Mendelssohn: Trumpet Overture, Op. 101 (with Score)

Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy:
Overture for orchestra in C major ("Trumpet"), Op. 101, MWV P 2 (with Score)
Composed: 1826 ca., rev. 1833
Conductor: Claudio Abbado
Orchestra: London Symphony Orchestra

There is really no good reason why Felix Mendelssohn's Overture for orchestra in C major, Op. 101 is known, and has for a long time been known, as the "Trumpet" Overture. No special light is thrown by Mendelssohn in the direction of the trumpets, either singly or as a section, and indeed, as brass go in the piece, the horn section generally has more and better things to do. Mendelssohn composed the overture in 1826, while still a teenager, and later revised it a little bit in preparation for a performance in Britain on June 10, 1833. It is a boisterous thing, not especially inventive but always energetic, always vital as it moves through a 75-page Allegro vivace sonata-form.

This followed such youthful triumphs as the Octet, Op. 20, and the Quintet in A major, Op. 18, all for strings, and it seems that he was still considerably more comfortable with the string sections than with winds. At least, so we might guess from the fact that the winds are silent throughout a great deal of the "Trumpet" Overture, while the strings carry more than their share of both thematic weight and fleet-footed rhythmic activity. "Trumpet" or not, this is an overture for strings with wind backup, which of course makes it all the more enjoyable when, as happens a few times in the piece, a woodwind player here or there rebels and picks up a tune on its own! (https://www.allmusic.com/composition/...)