Grove's dictionary of music and musicians

SYMPHONY 785
The Minuet is exti-aordinarily like that of
Mozart's G minor Symphony, not only in accent
and style, but in the manner in which the
strings and the wind are grouped and balanced,
especially in the short passage for wind alone
which occurs towards the end of each half of the
movement. It was possibly owing to this
circumstance that Mendelssohn substituted for
it the orchestral arrangement of the Scherzo of
his Octet when the work was performed later
in his life. In the last movement the most
characteristic passage is the second subject,
with the short chords of pizzicato strings, and
the tune for the clarinet which comes after the
completion of the first period by strings alone.
He used the same device more than once later,
and managed it more satisfactorily. But it is
just such suggestions of the working of the
musical spirit in the man which make an early
work interesting.
His next symphony happened to illustrate
the supposed tendency of the age towards programme.
It was intended for the tercentenary
festival of the Augsburg Protestant Confession
in 1830, though owing to political circumstances
its performance was deferred till later. He
evidently had not made up his mind what to
call it till some time after it was finished, as
he wrote to his sister and suggested Confession
Symphony, or Symphony for a Church Festival,
as alternative names. But it is quite evident
nevertheless that he must have had some sort
of programme in his mind, and a, purpose to
illustrate the conflict betwee;i the old and new
forms of the faith, and the circumstances and
attributes which belonged to them. The actual
form of the work is as nearly as possible what
is called perfectly orthodox. The slow introduction,
the regular legitimate allegro, the
simple pretty scherzo and trio, the short but
completely balanced slow movement, and the
regular last movement preceded by a second slow
introduction, present very little that is out of
the way in point of structure ;
and hence the
work is less dependent upon its programme than
some of the examples by Spohr above described.
But nevertheless the programme can be clearly
seen to have suggested much of the detail of
treatment and development in a perfectly consistent
and natural manner. The external traits
which obviously strike attention are two ; first,
the now well-known passage which is used
in the Catholic Church at Dresden for the
Amen, and which Wagner has since adopted
as one of the most conspicuous religious
motives of ' Parsifal' ; and secondly, the use of
'
Luther's famous hymn, Ein' feste Burg, m the
latter part of the work. The Amen makes its
appearance in the latter part of the opening
Andante, and is clearly meant to typify the old
church ; and its recurrence at the end of the
working out in the first movement, before the
recapitulation, is possibly meant to imply that
VOL. IV
the old church still holds its own : while in
the latter portion of the work the typical hymntune,
introduced softly by the flute and by
degrees taking possession of the whole orchestra,
may be taken to represent the successful spread
of the Protestant ideas, just as its final utterance
fortissimo at the end of all, does the establishment
of men's right to work out their own salvation
in their own way. There are various other
details which clearly have purpose in relation to
the programme, and show clearly that the composer
was keeping the possible succession of events
and circumstances in his mind throughout. The
actual treatment is a very considerable advance
upon the Symphony in C minor. The whole
work is thoroughly Mendelssohnian. There is no
obvious trace either in the ideas themselves, or
in the manner of expression of the Mozartian
influence which is so noticeable in the symphony
of six years earlier. And considering that the
composer was still but twenty-one, the maturity
of style and judgment is relatively quite as
remarkable as the facility and mastery shown
in the work of his fifteenth year. The orchestration
is quite characteristic and free ; and in
some cases, as in part of the second movement,
singularly happy. The principle of programme
here assumed seems to have been maintained by
him thenceforward ; for his other symphonies,
though it is not so stated in the published
scores, are known to have been recognised by
him as the results of his impressions of Italy
and Scotland. The first of them followed very
soon after the Reformation Symphony. In the
next year after the completion of that work he
mentioned the new symphony in a letter to his
sister as far advanced ; and said it was the
'
gayest thing he had ever done.' He was in
Rome at the time, and it appears most probable
that the first and last movements were written
there; Of the slow movement he wrote that
he had not found anything exactly right, and
'
would put it off till he went to Naples, hoping
to find something to inspire him there.' But
in the result it is difficult to imagine that
Naples can have had much share. Of the
third movement there is a tradition that it was
imported from an earlier work ; and it certainly
has a considerable flavour of Mozart, though
coupled with traits characteristic of Mendelssohn
in perfect maturity, and is at least well worthy
of its position ;
and even if parts of it, as is
possible, appeared in an earlier work, the
excellences of the Trio, and the admirable
effect of the final Coda which is based on it,
point to considerable rewriting and reconstruction
at a mature period. The actual structure
of the movements is based upon familiar
principles, though not without certain idiosyncrasies
; as for instance the appearance of a
new prominent feature in the working-out
portion, and the freedom of the recapitulation
in the first movement. In the last movement,
3e