What's the Name of That Book??? discussion

I read this in the 1980s/ early 90s, but it was an old book of my parents then, so could have been anything from the 30s onwards. They have no memory of it - probably never read it. I think it had may have had a greenish dust jacket. I don't know how factually accurate it was, but it was interesting about both Mendelssohn and Bach and I'd be interested to read it again.

Beyond Desire?

That might well be it. I will have to track down a copy, but unless someone wrote a very similar novel, I think it almost certainly is. The fact that the reviews suggest it's not very factually accurate at all does ring a bell.

Kirkus Review of Beyond Desire by Pierre la Mure - Rainbowheart's suggestion:

""M. La Mure has taken promiscuous liberties with the basic facts of Felix Mendelssohn's life to shape a story which seems ruthlessly uninterested in authenticity. Here we meet young Mendelssohn embarking on an early affair for a friend's sake, going to England and living with an Italian opera singer, staying with Chopin in Paris and returning to Berlin and banking, only to dash off to Frankfurt to court Cilette - a pastor's daughter - whose "feeling" took them to Leipzig. After about ten years, Mendelssohn; still questioning his destiny in a small town, disheartened by his wife's lack of passion but back with her after another go at the opera star in Dresden, finds Bach's St. Matthew's Passion in a butcher shop..."

There are different cover images.