Do All Styles Become Historical? Or Just Those of the Nineteenth Century?
John Gibbons
Mendelssohn, Schumann
In Leon Plantinga’s survey of musical romanticism, “Romantic Music: A History of Musical Style In Nineteenth-Century Europe” he gives vastly greater weight to Schumann than to Mendelssohn. In fact, he essentially promotes the time-worn and insupportable dismissal of Mendelssohn from the ranks of the truly great, for the time-worn and insupportable reasons of Mendelssohn’s supposedly “conservative” style, considered to have been fueled by the aesthetics of the past, his fortunate social and financial position, and the flawless perfection of his compositional technique, which is almost seen (implicitly, I grant you) as a liability.
But at the very end of his inadequate and even somewhat condescending passage on Mendelssohn, which focusses mainly on the overture to “Midsummer Night’s Dream” and the scherzo from the d minor Piano Trio, he makes a really provocative and interesting comment: “In the later twentieth century, when all the styles of the nineteenth seem historical, there are clear signs of a reawakening interest in the work of this extraordinarily gifted composer.”
Can you imagine a textbook (and that is what this book is, being part of the Norton “Introduction to Music” series) saying that Beethoven, or even Brahms, for heaven’s sake, was “extraordinarily gifted”? Of course not. That would be like saying that water is wet. But when that phrase is applied to Mendelssohn, it either means:
1. Actually, you know, Mendelssohn really wasn’t that bad. His music is sort of good afterall! or,
2. Mendelssohn wasn’t really a great composer. He was just exceptionally talented.
In fact, Plantinga’s book is excellent on the whole; lucid, informed, and remarkably wide-ranging for an introductory text. But the only interesting part of Plantinga’s Mendelssohn commentary is the suggestion that styles can “become historical”, which implies that we hear things differently over time, which does seem obvious, and platitudinous to boot, but really isn’t, because by specifying styles of the nineteeth century, he leaves open the notion that styles from other eras are capable of achieving a sort of timeless relevance denied to the romantic era. But it’s also possible that Plantinga is obliquely referring to a general reaction against Romanticism in the first two thirds of the twentieth century, at least among academics, among whom Plantinga is counted, obviously. I remember being really annoyed in my conservatory days when more than one of my fellow students would make a silly pronouncement to the effect that they didn’t like anything between Beethoven (or even Bach!) and the moderns. And they would say it with pride. This isn’t personal taste. It is either ignorance or immaturity. Or more probably, pretentiousness, which is in fact a sort of immaturity at all times, and at least some of the time it bespeaks ignorance as well.
Schumann’s greatest music is undeniably eccentric. Mendelssohn’s music is not, because when we apply the standards of the nineteenth century to (for us) strange conceptions such as the yoking of religious sentiment and virtuosity, or pseudo-baroque oratoria, we make allowance for the zeitgeist of the times. Charles Rosen discusses this in his Mendelssohn chapter in The Romantic Generation. For most of the twentieth century, critics (almost unanimously) and many listeners made a cult of “personal style”, which almost by defininiton implies something like eccentricity, or at least, uniqueness. So perhaps Plantinga is trying to say something along these lines:
“When Schumann’s music was composed, it appeared that its intrinsic eccentricity distinguished it in a way that would allow for the suspension of a historical context, because the music was so inextricably bound up with the unique personality of its creator, as opposed to Mendelssohn, whose aesthetics were, so to speak, more general. But with the passage of time we can see that this was not so, at least for the Romantics. This means that Mendelssohn’s style is capable of posthumous “rehabilitation”, because the avant-garde quickly becomes the “derriere-garde”, and therefore composers who were formerly considered reactionaries are now in the same boat with the erstwhile ‘experimentalists’.”
In our own time, it is impossible to tell what is reactionary and what is progressive. One may scoff, and say “It’s just music. It’s either good or bad, and the application of such categories is meaningless.” I totally and vehemently disagree with that. The history of style and the relationships between styles, and evaluation of these relationships is a vital part of understanding art. Brahms, Puccini, and Rachmaninov are no longer old fashioned. Vivaldi, Scriabin, Cage and Babbitt are newly old fashioned. And a generation from now? Who knows. Mendelssohn’s friend, Goethe, said: “The surest sign of sincerity is craftsmanship.” Pretty applicable to the “extraordinarily gifted” Mendelssohn, eh?
Reader Comments (3)
Dear Mr. Gibbons!
