In 1829, at the age of 20, Felix Mendelssohn directed the first performance of Bach’s St. Matthew Passion since the composer’s death in 1750. Felix and his sister, the composer Fanny Mendelssohn, had grown up studying harmony with a Bach specialist, Carl Friedrich Zelter. The siblings’ grandmother, Bella Salomon, encouraged Felix’s interest by arranging for a copy of Bach’s extremely rare St. Matthew Passion to be made as a gift for the teenage Felix around 1823 or 1824. By 1829, Felix Mendelssohn had completed the research, editing, copying, organization and rehearsal required to direct the Berlin Singakademie in a performance of the work, and in doing so, he more or less single-handedly began a revival of interest in Bach’s music which continues unabated to this day.

Mendelssohn’s love for Bach led him to experiment with bringing Bach’s techniques into his own compositions. FIve years after his revival of the St. Matthew Passion, Mendelssohn began one of his boldest neo-Baroque compositions: an oratorio based on the life of St. Paul.