6 Duets Op.63

Ich wollt, meine Lieb ergösse

Abschiedslied der Zugvögel

Gruss

Herbstlied

Volkslied

Maiglöckchen und die Blümlein

Before Mendelssohn turned his attention to the medium, no great composer - not even convivial personalities like Mozart and Schubert - took much interest in writing songs for two voices. Perhaps they felt it was a decorative art inappropriate for the interpretation of serious poetry. Mendelssohn himself seems to have had some such idea. In setting Heine’s Ich wollt, meine Schmerzen ergössen, he changed the first line to “Ich wollt, meine Lieb ergösse,” substituting “love” for “pain” as though he thought the original sentiment would be out of place in a duet destined mainly for sociable consumption.

The earliest of his 6 Duets Op.63 (written at various times between 1836 and 1844), Ich wollt, meine Lieb ergösse offers a characteristic example of Mendelssohn’s attractive if unambitious scoring for the two voices. Avoiding counterpoint, he usually has them moving in the same rhythm, often in parallel lines, occasionally separating them so that one voice can echo a phrase introduced by the other. Abschiedslied der Zugvögel and Herbstlied admit a little melancholy, but no more than that occasioned by the end of summer, and both of them are offset by the happy Gruss that comes between them. The Burns setting, Volkslied, is is a miniature masterpiece in the art of simplicity while Maiglöckchen delightfully recaptures the elfin atmosphere of Mendelssohn’s Midsummer Night’s Dream music.