of the worries at Berlin, made a serious inroad upon the composer s health. On his return to Leipsic he worked on as usual, but it was