A Dictionary of Music and Musicians/Midsummer Night's Dream Music
MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM MUSIC, by Mendelssohn, consists of two parts, 1. The Overture was written between July 7 and Aug. 6, 1826, with the latter of which dates the score (in the Berlin Bibliothek) is signed. It appears from Marx's statement (Erinn. ii. 231–3) that the work, as we possess it, is a second attempt. The former one, of which the first half was completed, began with the four chords and the fairy figure. On these followed a regular overture, in which the theme
represented the proceedings of the lovers. Nothing else has survived. The Bergomask dance and other most characteristic features are all new, and appear to have been the result of the representations of Marx, who urged that the overture should not only be formed on the subject of the play but should adopt it as a Programme. It was first performed in public at Stettin in Feb. 1827. Mendelssohn brought it with him to London in 1829, and it was played under his direction at a concert given by Drouet at the Argyll Rooms, on June 24, Midsummer night. On returning from the concert the score was left in a hackney coach and irrecoverably lost.
The coincidence between the melody at the close of the overture and that in the 'Mermaid's song' in the Finale to the 2nd act of Weber's 'Oberon' is no doubt a mere coincidence. Weber's sketch of the Finale was finished in Dresden on [1]Jan. 7, 1826, immediately after which he started for London; and it is very improbable that any of the motifs of the opera should have become known before its performance, April 12, 1826. But apart from this, it is so extremely unlike Mendelssohn to adopt a theme from another composer, that we may be perfectly sure that the idea was his own. He introduces it in the beginning of the work, at the first fortissimo; it then twice recurs in the course of the working, and appears in an extended form as a cantilène in the coda. Mendelssohn appears to have felt some difficulty as to the notation of the overture. He first wrote it with the fairy subject in quavers, and two minims in a bar. He then published an arrangement for the P.F. with Cramer & Co., which has the fairy subject in semiquavers; and lastly returned to the original notation, in, which the score is printed. The score was published with those of the Hebrides and Meeresstille, as '3 concert overtures,' by Breitkopfs, in March or April 1835.
2. The music for the Play was composed in 1843 in obedience to the desire of the King of Prussia, and was produced on the stage at the New Palace at Potsdam, on Oct. 14 of that year, after 11 rehearsals. It contains 12 numbers—Scherzo; Fairy march; 'You spotted snakes' for 2 sopranos and chorus; Melodrama; Intermezzo; Melodrama; Notturno; Andante; Wedding march; Allegro commodo; Bergomask dance; Finale. Its first performance at the Philharmonic was under the composer's direction, May 27, 1844.- ↑ Weber's Life, by his son, ii. 639, 643.