A Midsummer Night's Dream Essay

A Midsummer Night’s Dream is a concert overture (op. 21) as well as incidental music (op. 61) composed by Felix Mendelssohn. It is based on Shakespeare’s play of the same name. The “Wedding March” in the piece is one of the most famous of Mendelssohn’s repertoire. The Overture to A Midsummer Night’s Dream, op. 21, is in E major and was composed in 1826. Originally, Mendelssohn wrote this piece as a piano duet to be enjoyed with his sister Fanny, but he soon arranged it for orchestra, premiered in 1827. Although Mendelssohn was only 17 years old when he completed this work, it is rich in creativity and reaches phenomenal perfection. While this Overture has romantic expressions, with chromaticism and modal shifts, it is configured in the traditional sonata form.
The overture starts with an introduction of four chords, played by woodwinds and brass. The chords are
While the ophicleide was used in bands and big orchestras, it was never used much in small orchestras until this Overture. The instrument sticks out texturally, serving Mendelssohn’s purpose to represent Bottom, the weaver with a donkey head, sticking out of the gossamer bower of Titania, the queen of fairies. The ophicleide is replaced by the tuba in modern orchestras.
By creating this Overture, Mendelssohn had brought attention to a new genre: the “concert overture”, program music that depicts a literary work or place. It is not designed to be performed along with the play/story, but as a complete piece. This is different from overtures of previous times, where it was composed as merely an introduction to a performance. After the Overture to A Midsummer Night’s Dream, the concert overture and the tone poem became quintessential in the 19th century- such as Tchaikovsky’s Romeo and