Felix Mendelssohn was born in Hamburg, Germany, on February 3, 1809, and died in Leipzig, Germany on November 4, 1847. The first performance of the Incidental Music to A Midsummer Night’s Dream took place at the Neues Palais in Potsdam, Germany, on October 14, 1843, with the composer conducting. The Incidental Music to A Midsummer Night’s Dream is scored for two soprano soloists, women’s chorus, two flutes, two oboes, two clarinets, two bassoons, two horns, three trumpets, three trombones, tuba, timpani, triangle, cymbals, and strings. Approximate performance time is sixty-two minutes.

In the span of less than one year, the teenaged Felix Mendelssohn composed two remarkable works. In October of 1825, Mendelssohn completed his Octet for Strings, Opus 20. Shakespeare provided the inspiration for the next masterpiece. In July of the following year, Mendelssohn informed his sister Fanny: “I have grown accustomed to composing in our garden; there I completed two piano pieces in A major and E minor. Today or tomorrow I am going to dream there the A Midsummer Night’s Dream. This is, however, an enormous audacity.” A few days later, after hearing the Berlin premiere of Carl Maria von Weber’s Overture to the opera, Oberon, Mendelssohn wrote to his sister: “Ever since you left, my love for you goes in E minor.”

By the time of these letters, Mendelssohn had begun the composition of his Overture to Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Opus 21. Aided by the guidance and constructive criticism of his friend, composer Adolph Bernhard Marx, the 17-year-old Mendelssohn completed his Overture on August 6, 1826. After a few private performances, both in versions for piano duet and orchestra, the official premiere of the Overture to A Midsummer Night’s Dream took place at a concert in Stettin on February 20, 1827, led by composer and conductor Carl Loewe. That concert also featured the northern European premiere of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, in which Mendelssohn joined the orchestra’s violin section.

From the very first performance, Mendelssohn’s Overture to A Midsummer Night’s Dream dazzled audiences with its elegance, wit, and technical brilliance. Robert Schumann wrote: “The bloom of youth lies over it...It is an inspired moment when the mature master took his first and loftiest flight.” Almost two decades later, Mendelssohn composed numerous additional pieces to serve (along with the Overture) as incidental music for an October 14, 1843, production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream at the Neues Palais in Potsdam. Mendelssohn reconjured the magic of his earlier composition, and his Incidental Music to A Midsummer Night’s Dream remains one of the finest works in the genre. As one British musicologist observed: “With A Midsummer Night’s Dream we cannot think of Shakespeare without Mendelssohn or Mendelssohn without Shakespeare.”

Overture, Opus 21—The Overture (Allegro di molto) begins with four hushed ascending chords.  A gossamer string figure leads to a grand outburst by the orchestra. After a brief passage by the winds, the strings introduce a lovely descending melody. The exposition features other material relating to the action of Shakespeare’s play, including a rustic dance and a braying figure associated with Bottom’s transformation into a donkey. The opening string figure serves as the basis for the quicksilver development section. The four ascending chords return to introduce the recapitulation of the principal thematic material. The coda weaves its own magic. A cadence appears to mark the Overture’s conclusion, but is followed instead by the final reprise of the opening string figure. The four ascending chords cap the peaceful closing measures. As Mendelssohn described: “At the end, after everything has been satisfactorily settled and the principal players have joyfully left the stage, the elves follow them, bless the house and disappear with the dawn. So the play ends, and my Overture too.”

The ensuing Incidental Music, heard throughout the course of the play, frequently calls upon music from the Overture. The Incidental Music comprises purely orchestral numbers, songs with orchestral accompaniment, and melodramas (combining spoken word and orchestra).

Overture, Opus 21

I. Scherzo. Allegro vivace

II. [L’istesso tempo]

III. Song with Chorus. Allegro ma non troppo

IV. Andante

V. Allegro appassionato

X. Funeral March. Andante comodo

VII. Con moto tranquillo (Nocturne)

VIII. Andante

IX. Wedding March. Allegro vivace

X. Funeral March. Andante comodo

XI. A Dance of Clowns. Allegro di molto

XII. Allegro vivace come primo

XIII. Finale