Mendelssohn's Elijah

About

Well-loved and steeped in tradition, Felix Mendelssohn's most monumental oratorio Elijah brings the sacred to life with operatic gusto.
Like most oratorios, Elijah is based on a Biblical story. The prophet Elijah has predicted a drought: punishment for those who worship the false God Baal. This includes King Ahab's wife, Jezebel. After Elijah is proved right, he persuades the people to repent – and to kill Baal's prophets. Their faith is rewarded with storm clouds and rain. But Jezebel, furious, forces Elijah into exile.
Alone and hopeless in the wilderness, Elijah is consoled first by angels and then – after a mighty storm, an earthquake and a fire – by God himself. Following his trials, Elijah is whisked up to heaven in a fiery chariot. We end with a profound reflection on the glory of God and a triumphant 'Amen'.
Elijah's composer, Felix Mendelssohn, was someone who loved the music of Johann Sebastian Bach and George Frideric Handel, and became a major force in the 18th-century revival of interest in these Baroque composers. No surprise, then, that Elijah nods to his musical heroes. Structurally, for instance, alongside standard oratorio forms such as recitative and aria, he includes complex choral fugues in the manner of Bach.
After the huge success of his first oratorio St Paul in 1836, Mendelssohn laboured for 10 years on a follow up. Elijah received its first performance on 26 August 1846 in Birmingham and The Times wrote: "Never was there a more complete triumph – never a more thorough and speedy recognition of a great work of art." Most striking perhaps is the significant role of the chorus in pushing the action onward. Elijah soon overtook Handel's Messiah in popularity, remaining the most performed oratorio for most of the nineteenth century.