Early Works of Felix Mendelssohn: A Study in the Romantic Sonata Style

by Greg Vitercik

This book provides a unique analytical and critical study of the early works of Mendelssohn, including such beloved masterpeices as the Midsummer Night's Dream Overture and the Octet for Strings. It re-examines a number of crucial issues; in particular, it questions the widespread notion that Mendelssohn was primarily a lyric miniaturist incapable of handling large-scale instrumental forms. It proposes that the elegance of Mendelssohn's method has almost completely obscured the fact that it is a method at all. With scholarly detail, the book reveals how Mendelssohn's extensive and carefully constructed strategies reflect a successful attempt to create a specifically Romantic sonata style. Musicologists and theorists, as well as the educated music-lover, will find this a fascinating study.

335 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1992