A piano sonata by German composer Fanny Mendelssohn is being performed in Britain for the first time, 140 years after it was written. The work was once thought to be by her brother, Felix.
Image: picture-alliance/akg-images
Advertisement
A sonata formerly attributed to German composer Felix Mendelssohn, but that was in fact written by his sister, Fanny, is to be performed on Wednesday in London in a concert for International Women's Day dedicated to women composers who have suffered unjust neglect.
The work, entitled "Easter Sonata," was long thought to be lost, before being recorded in France in the 1970s as a work by Felix, whose fame has long overshadowed that of Fanny.
Felix Mendelssohn House
Felix Mendelssohn was born on February 3, 1809 in Hamburg and grew up in Berlin. In Leipzig, he founded the first German music conservatory, and the city has just seen the reopening of its Mendelssohn House.
Image: Archiv Mendelssohn-Haus
Universal genius of the 19th century
Not just one of the most significant composers of the 19th century, Felix Mendelssohn was also a virtuoso, conductor, organist and painter. On February 3, 1809, he was born in Hamburg, then grew up in Berlin. In Leipzig, he founded the first German music conservatory. The Mendelssohn House located there is now giving him a very special gift.
Image: Archiv Mendelssohn-Haus
Electronic orchestra
In the newly expanded first floor, guests enter a unique chamber featuring an installation with 13 speakers, each "embodying" a certain group of instruments, in which the guests themselves can take on the role of conductor. Behind a digital podium, they're able to control the tempo and volume and to compare interpretations.
Image: Christian Kern
The conductor
For the installation, recordings were made of Mendelssohn's overtures to "A Midnight Summer Night's Dream" and the "Reformation Symphony." Guests can get acquainted with the special role of a conductor, which Mendelssohn helped turn into an institution. In 1835, he became the Kapellmeister of Leipzig's Gewandhaus Orchestra. In 1841, he was named royal Prussian court Kapellmeister.
Image: Christian Kern
Creative haven in Leipzig
Mendelssohn's onetime home in Leipzig, built in 1844 and 1845, has been open to visitors since 1997. After a ten-month renovation period, it was reopened in February. The composer lived there from 1845 until his death in 1847, along with his wife Cecile and his five children, Carl, Marie, Paul, Felix and Lili.
Image: Benjamin Ealovega
Cultural monument
In 1993, the Felix Meldelssohn Bartholdy Foundation purchased the house in order to prevent its collapse. A museum preserves and looks after all things Mendelssohn, drawing 40,000 visitors annually from around the world. Germany's federal government has since included the Mendelssohn House in its blue book of the country's cultural monuments.
Image: Christian Kern
The painter
On the occasion of the reopening of the Mendelssohn House, the Foundation received three Mendelssohn originals from the estate of Cecile Lowenthal-Hensel, great-granddaughter of Felix' sister Fanny Hensel. They include the watercolor "Comer See, Blick auf Cadenabbia," long believed to be lost. Mendelssohn didn't just compose; he also spoke various languages and loved to paint.
Image: Christian Kern
State of the art museum
A notable feature of the exhibition is a five-meter-wide and nearly four-meter-tall paternoster display cabinet. It houses a total of 40 articles, including scores, letters, music instruments, coins and personal objects. They rotate slowly before the viewers' eyes, and the corresponding descriptions can be read on tablet computers.
Image: Christian Kern
Life in the 19th century
The stairway and furniture in the Mendelssohn House are authentic, offering a glimpse into how the composer lived with his family. His work studio was decorated in accord with a watercolor by English painter Felix Moscheles. Two cabinets with original furniture and the music salon are also both worth taking in.
Image: Claudia Euen
Family man and world traveler
Felix Mendelssohn was a sociable person and kept up a good relationship with his family, particularly his sister Fanny, who died in the same year as he did. Among other things, the exhibition documents his countless acquaintances in the arts scene, musical role models and peers, as well as his many trips to various European countries.
Image: Christian Kern
Defamation
"Even at the time of his death, people knew that they had lost a great," said Cornelia Thierbach, who heads the Mendelssohn Museum. But just a few years after his death, Richard Wagner denounced him as an mediocre - because Jewish - composer. In 1936, the Nazis tore down Leipzig's monument to the composer, and a new one wasn't dedicated until 2008.
Image: Stephan OKOLO Fromme
Music history for everyone
The musuem's expansion cost 1.5 million euros, and its younger visitors profit from the changes as well. A children's museum offers playful insights into the significance of Mendelssohn's music. The project is supported by the foundation Leipzig hilft Kindern (Leipzig Helps Children).
Image: Christian Kern
11 images1 | 11
However, in 2010, an American scholar, Dr. Angela Mace Christian, tracked down the manuscript in a private archive in France and identified it as being by Fanny after an analysis of the handwriting and corrections.
Typical fate
Fanny, just 23 years old at the time, had mentioned the work in her private diary, writing that she had played it in a performance at home in April 1829. However, like most of her some 500 works, it never received public attention, with the composer subjugating her outstanding creative gifts to the roles of housewife and mother imposed on her by the society she lived in.
Wednesday's performance of the work, by pianist Sofya Gulyak, is to be broadcast on BBC Radio 3 from a lunchtime concert at the Royal College of Music.
A direct descendant of Fanny Mendelssohn, Sheila Hayman, is currently making a television documentary telling the story of the work.
Scholars suspect that several works by Fanny are still credited to FelixImage: ullstein bild - Lebrecht Music & Arts
Brotherly encouragement?
Fanny, who was born in 1805 and took on the name Hensel after marrying painter Wilhelm Hensel in 1829, died in 1847 aged just 41.
Although Felix (1809-1847), who died less than six months later, supported her creative ambitions to a certain extent, he discouraged her from publishing her works, with several of her songs ending up being printed under his name.
In recent years, concert performances and a number of recordings have brought Fanny's works increasingly to the public's attention. Some modern scholars credit her with having preceded her brother in the writing of short character pieces for piano known as "Songs Without Words," a genre that her brother cultivated to a high pitch.
