Wedding March

Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy (1809 - 1847) composed the music to William Shakespeare's play A Midsummer Night's Dream at two different times. In 1826, at the age of 16, he wrote a concert overture (op. 21). Sixteen years later, in 1842, he composed incidental music (opus 61) for King Frederick William IV of Prussia, into which he incorporated the existing overture. The overture was premiered on 20 February 1827 in Stettin (then in Prussia, now Szczecin, Poland) under the direction of Carl Loewe. Mendelssohn had to drive 80 miles through a raging snowstorm to get to the concert, which was his first public performance. The interlude between the 4th and 5th acts of the incidental music is the famous Wedding March, Mendelssohn's most popular and frequently performed work.