A Midsummer

Night's Dream
(Mendelssohn)

At two separate times, Felix

Mendelssohn composed music
for William Shakespeare's play A
Midsummer Night's Dream (in
German Ein
Sommernachtstraum). First in
1826, near the start of his career,
he wrote a concert overture (Op.
21). Later, in 1842, only a few
years before his death, he wrote
incidental music (Op. 61) for a
production of the play, into which
he incorporated the existing
Overture. The incidental music
includes the famous Wedding
March.
Ein Sommernachtstraum
A Midsummer Night's
Dream
Concert overture

by Felix Mendelssohn

Key E major

Catalogue Op. 21

Based on Shakespeare' A
Midsummer
Night's Dream

Composed 1826

Performed 27 February 1827:

Stettin
 Ein Sommernachtstraum
A Midsummer Night's
Dream
Incidental music

Beginning of the Wedding March

Catalogue Op. 61

Related including
Wedding March
and the Overture

Composed 1842

Performed 14 October 1843:

Potsdam

Movements 14
Scoring soprano •
mezzo-
soprano •
women's
chorus •
orchestra

Overture
The Overture in E major, Op. 21,
was written by Mendelssohn at 17
years and 6 months old (it was
finished on 6 August 1826).[1]
Contemporary music scholar
George Grove called it "the
greatest marvel of early maturity
that the world has ever seen in
music".[2] It was written as a
concert overture, not associated
with any performance of the play.
The Overture was written after
Mendelssohn had read a German
translation of the play in 1826.
The translation was by August
Wilhelm Schlegel, with help from
Ludwig Tieck. There was a family
connection as well: Schlegel's
brother Friedrich married Felix
Mendelssohn's Aunt Dorothea.[3]
While a romantic piece in
atmosphere, the Overture
incorporates many classical
elements, being cast in sonata
form and shaped by regular
phrasings and harmonic
transitions. The piece is also
noted for its striking instrumental
effects, such as the emulation of
scampering 'fairy feet' at the
beginning and the braying of
Bottom as an ass (effects which
were influenced by the aesthetic
ideas and suggestions of
Mendelssohn's friend at the time,
Adolf Bernhard Marx). Heinrich
Eduard Jacob, in his biography of
the composer, surmised that
Mendelssohn had scribbled the
opening chords after hearing an
evening breeze rustle the leaves
in the garden of the family's
home.[3]

The overture begins with four

chords in the winds. Following the
first theme in the parallel minor (E
minor) representing the dancing
fairies, a transition (the royal
music of the court of Athens)
leads to a second theme, that of
the lovers. This is followed by the
braying of Bottom with the "hee-
hawing" being evoked by the
strings. A final group of themes,
reminiscent of craftsmen and
hunting calls, brings the
exposition to a close. The fairies
dominate most of the
development section, while the
Lover's theme is played in a minor
key. The recapitulation begins
with the same opening four
chords in the winds, followed by
the Fairies theme and the other
section in the second theme,
including Bottom's braying. The
fairies return, and ultimately have
the final word in the coda, just as
in Shakespeare's play. The
overture ends once again with the
same opening four chords by the
winds.

The Overture was premiered in

Stettin (then in Prussia; now
Szczecin, Poland) on 20 February
1827,[4] at a concert conducted
by Carl Loewe. Mendelssohn had
turned 18 just over two weeks
earlier. He had to travel 80 miles
through a raging snowstorm to
get to the concert,[5] which was
his first public appearance. Loewe
and Mendelssohn also appeared
as soloists in Mendelssohn's
Concerto in A-flat major for two
pianos and orchestra, and
Mendelssohn alone was the
soloist for Carl Maria von Weber's
Konzertstück in F minor. After the
intermission, he joined the first
violins for a performance of
Beethoven's Ninth Symphony.
The first British performance of
the Overture was conducted by
Mendelssohn himself, on 24 June
1829, at the Argyll Rooms in
London, at a concert in benefit of
the victims of the floods in Silesia,
and played by an orchestra that
had been assembled by
Mendelssohn's friend Sir George
Smart.[4]

