Calm Sea and Prosperous Voyage, Op. 27

Composer: MENDELSSOHN, Felix
  • Mendelssohn composed his concert overture Meeresstille und glückliche Fahrt, Op. 27, in 1828.1 The overture received its first performance on September 7 of that year, in the Mendelssohn home.2
    • The Mendelssohn family had a long tradition of hosting musicales in their homes; Felix’s maternal aunts had done so, and his parents’ musicales had offered him his earliest performance opportunities. Fanny Hensel hosted the series on Sundays in the Mendelssohns’ Berlin home from 1831 onward as Sonntagsmusiken (Sunday Music).3
  • This concert overture was inspired by two shorts poem by Goethe: “Meeres stille” and “Glückliche Fahrt.”4
    • Beethoven had set these two companion poems as a cantata in 1815, and it was published in 1822. 
  • The overture is structured in two sections and a coda: the first section illustrates the first poem, “Meeres stille,” the second section illustrates the second poem, and the final coda may suggest an ending where the ship safely reaches harbor. (Goethe’s second poem ends with the sighting of land.)5

Sources

  1. 73R. Larry Todd, “Mendelssohn(-Bartholdy), (Jacob Ludwig) Felix,” Grove Music Online (2001), accessed July 2, 2021, https://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/grovemusic/view/10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.001.0001/omo-9781561592630-e-0000051795. 
  2. “Meeresstille und glückliche Fahrt, Op.27 (Mendelssohn, Felix),” IMSLP, accessed July 2, 2021, https://imslp.org/wiki/Meeresstille_und_gl%C3%BCckliche_Fahrt%2C_Op.27_(Mendelssohn%2C_Felix). 
  3. “Fanny Mendelssohn Hensel, 1805-1847,” The Library of Congress, accessed July 2, 2021, https://www.loc.gov/item/ihas.200156440/. 
  4. Todd, “Mendelssohn(-Bartholdy), (Jacob Ludwig) Felix,” Grove Music Online.
  5. Ibid.

Cut IDs

20529 41872 42104 44367