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But there is another myth that has fortunately been demolished: the idea
that personal tragedy was part and parcel of the Romantic musician.
Impoverished and unhealthy, confined within his schizophrenia, he would
become a creator… But Mendelssohn was born into a prosperous family of
Jewish bankers who converted to Christian Protestantism. He played the
piano, the viola and the organ, and was also a painter and an accomplished
sportsman, and he enjoyed travelling (the titles of some of his symphonic
works reflect the places he visited). His short life, only thirty-eight years, left
him little respite, despite his musical output, which was exceptional both
quantitatively and qualitatively.
His writing is fresh and inventive, showing a precocious mastery of the
subtlest of forms, as well as fine precision and an exceptional personality. The
influence of Beethoven and an insatiable curiosity with regard to masters of
the past are perceptible in all his music. His chamber works often show signs
of ‘extra-Germanic’ influences. The colours of Great Britain and Italy stood out
clearly in a Germany whose early signs of nationalismwere constantly being
exacerbated. He was European-minded in the modern sense, without flying
the flag, but attached to his cultural past. Let us think for a moment of the
subtitle of his Fifth Symphony in D minor,
Reformation
, and of the power of
that tribute from a Jew who had adopted a Protestant German society, and
who carried his idea of cultural integration through to its conclusion…
26 MENDELSSOHN_TALICH QUARTET