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Mendelssohn: Mendelssohn Family
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In terms of natural gifts, Mendelssohn was born with more than any other composer except for possibly Mozart. His family was naturally a musical family. His musicianship was unparalleled during his time. And not only did he excel in music, but ... in painting and drawing. His memory, not only in terms of music, was said to be enormous. It was generally thought that he would have excelled in any endeavor that he chose.
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Mendelssohn was born in Hamburg in 1809 into a distinguished family and was raised in a particularly cultivated environment. His grandfather, Moses Mendelssohn, had been an eminent philosopher of the Enlightenment and an important literary figure, who fought against the anti-Semitism of eighteenth-century Prussia. Mendelssohn's father, Abraham, was a banker, and he moved with his family from Hamburg to Berlin in 1811 to avoid the terror being waged in Hamburg by Napoleon's occupying forces.
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Mendelssohn wrote some Singspiels for family performance in his youth. His opera "Die beiden Neffen" was rehearsed for him on his fifteenth birthday.[5] In 1827 he wrote a more sophisticated work, Die Hochzeit von Camacho, based on an episode in Don Quixote, for public consumption. It was produced in Berlin in 1827. Mendelssohn left the theatre before the conclusion of the first performance and subsequent performances were cancelled.
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A nephew of the great Enlightenment philosopher Moses Mendelssohn, and son of a prosperous businessman, Felix's youth was filled with exposure to literary and musical masters who were friends of the family. Two weeks with Goethe in Weimar, visits to Rossini and Meyerbeer in Paris, and eventually performances in London and Scotland (where he got the inspiration for the Hebrides overture) made Mendelssohn-Bartholdy an international figure before settling in Leipzig to establish Germany’s first musical conservatory.
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The grandson of philosopher Moses Mendelssohn (1729-86), Felix Mendelssohn was afforded a rich artistic and intellectual education during his formative years. Both Felix and his sister, Fanny, traveled extensively within elite European cultural circles (family friends included Goethe, Heine, and Hegel) achieving fame for their virtuosic keyboard skill.
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By his late teens, Mendelssohn had already composed two of his most important compositions: the Octet in E-flat Major and the Overture to A Midsummer Night's Dream. His family had a private orchestra, which gave Mendelssohn the unusual privilege of composing and then hearing his creations performed during his developmental years.
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Mendelssohn Family