The composer, pianist, organist and conductor, Felix Mendelssohn, was an essential figure of the Romantic period. As a composer, Mendelssohn is known for his famous Violin Concerto in E Minor, Op. 64, his oratorios St. Paul and Elijah, the eight cycles of Songs Without Words for solo piano, and incidental music to A Midsummer Night’s Dream, which includes the famous Wedding March. Although Mendelssohn is mostly known as a composer, he also made essential contributions to classical music as a conductor. One of his most important engagements was the first performance of J.S. Bach’s St. Matthew Passion since Bach’s death in 1750, which stirred new interest in Bach’s music throughout Europe.
Mendelssohn as a young boy was compared to Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart in musical talent. His aunt, Sarah Levy, studied keyboard with J. S. Bach’s two sons, W.F. Bach and C.P.E. Bach, and had a collection of works by J.S. Bach that undoubtedly had an important influence on Mendelssohn’s numerous chorales and fugues. Another important musical figure in his life was his sister, Fanny Mendelssohn, a virtuoso musician herself, who composed over 400 musical works and published selected pieces under her brother’s name.
Along with his Octet, Op. 20, the Piano Trio in D Minor, Op. 49 is one of Mendelssohn’s most popular pieces of chamber music. The work is in four movements and calls for the typical piano trio ensemble of violin, cello, and piano. Upon completion of the first draft, Mendelssohn was persuaded to rewrite the work to make it more romantic in style, meaning it didn’t have the technical brilliance of composers such as Liszt and Chopin. Most of the revisions occurred in the final movement, where one can hear varied piano textures consisting of sweeping arpeggios and virtuosic writing. The opening of the Andante second movement is characteristic of Mendelssohn’s Songs Without Words for piano in its flowing accompaniment divided by both hands of the piano in combination with a floating melodic line.
-- Kyle Blaha