Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy

Books about Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy and his music

R. Larry Todd Mendelssohn and His World (The Bard Music Festival) Princeton University Press, 1991; ISBN 0691027153; 428 pages Price indication: $ 41.00

R. Larry Todd Mendelssohn: A Life In Music Oxford University Press, 2005; ISBN 0195179889; 736 pages An extraordinary prodigy of Mozartean abilities, Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy was a distinguished composer and conductor, a legendary pianist and organist, and an accomplished painter and classicist. Lionized in his lifetime, he is best remembered today for several staples of the concert hall and for such popular music as "The Wedding March" and "Hark, the Herald Angels Sing." Now, in the first major Mendelssohn biography to appear in decades, R. Larry Todd offers a remarkably fresh account of this musical giant, based upon painstaking research in autograph manuscripts, correspondence, diaries, and paintings. Rejecting the view of the composer as a craftsman of felicitous but sentimental, saccharine works (termed by one critic "moonlight with sugar water"), Todd reexamines the composer's entire oeuvre, including many unpublished and little known works. Here are engaging analyses of Mendelssohn's distinctive masterpieces--the zestful Octet, puckish Midsummer Night's Dream, haunting Hebrides Overtures, and elegiac Violin Concerto in E minor. Todd describes how the composer excelled in understatement and nuance, in subtle, coloristic orchestrations that lent his scores an undeniable freshness and vividness. He also explores Mendelssohn's changing awareness of his religious heritage, Wagner's virulent anti-Semitic attack on Mendelssohn's music, the composer's complex relationship with his sister Fanny Hensel, herself a child prodigy and prolific composer, his avocation as a painter and draughtsman, and his remarkable, polylingual correspondence with the cultural elite of his time. Mendelssohn: A Life offers a masterful blend of biography and musical analysis. Readers will discover many new facets of the familiar but misunderstood composer and gain new perspectives on one of the most formidable musical geniuses of all time. Price indication: $ 16.47

Peter Mercer-Taylor The Life of Mendelssohn (Musical Lives) Cambridge University Press, 2000; ISBN 0521639727; 246 pages Price indication: $ 25.99

R. Larry Todd and Julian Rushton Mendelssohn: The Hebrides and Other Overtures (Cambridge Music Handbooks) Cambridge University Press, 1993; ISBN 0521407648; 132 pages The concert overtures A Midsummer Night's Dream, Calm Sea and Prosperous Voyage, and The Hebrides (Fingal's Cave), conceived by Mendelssohn before the age of twenty, have ranked among the most enduring of the nineteenth-century orchestral repertoire. R. Larry Todd offers a historical, stylistic, and analytical guide to these three remarkable works. His clearly structured and accessible text is supported by a wealth of primary documents, including Mendelssohn's correspondence, memoirs of his friends, and nineteenth-century critical reviews. Price indication: $ 16.99

Clive Brown A Portrait of Mendelssohn Yale University Press, 2003; ISBN 0300095392; 586 pages Price indication: $ 47.50

John Michael Cooper and Julie D. Prandi The Mendelssohns: Their Music in History Oxford University Press, 2003; ISBN 0198167237; 404 pages Since about 1970 there has been a veritable renaissance in scholarship and performances concerning the works of Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy and Fanny Hensel. The essays in this book, presenting the findings of three generations of members of the international community of Mendelssohn/Hensel scholars, constitute a compendium of cutting-edge research relating to these two important representatives of nineteenth-century musical culture. Price indication: $ 110.00

Rudolf Elvers and Craig Tomlinson Felix Mendelssohn: A Life in Letters Fromm International, 1986; ISBN 088064060X; 334 pages Price indication: $ 19.95

John Horton Mendelssohn Chamber Music (BBC Music Guides, 24) Olympic Marketing Corp, 1972; ISBN 0295952512; 64 pages Price indication: (used only): from $ 3.50

G. Selden-Goth Felix Mendelssohn Letters Vienna House, 1973; ISBN 0844301086; 372 pages Price indication: (used only): from $ 3.40

George Richard Marek Gentle Genius: The Story of Felix Mendelssohn Apollo Editions, 1975; ISBN 0815203748 Price indication: (used only): from $ 0.83

Jon Finson and Larry Todd Mendelssohn and Schumann: Essays on Their Music and Its Context Duke Univ Pr (Tx), 1985; ISBN 0822305690; 300 pages Price indication: (used only): from $ 9.00

Sheet music, libretti, etc.

A Midsummer Night's Dream for Piano Four Hands - Dover Publications

Chamber Works for Piano and Strings - Dover Publications

Complete Chamber Music for Strings - Dover Publications

Complete Works for Piano and Orchestra in Full Score - Dover Publications

Complete Works for Pianoforte Solo, Vol. 2 - Dover Publications

Elijah in Full Score - Dover Publications

Elijah: An Oratorio for Piano & Vocal Score - Hal Leonard Publishing Corporation

Mendelssohn Songs Without Words (Complete) and Six Ch - Warner Bros Pubns

Music Minus One Piano: Mendelssohn Concerto No. 1 in G Minor, Op. 25 (Sheet Music and CD Accompaniment) - Music Minus One

Symphony No. 5 ("Reformation" in Full Score) - Dover Publications

Wedding March from A Midsummer Night's Dream - G. Schirmer, Inc.