Full Description
New essays on the Mendelssohns and their circle, illuminating their lives, works, and influence.
Perspectives on Mendelssohn presents newly commissioned essays by a group of distinguished international music historians on the Mendelssohns' life, work, and influence on their contemporaries. In four sections, the book addresses Felix Mendelssohn's works and their reception by contemporary critics, Fanny Mendelssohn's works, and the circle of composers and performers who were influenced by them both. Among the essays are Douglass Seaton's discussion of Felix Mendelssohn's aesthetics, Leon Botstein's examination of the shadow of "German guilt" that has colored Mendelssohn's critical reception, Anna Harwell Celenza's discussion of Mendelssohn's presence in popular American music and film during the early twentieth century, Marcia J. Citron's discussion of Fanny Mendelssohn's lieder, and Katharina Uhde's essay on Joseph Joachim. Many of these essays feature close analysis of musical examples from key works by these composers. This volume will appeal to serious listeners, musicologists, and students of the history and reception of the Romantic musical era.
Contents
Acknowledgements
Preface
Notes on Contributors
I. THE LIFE AND WORK OF FELIX MENDELSSOHN
1. Singing without Words: Applying Mendelssohn's Aesthetics
Douglass Seaton
2. Mendelssohn's Fugue in E flat (R 23) and the Echo of Beethoven
Benedict Taylor
3. A Brief Exploration of Mendelssohn's Cellists
Marc Moskowitz
4. Heart's Jewel: The "Sense" of Mendelssohn's Violin Concerto, Op. 64
Robert Whitehouse Eshbach
5. Three Postludes to Mendelssohnian Research
Peter Ward Jones
II. MENDELSSOHN RECEPTION
6. Felix Mendelssohn's English Countenance as Reflected in London Publications of His Vocal Chamber Music to ca. 1850
John Michael Cooper
7. Mendelssohn and the Question of German Guilt
Leon Botstein
8. To the Tomb of Genius: Heinrich, Mendelssohn, and American Musical Ambition
Marian Wilson Kimber
9. "That Mesmerizing Mendelssohn Tune": from Tin Pan Alley to the Silver Screen
Anna Harwell Celenza
III. FANNY MENDELSSOHN HENSEL
10. Chorale Transformation and Triumph in Felix Mendelssohn's Sinfonia VI and Fanny Hensel's Das Jahr
Claire Fontijn
11. From Excavation to Analysis: The Lieder of Fanny Hensel
Marcia J. Citron
12. Comprehending Heine in Fanny Hensel's "Schwanenlied"
Susan Youens
13."Other" Mendelssohns: The Lied ohne Worte op. 19[b] no. 2
Angela R. Mace
IV. MENDELSSOHN'S CIRCLE
14. "The Woman for the New Era?": Johanna Kinkel's Musical Exile in London
Monika Hennemann
15. Hearing Forward and Backward: Clara Schumann's Romance in B Minor als Denkmal und Ruine
Emily Shyr
16. Schumann Fantasies: Scene and Style in Robin Holloway's Music
Philip Rupprecht
17. "My Last Hope in this Respect": The Saga of the Swedish Composer Wilhelm Bauck's Correspondence with Felix Mendelssohn
Kirsten Santos Rutschman
18. Joseph Joachim in Oxford
Susan Wollenberg
19. "I felt as if I had found a diamond": The Mozart-Enthusiast Sir William Sterndale Bennett in the Context of His Multifaceted Mozart Revival
Walter Kurt Kreyszig
20. Ferdinand Hiller and Franz Liszt: A Friendship Built at the Keyboard, Then Sundered and Never Healed
Jürgen Thym and Ralph P. Locke
21. "Becoming" Joseph Joachim, or, "Becoming" 283 Johannes Brahms, the Composer of Violin Concerto Op. 77 (1878)
Katharina Uhde
Index
