WAGNER, RICHARD (Wagner, Richard) (1813–1883), great German composer. Wilhelm Richard Wagner was born on May 22, 1813 in Leipzig, the son of an official, Karl Friedrich Wagner, and Johanna Rosina Wagner (née Pez), the daughter of a miller from Weißenfels.
Wagner’s childhood was not prosperous: he was sick a lot, his family moved often, and as a result, the boy studied in fits and starts at schools in different cities. Nevertheless, already in his youth, Wagner absorbed much of what was later useful to him: he was well read in classical and modern literature, fell in love with the operas of K. M. Weber (who was a member of the Wagner house), attended concerts, and mastered the basics of compositional technique. He also showed a desire for self-expression in theatrical and dramatic form, and was keenly interested in politics and philosophy. In February 1831 he entered the University of Leipzig, and shortly before that one of his first works was performed - the Overture in B-flat major.
At the university, Wagner attended lectures on philosophy and aesthetics, studied music with T. Weinlig, cantor of the school of St. Thomas. At the same time, he met people associated with exiled Polish revolutionaries, and in 1832 he accompanied Count Tyszkiewicz on his journey to Moravia, and from there he went to Vienna. In Prague, his just completed symphony in C major was played at the conservatory at an orchestral rehearsal, and on January 10, 1833 it was publicly performed in Leipzig in the Gewandhaus concert hall.
Years of need.
A month later, thanks to the assistance of his brother (singer Karl Albert), Wagner received the position of tutor (choirmaster) at the Würzburg Opera House. He energetically set to work, while continuing his composition studies. In the Leipzig “Newspaper of Elegant Light”, Wagner published an article “German Opera”, which essentially anticipated his later theories, and began composing the opera The Fairies (Die Feen, based on a story by C. Gozzi), the composer’s first work in this genre. However, the opera was not accepted for production in Leipzig.
In 1834, he took the place of conductor at the Magdeburg Theater, and at the same time an important event occurred in his life: he met the actress Minna Planer, became seriously interested in her, and after two years of courtship he got married. The young musician did not achieve much success in Magdeburg (although the famous singer Wilhelmina Schröder-Devrient, who performed there, highly appreciated Wagner’s conducting art) and was not averse to looking for another place. He worked in Königsberg and Riga, but did not stay in these cities. Minna had already begun to regret her choice and left her husband for a while. In addition, Wagner was plagued by debts and disappointment in his abilities after the failures of two new works - the overture Rule, Britannia! (Rule, Britannia) and the opera The Forbidden Love (Das Liebesverbot, based on Shakespeare's comedy Measure for Measure). After Minna's departure, Wagner fled from debts and other troubles to his sister Ottilie, who was married to the book publisher F. Brockhaus. In their house, he first read E. Bulwer-Lytton's novel Cola Rienzi - The Last Tribune (Cola Rienzi, der letzte der Tribunen), which seemed to him suitable material for an opera libretto. He set to work in the hope of receiving the approval of the famous Parisian master J. Meyerbeer, because Rienzi was written in the genre of French “grand opera”, and Meyerbeer was its unsurpassed master.
In the fall of 1838, Richard reunited with Minna in Riga, but theatrical intrigues forced him to soon leave the theater. The couple went to Paris by sea, visiting London along the way. The sea voyage turned out to be a difficult ordeal, as Wagner eloquently recounts in his autobiography, My Life (Mein Leben). During the voyage, he heard from the sailors a legend that formed the basis of his new opera The Flying Dutchman (Der fliegende Hollander). The Wagner couple spent two and a half years in France (from August 20, 1839 to April 7, 1842). Despite all sorts of difficulties and the lack of constant income, Richard developed his life in Paris in full force. His charm and brilliance of intellect earned him the respect and friendship of a number of prominent people. Thus, F. Habeneck, conductor of the Paris Grand Opera, authoritatively testified to Wagner’s outstanding talent as a composer (who, in turn, was deeply impressed by Habeneck’s interpretation of Beethoven’s works); publisher M. Schlesinger gave Wagner a job in the Musical Newspaper he published. Among the composer's supporters were German emigrants: specialist in classical philology Z. Leers, artist E. Kitz, poet G. Heine. Meyerbeer treated the German musician favorably, and the culmination of his Parisian years was Wagner’s acquaintance with G. Berlioz.
In terms of creativity, the Parisian period also brought considerable fruit: the symphonic overture Faust was written here, Rienzi’s score was completed, the libretto of The Flying Dutchman was completed, plans for new operas arose - Tannhauser, the result of reading a collection of ancient German legends by the Brothers Grimm) and Lohengrin ( Lohengrin). In June 1841, Wagner learned that Rienzi had been accepted for production in Dresden.