Incidental music
Portrait of Mendelssohn by James
Warren Childe, 1839

Mendelssohn wrote the incidental

music, Op. 61, for A Midsummer
Night's Dream in 1842, 16 years
after he wrote the Overture. It was
written to a commission from King
Frederick William IV of Prussia.
Mendelssohn was by then the
music director of the King's
Academy of the Arts and of the
Leipzig Gewandhaus
Orchestra.[6] A successful
presentation of Sophocles'
Antigone on 28 October 1841 at
the New Palace in Potsdam, with
music by Mendelssohn (Op. 55)
led to the King asking him for
more such music, to plays he
especially enjoyed. A Midsummer
Night's Dream was produced on
14 October 1843, also at
Potsdam. The producer was
Ludwig Tieck. This was followed
by incidental music for Sophocles'
Oedipus at Colonus (Potsdam, 1
November 1845; published
posthumously as Op. 93) and
Jean Racine's Athalie (Berlin,
1 December 1845; Op. 74).[1]

The A Midsummer Night's Dream

Overture, Op. 21, originally written
as an independent piece 16 years
earlier, was incorporated into the
Op. 61 incidental music as its
overture, and the first of its 14
numbers. There are also vocal
sections and other purely
instrumental movements,
including the Scherzo, Nocturne
and Wedding March. The vocal
numbers include the song "Ye
spotted snakes" and the
melodramas "Over hill, over dale",
"The Spells", "What hempen
homespuns", and "The Removal
of the Spells". The melodramas
served to enhance Shakespeare's
text.

Act I was played without music.

The Scherzo, with its sprightly
scoring, dominated by chattering
winds and dancing strings, acts
as an intermezzo between Acts I
and II. The Scherzo leads directly
into the first melodrama, a
passage of text spoken over
music. Oberon's arrival is
accompanied by a fairy march,
scored with triangle and cymbals.

The vocal piece "Ye spotted

snakes" („Bunte Schlangen,
zweigezüngt“) opens Act II's
second scene. The second
Intermezzo comes at the end of
the second act. Act III includes a
quaint march for the entrance of
the Mechanicals. We soon hear
music quoted from the Overture
to accompany the action. The
Nocturne includes a solo horn
doubled by bassoons, and
accompanies the sleeping lovers
between Acts III and IV. There is
only one melodrama in Act IV.
This closes with a reprise of the
Nocturne to accompany the
mortal lovers' sleep.

The intermezzo between Acts IV

and V is the famous Wedding
March, probably the most popular
single piece of music composed
by Mendelssohn, and one of the
most ubiquitous pieces of music
ever written.

Act V contains more music than

any other, to accompany the
wedding feast. There is a brief
fanfare for trumpets and timpani,
a parody of a funeral march, and a
Bergamask dance. The dance
uses Bottom's braying from the
Overture as its main thematic
material.

The play has three brief

epilogues. The first is introduced
with a reprise of the theme of the
Wedding March and the fairy
music of the Overture. After
Puck's speech, the final musical
number is heard – "Through this
house give glimmering light" („Bei
des Feuers mattem Flimmern“),
scored for soprano, mezzo-
soprano and women's chorus.
Puck's famous valedictory speech
"If we shadows have offended" is
accompanied, as day breaks, by
the four chords first heard at the
very beginning of the Overture,
bringing the work full circle and to
a fitting close.

The movements
In published scores the overture
and finale are usually not
numbered.

