MENDELSSOHN VIOLIN CONCERTO

Violinist Tessa Lark delves beneath the surface to discover why the concerto’s second movement is such a pleasure to perform

From Mendelssohn Violin Concerto in E minor. Urtext edition, paperbound with marked and unmarked string parts. Ed. Ullrich Scheideler. Vln fingering and bowing Igor Ozim. Pf reduction Johannes Umbreit. Order no.HN 720, ISMN 979-0-2018- 0720-1. Printed with permission of G. Henle Verlag, Munich © 2003

After the virtuosity of the first movement, the second is all about letting the violin sing. Everything is written into the score, from the exquisite balance between orchestra and soloist to the famous held note in the bassoon that prepares the mood at the very beginning.

The composer’s practical knowledge of the instrument is invaluable, and the balance he attains with the orchestra works in such a way that you never have to force the sound. When the orchestration does thicken and you have to make more of an effort to project, it actually serves a beautiful emotional purpose. One example is bars 23–24 and bars 37–38 where clarinets and bassoon colour the top of the phrase, and it is for the violinist to ride the swell.

Freedom to respond in the moment

When it comes to fingerings and bowings I like to have options, especially for a movement like this that isn’t particularly demanding technically. Having a different solution at hand means I can respond if the conductor has a moment of inspiration, or the orchestra hands me something different in the performance. I love improvising in that way. As much as it sounds free, though, it is a good idea to practise the different choices you might make.

At the beginning, if I am wanting to play in a historically informed way, I might use first and second position in bars 13–14 and only do a big shift for the blossoming of the phrase in bar 15. However, if I want to channel something of Kreisler, I would favour second position in bar 13, shifting up on the D string in the following bar. This allows me to use the brightness of the A string to colour the top of the phrase in bar 15.

Following clues in the manuscript

The biggest challenge of this movement is to enjoy the singing style and all the different colours, while keeping it moving and lilting. In German Romantic music like this it’s important to maintain momentum in order to play the long phrases. Looking at a holograph of the original manuscript, there are places where Mendelssohn marked slurs, then removed them and ultimately added them back in again, for example in the orchestral violin parts in bars 7–8 of the introduction. And there are a couple of phrases in the solo part that originally had up-beats. All of this indicates to me that he wants to keep it flowing as much as possible and I tend to think that this movement should move a little faster than we’re used to. The music is so beautiful that it’s going to be a real pleasure no matter what, so I prefer to take a lighter approach, especially considering the drama and scope of the outer movements. This music is sweet in a youthful sense rather than a saccharine one, so I would play with a restrained vibrato and plenty of flow.

A lot of the slurring is marked over full bars in the manuscript. It is fine to split the slurs into half bars for projection, as most people do, but it can end up sounding in 3/8 if you’re not careful. It’s easy for that to happen when you’re just enjoying playing with full bows and I think there’s something really magical about making sure the phrases hold together, whether they be four bars, eight bars or even sixteen.

Details

It may not seem like there is a huge amount of detail in this movement but when you look, there is much to uncover. Observing the dynamic markings allows us to communicate the music’s structure. For example, I think the crescendo in bars 27–28 – where the music becomes more searching – should be significant. We want to colour the music similarly in places without a marked crescendo, and it needs to sound much more intentional in this moment to differentiate it from the others. In places like bar 29 Mendelssohn experiments with the amount of lilt and we need to engage confidently with that. Whether it’s in his choice of instrumentation or deciding to insert a rest into the accompaniment's normal crotchet–quaver (q– e) rhythm, all the answers to questions of interpretation are in the score.

When making fingering and bowing choices I like to think about the sound first and then check that it makes sense with what is going on harmonically, rhythmically and with instrumentation. I make sure that what I am inspired to do is not imposed on the music but is present within it. The sections where I might be more improvisatory with bowing are those where I am concerned about balance – for example, from bar 35 where the melody goes up the octave. As it extends to the very top C the orchestra’s excitement can rise. Although most editions have a slur in bar 37, I might play separate bows, which also happens to be what is marked in the manuscript. I only do this if I feel I really need to sing out based on the amount of volume behind me. My mindset is that as long as the bowing sounds like it looks on the page, you can adapt it freely.

Stormy seas

As soon as the solo line finally settles in C major in bar 48 we turn a corner into the middle section and it's as if you have new air beneath your wings to travel. Just by looking at the demisemiquavers ( ) in bar 55 there seems to be much more activity, and the repeated quaver figure in the bass is like a heartbeat: fateful and implying continuity. While this rolls on, gently supporting the solo statements, the brilliance of the orchestration really comes out in the tuttis. The swells (I like to think of the ocean here) can be heard purely by how the composer has voiced the question-and-answer phrases. From bar 58 the storm intensifies, and you can enjoy breaking up the 6/8 lilt by emphasising the shortened phrases and half-bar harmonic changes, heard here for the first time in this movement. Further disruption follows with the hemiolas in bar 66–67 as the tempest plays out but I think what is really clever is how we return to the first theme.

Return to innocence

From bar 77 it is as if Mendelssohn takes the semitone steps that unfurl over the movement’s first four bars and reverses them. At the beginning there is anticipation and an element of uncertainty with the rising semitones, but here it is like letting air out of a balloon: the relaxation is much more directional. With its pianissimo marking the reprise is somewhat reserved as we don’t yet have the release of a full resolution. But there is an innocent flow to it too. The stormy sea has turned into a babbling brook, and even though the orchestration is thicker than at the beginning there is less viscosity to the solo line here.

Bars 85 and 86 feel like an arrival, but to stay tethered to the home key this time, Mendelssohn adds a series of phrase extensions rather than beginning a new phrase in a different key. Again, we have beautifully expressive rising semitones in bars 91–92 that are repeated in bars 95–96. The chromatic movement from bar 85 is a way to test and question the home key and so the static C major harmony in bar 97 is a surprise. I like to pause on the top G in the way I imagine a vocalist would, letting the conductor wait on the half-bar before moving through the cadence with the utmost tenderness.

From bar 99 there is a feeling of pure rejoicing as we reach our destination. Not content with anything but the best, Mendelssohn made some adjustments to the ending, changing the sequences of semiquavers (s) in bars 103–106 into something more settled, and limiting the range of the final three bars, which originally spanned all the way from a top C7 in bar 107 down to middle C at the end. In the final version there is time to rest on the final three Cs. What we have now is less of an obvious solution but one that’s far more satisfying: it feels like infinite music, as if he hit upon a discovery rather than inventing it.

INTERVIEW BY HELENA RUINARD