Mendelssohn at Starbucks?

Synopsis

On this date in 1831, the 21-year-old Felix Mendelssohn conducted a concert in Munich consisting entirely of his own works — a concert that included the premiere of his Piano Concerto No. 1, with its composer as the soloist.

Mendelssohn was in high spirits and wrote these lines to family:

“It is a glorious feeling to waken in the morning and to know that you are going to write the score of a grand allegro with all sorts of instruments … while bright weather promises a cheering, long walk in the afternoon. On the evening of the October 17 at half-past six, think of me, for then I will dash off with thirty violins and two sets of wind instruments [for] my new concerto in G minor. Every morning I have to write, correct and score till one o’clock, when I go to Scheidel’s coffee house in Kaufinger Gasse, where I know each face by heart and find the same people every day in the same position: two playing chess, three looking on, five reading the newspapers, six eating their dinner — with me making up the seventh.”

Unfortunately for posterity, Mendelssohn never said if he recognized any of that coffeehouse crowd sitting in the audience for the performance of his new concerto!

Music Played in Today's Program

Felix Mendelssohn (1809-1847): Piano Concerto No. 1; Cyprien Katsaris, piano; Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra; Kurt Masur, conductor; Teldec 8.43681

On This Day

Births

• 1892 - British composer Herbert Howells, in Lydney, Gloucestershire

Deaths

• 1837 - German composer and pianist Johann Nepomuk Hummel, 58, in Wiemar

• 1849 - Polish composer Frédéric Chopin, 39, in Paris

Premieres

• 1727 - J.S. Bach: Trauerode (Funeral Cantata), at a memorial service for Electress Christiane Eberhardine (who died on Sept. 4)

• 1761 - Gluck: ballet, Don Juan, in Vienna

• 1831 - Mendelssohn: Piano Concerto No. 1, in Munich, with the composer as soloist

• 1905 - Glazunov: Violin Concerto, with soloist Mischa Elman, at Queen’s Hall, London

• 1941 - Wm. Schuman: Symphony No. 3, by the Boston Symphony, Serge Koussevitzky conducting

• 1944 - Copland: Letter from Home, on a radio broadcast

• 1958 - Stravinsky: Epitaphium in memory of Prince Max Egon zum Fürstenberg, at the Donaueschingen Festival in Germany

• 1988 - Christopher Rouse: Artemis for brass quintet, at Yale University, New Haven, Conn., by The Brass Ring

• 1991 - Wayne Peterson: Face of the Night, The Heart of the Dark for orchestra, by the San Francisco Symphony, David Zinman conducting; This work won the Pulitzer Prize for Music in 1992

• 1996 - Peter Lieberson: Fire at New York Philharmonic concert conducted by Leonard Slatkin

• 2000 - John Tavener: The Bridegroom, at the South Bank Centre in London, by Anonymous 4 and the Chilingirian String Quartet

Others

• 1707 - Johann Sebastian Bach (22) marries his cousin, Maria Barbara Bach (23)

• 1739 - Handel completes his Concerto Grosso No. 3 in London (Julian date: Oct. 6)

• 1978 - President Jimmy Carter presents the Congressional Medal of Honor to singer Marian Anderson