Dresden, 1842–1849.
Inspired by the news they received, the Wagners decided to return to their homeland. In Leipzig (where the Brockhaus family helped them), Munich and Berlin, Wagner encountered a number of obstacles, and when he arrived in Dresden, he found dissatisfied orchestra members for whom Rienzi’s score posed unusual tasks, directors for whom the opera’s libretto seemed too long and confusing, and artists not at all inclined to spend money on costumes for an unknown opera. However, Wagner did not give up, and his efforts were crowned with the triumphant premiere of Rienzi on October 20, 1842. The result of success was, in particular, a rapprochement between Wagner and F. Liszt, as well as invitations to conduct concerts in Leipzig and Berlin.
Best of the day
Following Rienzi, The Flying Dutchman was staged in Dresden at the beginning of 1843. Although this opera lasted only four performances, Wagner's name became so famous that in February 1843 he was appointed to the post of court conductor (head of the court opera). This news attracted the attention of numerous creditors of the composer from different cities in Germany. Wagner, who had a genius for resolving conflicts caused by living beyond one's means, dealt with the onslaught of creditors as well as previous and subsequent incidents of this kind.
Wagner had wonderful ideas (he later developed them in his literary works): he wanted to transform the court orchestra so that it could properly perform the scores of Beethoven, the idol of the young Wagner; At the same time, he showed concern for improving the living conditions of the orchestra members. He sought to free the theater from the tutelage of the court with its endless intrigues, and sought to expand the repertoire of church music by introducing into it the works of the great Palestrina.
Naturally, such reforms could not but cause resistance, and although many Dresdeners supported Wagner (at least in principle), they still remained in the minority, and when on June 15, 1848 - shortly after the revolutionary events in the city - Wagner publicly defended republican ideas, he was removed from his post.
Meanwhile, Wagner's fame as a composer grew and strengthened. The Flying Dutchman earned the approval of the venerable L. Spohr, who performed the opera in Kassel; it also ran in Riga and Berlin. Rienzi was staged in Hamburg and Berlin; Tannhäuser premiered on October 19, 1845 in Dresden. In the last years of the Dresden period, Wagner studied the epic Song of the Nibelungs and often appeared in print. Thanks to the participation of Liszt, a passionate promoter of new music, a concert performance of the third act of the just completed Lohengrin and a production of Tannhäuser in its complete (the so-called Dresden) edition were carried out in Weimar.
In May 1849, while in Weimar at the Tannhäuser rehearsals, Wagner learned that his house had been searched and a warrant had already been signed for his arrest in connection with his participation in the Dresden uprising. Leaving his wife and numerous creditors in Weimar, he hastily left for Zurich, where he spent the next 10 years.
Exile.
One of the first in Zurich to support him was Jessie Losso, an Englishwoman, the wife of a French merchant; she did not remain indifferent to the advances of the German musician. This scandal was followed by another, which gained greater publicity: we are talking about Wagner’s relationship with Mathilde Wesendonck, the wife of a philanthropist who gave Wagner the opportunity to settle in a comfortable house on the shores of Lake Zurich.
In Zurich, Wagner created all of his major literary works, including Art and Revolution (Die Kunst und die Revolution), Das Kunstwerk der Zukunft, inspired by and dedicated to the philosophy of Ludwig Feuerbach, Opera and Drama (Oper und Drama), and also the completely inappropriate pamphlet Jews in Music (Das Judenthum in Musik). Here Wagner attacks Mendelssohn and Meyerbeer, the poets Heine and Börne; As for Heine, Wagner even expressed doubts about his mental abilities. In addition to his literary work, Wagner performed as a conductor - in Zurich (concert series were held by subscription) and in the 1855 season at the Philharmonic Society in London. His main task was the development of a grandiose musical and dramatic concept, which, after a quarter of a century of hard work, took the form of the opera tetralogy Der Ring des Nibelungen.
In 1851, the Weimar court, at the insistence of Liszt, offered Wagner 500 thalers so that part of the future tetralogy - The Death of Siegfried (later the finale of the cycle - Death of the Gods, Gtterdmmerung) was ready for execution in July 1852. However, Wagner's plan clearly exceeded the capabilities of the Weimar theater. As the composer wrote to his friend T. Uhlig, at that time he already imagined The Ring of the Nibelung as “three dramas with a three-act introduction.”
