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Following Dr. Robin Elliott’s stimulating pre-concert lecture entitled “The Mendelssohn Legacy: Bicentennial Reflections,” many of us were left astounded by recent scholarship concerning the elusive “Mendelssohn Document” now under guard in the Royal Academy of Music. This “document,” offers new material on the final years of Felix Mendelssohn’s life and first-hand information penned by Otto Goldschmidt in 1896, himself a former Mendelssohn student and husband of the Swedish soprano Jenny Lind-Goldschmidt. The rumours are that the true nature of Mendelssohn’s death may concern his perhaps adulterous relationship with “The Swedish Nightingale”. This idea certainly provides new perspectives on Mendelssohn’s emotional life and his inner state of mind during the final years of musical creation. The String Quartet Op.80, one of the featured items in tonight’s programme, has always been thought of as a musical eulogy for Fanny Mendelssohn-Hensel, Felix’s sister who passed away that very same year of 1847. But, with the surfacing of this “Mendelssohn Document,” there have been new hypotheses concerning the true nature of this revolutionary work which is distinctively unique in style compared with Mendelssohn’s earlier musical outputs. Could it be, perhaps, a “death note” penned by its composer as an ‘account’ of his ill-fated relationship with Jenny Lind? The answer, of course, remains purely speculative for the time being, but the possibility certainly opens new dimensions for listeners on how best to appreciate this music.

The Leipzig String Quartet returned to the Toronto Summer Music Festival for their fourth year following popular demand. The musicians explored in their sold-out concert this year a theme surveying the intimate musical worlds of celebrated Classical and Romantic composers. While Haydn and Mendelssohn gave us a pure introspection on music written solely for the string instruments, the second part of the concert featured a partnership between the Leipzig SQ and celebrated clarinetist Karl Leister in Brahms’s Clarinet Quintet in B Minor Op.115.

Among the many ‘nicknames’ that have been conferred to Haydn, one of most impressive is “The Founder of String Quartets.” Haydn has placed his decisive stamp on the quartet form, in major part by letting the four musicians engage in it with equal contributions. The String Quartet in B Flat Major Op.50 No.1 is the first of six quartets that Haydn wrote for King Friedrich Wilhelm II of Prussia, and opens with an Allegro in 2/2 time. Importantly, this piece was the first time Haydn had written in 2/2 for an opening movement and shows an influence he picked up from Mozart. Matthias Moosdorf began the movement with an unearthly cello call on a repeated B Flat, echoed and answered by Tilman Buning, and then Stefan Arzberger on violins all of them with excellent tonal timbres. The Leipzig SQ consistently placed special emphasis on rhythmic pulse and rich sonority as a group, although admittedly from the location where I sat in the sixth row of the left aisle, the sound projected by violist Ivo Bauer was relatively the weakest.. The Adagio, a theme and variations, gave ample displays of dialogue and tonal coherence between the two violinists, and the delicate handling of the descending single notes in the Minuet movement, notably by Stefan Arzberger, was utterly delightful. The final Vivace movement gave an uplifting excitement like many of Haydn’s other quartets, with a particularly strong and emotional sense of purposeful drive shown by Matthias Moosdorf.

The Mendelssohn String Quartet Op.80 is certainly a phenomenon, given the new perspective on its emotional origins, and I would rate it as the highlight of the evening. Starting with the emotionally powerful Allegro movement characterized by coordinated tremolandi from each of the respective players, it takes no effort for any listener acquainted with Mendelssohn’s music to distinguish and appreciate this work as one of the darkest (and revolutionary) turns of Mendelssohn’s musical creations. The Leipzig SQ is to be congratulated for their combined vision to bring out its passionate chemistry: the musicians played it with ever increasing greater panache and vigour and by the time the music stormed into its Finale movement, ‘pure magic’ was the phrase that sprang to mind to describe their sublime interpretation. 

L-R Stefan Arzberger, Tilman Buning, Karl LeisterMatthias Moosdorf, Ivo Bauer
(Photo Courtesy of Dr. Peter Alberti) 

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