Encounter I

Life of Discovery: A Portrait of Felix Mendelssohn, with Orli Shaham

FRIDAY, JULY 17, 2009
7:30 p.m., Martin Family Hall, Menlo School
Tickets: $40 adult; $20 student

Driven to absorb and master the Western musical tradition as comprehensively as his genius would allow, Felix Mendelssohn assembled a body of work that represents the culmination of music history up to his own lifetime. His music education found firm grounding in the music of Bach and Mozart; he discovered and internalized the innovation of Beethoven’s enigmatic late style during his precocious teenage years; and by his early twenties, he was already creating music that forecast the direction of the latter nineteenth century. Pianist, writer, and lecturer Orli Shaham explores the creative origins of this quintessential Romantic master, tracing Mendelssohn’s path from insatiable curiosity to groundbreaking genius.

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Image: Theodor Hildebrandt (1804–1874): Felix Mendelssohn, 1835. Oil on canvas. (Bildarchiv Preussischer Kulturbesitz/Art Resource, NY)