In 1857–1859, Wagner interrupted work on the Nibelungen Saga, captivated by the story of Tristan and Isolde. The new opera arose from Mathilde Wesendonck and was inspired by Wagner's love for her. While composing Tristan, Wagner met the composer and conductor G. von Bülow, who was married to Liszt's daughter Cosima (who later became Wagner's wife). Tristan was almost finished when, in the summer of 1858, its author hastily left Zurich and went to Venice: this happened as a result of another quarrel with Minna, who again declared her firm intention to never live with her husband again. Expelled from Venice by the Austrian police, the composer went to Lucerne, where he completed work on the opera.
Wagner did not meet his wife for about a year, but in September 1859 they met again in Paris. Wagner made another attempt to conquer the French capital - and again failed. His three concerts, given in 1860, were met with hostility by the press and brought nothing but losses. A year later, the premiere of Tannhäuser at the Grand Opera - in a new version made especially for Paris - was booed by raging members of the Jockey Club. Just at this time, Wagner learned from the Saxon ambassador that he had the right to return to Germany, to any region except Saxony (this ban was lifted in 1862). The composer used the permission he received to search for a theater that would stage his new operas. He managed to convert the music publisher Schott, who gave him generous advances.
In 1862–1863, Wagner made a series of concert trips that made him famous as a conductor: he performed in Vienna, Prague, St. Petersburg, Budapest and Karlsruhe. However, uncertainty about the future weighed heavily on him, and in 1864, in the face of the threat of arrest for debt, he made another escape - this time with his Zurich acquaintance Elisa Wille - to Marienfeld. This was truly the last refuge: as Ernest Newman writes in his book, “most of the composer’s friends, especially those who had the means, were tired of his requests and even began to fear them; they came to the conclusion that Wagner was absolutely incapable of observing elementary decency, and were no longer going to allow him to encroach on their wallets.”
Munich. Second exile.
At this moment, unexpected help came - from Ludwig II, who had just ascended the royal throne in Bavaria. More than anything else, the young king loved Wagner's operas - and they were performed in Germany more and more often - and invited their author to Munich. In the summer of 1865, the royal troupe premiered Tristan (four performances). Shortly before that, Cosima von Bülow, with whom Wagner connected his life from the end of 1863, gave birth to his daughter. This circumstance gave Wagner's political opponents in Bavaria a reason to insist on the composer's removal from Munich. Once again Wagner became an exile: this time he settled in Tribschen on the shores of Lake Lucerne, where he spent the next six years.
At Triebschen he completed Die Meistersinger, Siegfried and most of The Twilight of the Gods (the other two parts of the tetralogy were completed a decade earlier), and created a number of literary works, the most important of which are On Conducting (ber das Dirigieren, 1869) and Beethoven (1870). He also completed his autobiography: the book My Life (the presentation in it was completed only up to 1864) appeared at the insistence of Cosima, who, after her divorce from von Bülow, became Wagner’s wife. This happened in 1870, a year after the birth of the composer’s only son, Siegfried. By that time, Minna Wagner was no longer alive (she died in 1866).
Ludwig of Bavaria, disillusioned with Wagner as a person, always remained a passionate admirer of his art. Despite serious obstacles and his own prejudices, he achieved the production in Munich of Die Meistersinger (1868), Das Rheingold (1869) and Die Valkre (1870), and the capital of Bavaria became a mecca for European musicians. In those years, Wagner became the undisputed leader in European music. Election to the Prussian Royal Academy of Arts was a turning point in Wagner's biography. Now his operas were staged throughout Europe and often met with a warm reception from the public. The new copyright law strengthened his financial position. E. Fritsch published a collection of his literary works. All that remained was to realize the dream of a new theater, where his musical dramas could be ideally embodied, and Wagner now interpreted them as a source of revival of German national identity and German culture. It took a lot of work, the support of well-wishers and financial assistance from the king to begin construction of the theater in Bayreuth: it was opened in August 1876 with the premiere of the Ring of the Nibelung. The king was present at the performances, and this was his first meeting with Wagner after an eight-year separation.
Last years.
After the celebrations in Bayreuth, Wagner and his family traveled to Italy; he met with Count A. Gobineau in Naples and Nietzsche in Sorrento. Once Wagner and Nietzsche were like-minded people, but in 1876 Nietzsche noticed a change in the composer: he had in mind the idea of Parsifal, in which Wagner, after the “pagan” Ring of the Nibelung, returns to Christian symbols and values. Nietzsche and Wagner never met again.
Wagner's late period of philosophical exploration found expression in such literary works as Is There Hope For Us? (Wollen wir hoffen, 1879), Religion and Art (Religion und Kunst, 1889), Heroism and Christianity (Heldentum und Christentum, 1881), and mainly in the opera Parsifal. This last opera by Wagner, in accordance with the royal decree, could only be performed in Bayreuth, and this situation remained until December 1903, when Parsifal was staged at the New York Metropolitan Opera.
