Mendelssohn's String Quintet No. 2 – With Sean Lee, Danbi Um, Paul Neubauer, Richard O'Neill and Mihai Marica

Members of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center present a passionate performance of Felix Mendelssohn's Second String Quintet in B-flat major. In contrast to his first string quintet (composed at the tender age of 17), the String Quintet No. 2 (completed two years before his premature death in 1845) shows the composer at the height of his powers, an evolution particular apparent in his mature approach to the work’s slow movements. Also notable is his choice to give the first violin a role more typical of orchestral writing than chamber compositions: its overwhelming melodic importance in the first and fourth movements runs counter to the more typical Romantic practice of treating the different instruments as relatively equal solo voices.