The First Walpurgis Night Op.60

During the summer of 1799, Goethe wrote his ballad “Die erste Walpurgisnacht ” and asked his friend Carl Friedrich Zelter to set the work to music. Zelter however, felt unable to do this, and so Goethe’s wish was only realisedthirty years later by Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy.

The “heavenly words” of the pagan ballads had impressed the composer so much after a visit to Weimar, that he was inspired to set them to music. In 1832 thecomposition took shape and was performed a year later in the Sing- Akademie in Berlin.

Mendelssohn was, however, unhappy with the first version of the work and held it back, until he decided on a radical revisionofthe work ten years after its premiere. Die “erste Walpurgisnacht” was first performed in 1843 in Leipzig in the presence of Robert Schumann and Hector Berlioz, in the form in which the work is still performed today. Thepublication of this edition by John Michael Cooper, Associate Professor of Music History at the University of North Texas (Denton), makes the work available in an Urtext edition for the first time in time for the 200thanniversary of the composer’s birth. The edition reflects the latest state of research, and the volume includes a Critical Commentary.

– One of Mendelssohn’s most important secular works in an edition reflectingthe latest research findings.

– Bärenreiter Urtext for the Mendelssohn anniversary year 2009.

– Critical Commentary (Eng)

– Full score (BA9072) and vocal score (BA9072-90) for sale; performance material(BA9072-72) available for hire.