Ruy Blas in C minor [Op. 95] MWV P 15

2.2.2.2 – 4.2.3.0 – timp – str

The Overture to Ruy Blas, Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy’s last overture, was not composed as an autonomously conceived score, but as the opening piece of a stage work. Nevertheless, its immediate success at the Leipzig first performance in 1839, as well as the fact that no further contributions to Victor Hugo’s drama followed from Mendelssohn’s pen soon made it well known in the concert hall.

The work’s special history, including several arrangements occasioned by various performances, led to the fact that the overture had its largest circulation in the version of the posthumous first edition on which this edition is also based.