Mendelssohn: A Midsummer Night's Dream - incidental music, Op. 61

In 1826 Felix Mendelssohn, aged only seventeen, composed his famous overture to A Midsummer Night’s Dream. He wrote incidental music for the same play sixteen years later, and effortlessly recaptured the world of his youthful imagination. It sparkles and shimmers with its fairy magic even now. In this recording, the haunting Nocturne, the lively Scherzo and the famous Wedding March are interspersed with ‘melodramas’ accompanying spoken text from Shakespeare’s much-loved play.