Classical Music | Piano Music

Recorded on 07/14/2004, uploaded on 05/01/2009

Musician's or Publisher's Notes

Songs without Words       Felix Mendelssohn

Felix Mendelssohn, another of the great Romantic composers, was also a gifted conductor and one of the finest pianists of his time. Mendelssohn had created more than 60 pieces by age 11, and had composed both the Octet and the Overture to A Midsummer Night's Dream by the time he was seventeen.

Mendelssohn enjoyed painting scenes from his travels, both on the canvas and in his music compositions. His music is highly descriptive, allowing the listener to imagine the scene being painted. Well constructed ideas, flowing melodies, and a charming quality stemming from Mendelssohn's innate sense of style, also are characteristic of his music.

Some of Mendelssohn's most charming work can be found in his Songs without Words. Between 1830 and 1847, Mendelssohn composed eight sets of six short piano pieces--48 pieces in all--that he himself titled Songs without Words. The nicknames now associated with the individual pieces, however, are not his, with the exception of Venetian Boat Song, Spinning Song, and Spring Song. These immensely rich, lyrical pieces reflect Mendelssohn's highly refined aesthetic sensitivity, his sense of unity and balance, and his spontaneity and invention. They also were a perfect vehicle through which Mendelssohn expressed, without words, his innermost thoughts and feelings.

The first book of Songs without Words, Opus 19 was written between 1830 and 1832. During that time, Mendelssohn was touring Italy, Switzerland, and Germany, and his travels are thought to have indirectly influenced this collection. Sweet Remembrance with its sustained melody above a flowing, arpeggiated accompaniment, is one of the most beautiful of the songs. The second book, Opus 30, originally was published in Paris in 1835 under the title Six Romances. Later that year it was published as Opus 30 by the German publisher, Simrock, who went on to publish the other six sets of Songs. Contemplation has a broad melodic line with a full accompaniment that provides a charming substructure. Unlike Sweet Remembrance and Contemplation which have a more vocal melodic line, The Wanderer is a more instrumental, virtuosic piece.  Christopher Falzone

Courtesy of International Music Foundation.