Overture
1. Scherzo (After the first act)
2. L’istesso tempo
 3. Lied mit Chor
4. Andante
5. Intermezzo (After the end of
the second act)
6. Allegro
7. Con moto tranquillo
(Notturno)
8. Andante
9. Hochszeitmarsch (Wedding
March after the end of the
fourth act)
10. Marcia funebre
11. Ein Tanz von Rüpeln (A
dance of clowns)
12. Allegro vivace come I
Finale (mit Chor)

Suite and excerpts

The purely instrumental
movements (Overture, Scherzo,
Intermezzo, Nocturne, Wedding
March, and Bergamask) are often
played as a unified suite or as
independent pieces, at concert
performance or on recording,
although this approach never had
Mendelssohn's imprimatur. Like
many others, Eugene Ormandy
and the Philadelphia Orchestra
recorded selections for RCA
Victor; Ormandy broke with
tradition by using the German
translation of Shakespeare's text.
In the 1970s Rafael Frühbeck de
Burgos recorded a Decca Records
LP of the complete incidental
music with the New Philharmonia
Orchestra and soloists Hanneke
van Bork and Alfreda Hodgson; it
later was issued on CD.[7] In
October 1992, Seiji Ozawa and
the Boston Symphony Orchestra
recorded another album of the full
score for Deutsche Grammophon;
they were joined by soloists
Frederica von Stade and Kathleen
Battle as well as the Tanglewood
Festival Chorus. Actress Judi
Dench was heard reciting those
excerpts from the play that were
acted against the music. In 1996,
Claudio Abbado recorded an
album for Sony Masterworks of
extended excerpts with Kenneth
Branagh acting several roles from
the play, performed live.[8]

Scoring
The Overture is scored for two
flutes, two oboes, two clarinets,
two bassoons, two horns, two
trumpets, ophicleide, timpani and
strings. The ophicleide part was
originally written for English bass
horn ("corno inglese di basso"),
which was also used at the first
performance; the composer
subsequently replaced this
instrument with the ophicleide in
the first published edition.[9]

The incidental music adds a third

trumpet, three trombones, triangle
and cymbals to this scoring.

Uses
Sections of the score were used
in Woody Allen's 1982 film A
Midsummer Night's Sex
Comedy.[10]

References
1. Grove's Dictionary of Music
and Musicians, 5th ed.,
1954
2. Grove, Sir George
(November 1, 1903).
 "Mendelssohn's Overture to
"A Midsummer Night's
Dream" ". The Musical
Times. 44 (729): 728–738.
doi:10.2307/905298 .
JSTOR 905298 .
3. "Portland Chamber
Orchestra – "A Midsummer
Night's Dream" music by
Felix Mendelssohn" . 2008-
08-07. Archived from the
original on August 7, 2008.
Retrieved 2013-06-30.
4. "Tuba Journal" (PDF).
Retrieved 2013-06-30.
5. Brockeay, Wallace (March
2007). Wallace Brockeay,
Men of Music – Their Lives,
Times and Achievements .
ISBN 9781406736168.
Retrieved 2013-06-30.
6. "Answers.com" .
Answers.com. Retrieved
2013-06-30.
7. "Mendelssohn: Midsummer,
Overtures/Burgos –
Classics TodayClassics
Today" . Classicstoday.com.
Retrieved 2013-06-30.
 8. "Mendelssohn: A
Midsummer Night's
Dream/Symphony No. 4:
Music" . Retrieved
2013-06-30.
9. Todd, R. Larry (1993).
Mendelssohn: The Hebrides
and Other Overtures .
Cambridge University
Press. p. 15.
ISBN 9780521407649.
10. Harvey, Adam (2007-02-
28). The Soundtracks of
Woody Allen . McFarland &
Company, Incorporated
 Publishers. p. 97.
ISBN 9780786429684.

External links
Media related to Puck (elf) at
Wikimedia Commons
Public domain score with parts
at the IMSLP

Retrieved from
"https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?
title=A_Midsummer_Night%27s_Dream_
(Mendelssohn)&oldid=940839910"

Last edited 22 days ago by an anonymous user

Content is available under CC BY-SA
3.0 unless otherwise noted.