Love and Loyalty: Musical Confessions of Albrecht Mendelssohn Bartholdy (1874-1936)

Albrecht Mendelssohn Bartholdy was a grandson of Felix and a prestigious jurist who served as one of Germany's observers to the Treaty of Versaille negotiations. He was also a poet, a pianist, a composer, a librettist, and a music historian. 

After his father Karl suffered a debilitating mental breakdown, Adolph Wach, a jurist married to Felix' daughter Lili, became Albrecht's substitute father and professional mentor. The Wachs introduced Albrecht to the leading musicians of their time, including Reger, Herzogenberg, Smyth, and Brahms. Though Albrecht was very close to Adolph's musical daughter Marie, he married Marie's sister Dora, a socially awkward woman with a passion for goat farming and a dislike for the arts. 

Marie's Music Album in the Mendelssohn-Archive Berlin contains love songs by Albrecht, dedicated to Marie two months after his marriage to Dora. Two years later, Albrecht self-published yet another love song collection for Marie. Only in the following year did he finally publish a collection of songs dedicated to Dora. Albrecht's open musical confessions of love for Marie, rather than for his wife, point to a familial agreement to an "arranged marriage" to Dora. Thus, Albrecht could show his gratefulness to his substitute father Adolph while ensuring that the family's heritage and inheritance remained in control of close family relations. 

The peak of Albrecht's law career was also marked by his close relationship with Magdalene Schoch, a talented student who soon became an indispensable colleague. During these years Albrecht once again produced a prodigious number of love songs, this time for Magdalena. 

Albrecht's work schedules meticulously list every professional work engagement and deadline. They also mention his song compositions, but none of his other artistic projects, thus putting his songs and his legal projects on the same plane. Professionally ambitious, and acutely aware of his responsibility as an heir to the Mendelssohn family legacy, he chose to comply with familial and societal expectations rather than pursue his own love interests. By publishing and gifting love song collections to his objects of desire, he ensured that his true confessions of love would outlive imperfect social arrangements he deemed necessary during his lifetime. 

Program

Ryan de Ryke, baritone

Eva Mengelkoch, piano and lecture

I. The Wach-Mendelssohn Music Salon in Leipzig 

1'50 Vom Berge (Joseph von Eichendorff) Ethel Smyth (1858-1944)

2'30 Abends (Theodor Storm), Opus 48 Nr. 6 Heinrich von Herzogenberg (1843-1900) 

1'40 Wenn ich mir in stiller Seele (J.W. von Goethe) Fanny Hensel (1805-1847)

II. Cousins and Butterflies – Albrecht's Songs for Marie and Dora

From Vier Gedichte (1907), dedicated to Marie Wach Albrecht Mendelssohn Bartholdy

'50 Rosenwolke 

1'00 Sag' mir 

From Sieben Lieder (1908), dedicated to Dora Mendelssohn (nee Wach)

3'10 Der Sänger (Roberty Piloty) 

III. "Ferne und Nähe" (Close-by and Far-Away) - Albrecht's Songs for Lena

1'45 Song from The Arabian Nights Albrecht Mendelssohn Bartholdy

2'15 Love's a Flower (John Galsworthy)

3'00 Ferne und Nähe (Anonymous) 

2'55 In der Nacht (Bruno Frank) 

1'30 Wenn ich mir Lieder singe (J.W. von Goethe) 

2'10 Ich hört ein Fräulein klagen (Des Knaben Wunderhorn)

3'46 Sonett (Anonymous)

1'30 Zum 18. Juni 1934 (Victor Hugo)

2'05 Gasel (Gottfried Keller) 

1'55 Wenn zwei sich lieben im Herzensgrund (Albrecht Mendelssohn Bartholdy)