The hidden composer – critical views on life and works of Felix Mendelssohn
Bartholdy from the nineteenth century to this day
Heringsdorf, September 13–15, 2009
in cooperation with the Usedom Music Festival 2009

Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy has been one of the most disputed composers in the
canon of European art music. The evaluation of his oeuvre has shifted radically
during the past 150 years, oscillating between complete dismissal and near
idolization. Even his adversaries acknowledge that he was one of the most gifted
and cultured artists of the Romantic era. It is well known that one main reason
for the ambivalence towards Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy’s art has been Richard
Wagner’s condemning criticism, and his propagandistic anti-Semitic statements
remain ingrained in the communal cultural consciousness to this very day. Also
for that reason a group of international researchers will meet in Heringsdorf,
previously to the Usedom Music Festival: On the occasion of Felix Mendelssohn
Bartholdy’s 200th birthday a new approach to the life and work of the “hidden
composer” and pathfinder of the Bach-Renaissance should be tried.

Speakers are: Hans-Joachim Hillerbrand (Duke University), Julius H. Schoeps
(Moses Mendelssohn Zentrum Potsdam), Michael Steinberg (Brown University), Ruth
Ha-Cohen (Hebrew University of Jerusalem), Angela R. Mace (Duke University), R.
Larry Todd (Duke University), Cornelia Bartsch (Universität Paderborn), Julius
Reder Carlson (UCLA), Judit Frigyesi (Bar Ilan University Israel), Efrat Frommer
(Bar Ilan University Israel), Sebastian Panwitz (Moses Mendelssohn Zentrum
Potsdam), Beatrix Borchard (Hochschule für Musik und Theater Hamburg), Yvonne
Wasserloos (Robert Schumann Hochschule Düsseldorf), and Michael Beckerman (New
York University).

Piano concert by Florian Uhlig, featuring works of Haydn and Mendelssohn.

Contact: Judit Frigyesi (judit.frigyesi at gmail.com) or Anna-Dorothea Ludewig
(aludewig at uni-potsdam.de).

Further info: www.mmz-potsdam.de