Just yesterday, I found your weblog by chance and have since very much enjoyed reading your articles. Mendelssohn is definitely one of my favourite composers and during the last years I have invested a lot of time and heartblood in listening to his music and in reading about him as a composer but also as a highly interesting individual. There's a lot that you write I do perfectly agree with and some I do occasionally disagree with, but in either case I am very grateful that somebody approaches Mendelssohn and his music in such a thoughtful way - something which is still a rare phenomenon. In Austria (my country), and probably all of Europe, Mendelssohn's position in classical music is quite similar to that in the US (which is absolutely not true for composers like Dvorak or Sibelius who are outrageously underrated in the German speaking countries): a "highly gifted" composer with a number of early masterpieces but with a dissipating talent over the course of years, who lacks true depth and never displays any immersion into the "deeper layers" of the human soul. As you state somewhere else, I don't believe that this is only motivated by antisemitism but rather by an almost petrified "textbook knowledge" that requires a great deal of courage and engagement of the individual scholar to be overcome. Indeed, most of which has been written about Mendelssohn (also and very much indeed the treatise of Werner) is highly biased and shortsighted but, nevertheless, has been canonized. Even Larry Todd, in his otherwise excellent biography, refrains from dismissing most of the nonsense Werner wrote. The main problem with the reception of Mendelssohn's music seems to be, as you rightfully state, our inclination to see music as a historical narrative, almost in parallel to the history of science. Since Mendelssohn does not nicely fit into this scheme, he provokes - which is somehow amusing when considering the fact that he almost always strived to prevent this from happening during his lifetime. Mendelssohn's music has been tagged as "superficial" which is, in fact, doubly false. First, naturally, because he sat over some of his pieces for years constantly changing details - a behaviour much feared by his publishers! Thus, it is obvious that he knew what he wanted and that he wouldn't be satisfied with any premature works. Accordingly, he just published about a quarter of his output - in contrast to Schumann who tried to publish as much as possible. Second, because he had his own "philosophical agenda". Mendelssohn was not a romantic in the sense of Berlioz, Schumann or Wagner bur rather a person deeply rooted in the age of enlightenment which can be easily understood when considering his family background and upbringing. I think he COULD write emotionally intense and subjective music. Some of his early works (e.g. the bleak song "Der Verlassene" which sounds like Schuberts Schwanengesang but was composed six years earlier or the a minor quartet) or the late f minor quartet clearly show this. However, almost always he DIDN'T WANT to. Mendelssohn had an own philosophical agenda which meant that he rather turned his attention outward, prompting others to participate in music, religious service etc.., rather than turning inward. In fact, he was what the Americans call a "philanthropist". It was his main "compositional objective" to share musical experience with others - something he was very successful in and with. I am convinced that his education and his father in particular were very influential in this aspect. This all means that you seldom get to read any notes of anguish or despair by Mendelssohn, still this cannot be set equal to "superficiality" because Mendelssohn's tonal language (a German expression) and style of composition deliberately avoid such overtly subjective feelings. Mendelssohn's romanticism is a "romanticism of nature", something almost everybody can understand and endorse, and not the romanticism of e.g. Lord Byron.
Another point with Mendelssohn is that, obviously he didn't take himself as important as most other composers did, seeing himself just as a part of the chain leading from the past to the future. Indeed this is also a "historical narrative" but of an "evolutionary" kind and not of the "revolutionary" kind propagated by the "Neudeutschen". This is mainly why his music is often mistaken as "classicistic" or even "ecclecticistic". However, this is a miscomprehension because it was his goal to use and to rever preexisting compositional styles but also to develop them further and adapt them to the aesthetic needs of his contemporaries. I think this a highly humane and thoughtful approach to composition and something that is perfectly in line with the anglosaxian way of life, explaining why he was so terrifically succesful in England. Unfortunately, musical aesthetics at a global level (in part due to George Bernard Shaw, I very much suppose) has been very much influenced by German philosophy which propagates a highly egocentric way of life and "Selbstverwirklichung" (self-realization) - a notion that is utterly irreconcilable with Mendelssohn's music and his convictions. Thus, to conclude, the dismissal of Mendelssohn is in most of cases rather of a philosophical nature than due to downright antisemitism because, obviously, other "jewish" composers who are almost diametrically opposed to Mendelssohn, e.g. Mahler, have been canonized as "great composers" already a long time ago.
I feel, there's a lot more to say in a more detailed manner and not so general speaking, but for the time being I have to give my fingers some rest.
With best regards,
David
Thank you for you especially thoughtful post. I apologise for not seeing it sooner, I don't always go back to my old posts often enough. In a sense, I'm doing a penance in connection with Mendelssohn. I was seduced by the slighting regard for his achievement that was communicated to me by some of my professors in school, as well as by some of the inadequate published commentaries on him, such as the egregious Werner book. Todd is better than OK, but he tries to tone down potentially harsh judgments. I've found the best way to rehabilitate one's perception of Mendelssohn's achievement is simply to listen carefully to the scores. The quartets, "Walpurgis Nacht", "Paulus" and plenty of the songs are totally underrated masterpieces. Thank you again for your uncommonly detailed reply.
Thank you for your kind answer! I have to admit that until a couple of years ago my opinion on Mendelssohn's music was also quite unreflected, mainly due to ignorance of most of his oevre of course. Knowing only some of his piano music, I was practically disinterested in Mendelssohn, until I luckily bought the f-minor quartet played by the Aurora quartet (Naxos) - I would never have bought it (as a student you can't spend to much money on experimental purchases) weren't Naxos a low-price label. Since then I've been hooked, as the Americans say, and have also learned to love his less expressive music. Probably one gains access to Mendelssohn's music more easily through the "hard stuff" like the f-minor quartet or the c-minor piano trio (my personal chamber music favourite from Mendelssohn's pen).
By the way, I absolutely agree with you on Walpurgisnacht and Paulus (although I agree with most critics that the second part is far inferior to the first - especially the end). Former is one of the most effective choral pieces I know (with a breathtaking overture that is second to nothing M. wrote for orchestra) and, in the concert hall, would also probably do well as a "children's piece", like Carneval des animaux or Prokofiev's Peter and the Wolf. I think the Walpurgisnacht can be enjoyed by both, adults and children, alike.