In September 1882, Wagner went to Italy again. He was tormented by heart attacks, and one of them, on February 13, 1883, became fatal. Wagner's body was transported to Bayreuth and buried with state honors in the garden of his villa Wahnfried. Cosima outlived her husband by half a century (she died in 1930). In the same year, Siegfried Wagner, who played a significant role in preserving the legacy of his father and the traditions of performing his works, died with her.
To a much greater extent than all European composers since the end of the 16th century. (the time of the Florentine Camerata), Wagner viewed his art as a synthesis and as a way of expressing a certain philosophical concept. Its essence is expressed in the form of an aphorism in the following passage from a work of art of the future: “Just as a person will not be freed until he joyfully accepts the bonds that unite him with Nature, so art will not become free until he no longer has any reason to be ashamed of his connection with life." From this concept stem two fundamental ideas: art should be created by a community of people and belong to this community; The highest form of art is musical drama, understood as the organic unity of word and sound. The first idea was embodied in Bayreuth, where the theater is treated as a temple, and not as an entertainment establishment; the embodiment of the second idea is the musical drama created by Wagner.
R. Wagner is the largest German composer of the 19th century, who had a significant influence on the development of not only the music of the European tradition, but also world artistic culture as a whole. Wagner did not receive a systematic musical education and in his development as a master of music owes a decisive degree to himself. The composer's interests, entirely focused on the opera genre, emerged relatively early. From his early work, the romantic opera The Fairies (1834) to the musical mystery drama Parsifal (1882), Wagner remained a staunch adherent of serious musical theater, which through his efforts was transformed and updated.
At first, Wagner did not think of reforming the opera - he followed the established traditions of musical performance and sought to master the achievements of his predecessors. If in “Fairies” the German romantic opera, so brilliantly represented by “The Magic Shooter” by K. M. Weber, became a role model, then in the opera “The Ban of Love” (1836) he was more oriented towards the traditions of French comic opera. However, these early works did not bring him recognition - in those years Wagner led the hard life of a theater musician, wandering around different cities of Europe. For some time he worked in Russia, in the German theater of the city of Riga (1837-39). But Wagner... like many of his contemporaries, was attracted by the cultural capital of the then Europe, which was then universally recognized as Paris. The bright hopes of the young composer faded when he came face to face with the unsightly reality and was forced to lead the life of a poor foreign musician doing odd jobs. A change for the better came in 1842, when he was invited to the position of conductor at the famous opera house in the capital of Saxony, Dresden. Wagner finally had the opportunity to introduce his works to theater audiences, and his third opera, Rienzi (1840), won lasting recognition. And this is not surprising, since the model of the work was the French grand opera, the most prominent representatives of which were the recognized masters G. Spontini and G. Meyerbeer. In addition, the composer had performing forces of the highest rank - vocalists such as tenor J. Tihaček and the great singer-actress V. Schröder-Devrient, who became famous in her time in the role of Leonora in L. Beethoven’s only opera “Fidelio,” performed in his theater.
The 3 operas adjacent to the Dresden period have a lot in common. Thus, in “The Flying Dutchman” (1841), completed on the eve of the move to Dresden, the old legend about a wandering sailor cursed for previous atrocities, whom only devoted and pure love can save, comes to life. In the opera “Tannhäuser” (1845), the composer turned to the medieval legend about the minnesinger singer, who gained the favor of the pagan goddess Venus, but earned the curse of the Roman church for this. And finally, in “Lohengrin" (1848) - perhaps the most popular of Wagner's operas - a bright knight appears, descending to earth from the heavenly abode - the Holy Grail, in the name of fighting evil, slander and injustice.
In these operas, the composer is still closely associated with the traditions of romanticism - his heroes are torn apart by conflicting impulses, when purity and purity are opposed to the sinfulness of earthly passions, boundless trust is opposed to deceit and betrayal. Romanticism is also associated with the slowness of the narrative, when it is not so much the events themselves that are important, but the feelings that they awaken in the soul of the lyrical hero. This is where the important role of detailed monologues and dialogues of the characters comes from, revealing the internal struggle of their aspirations and motivations, a kind of “dialectic of the soul” of an extraordinary human personality.
But even during the years of work in the court service, Wagner had new plans. The impetus for their implementation was the revolution that broke out in a number of European countries in 1848 and did not escape Saxony. It was in Dresden that an armed uprising broke out against the reactionary monarchist regime, led by Wagner's friend, the Russian anarchist M. Bakunin. With his characteristic passion, Wagner took an active part in this uprising and after its defeat was forced to flee to Switzerland. A difficult period began in the composer’s life, but very fruitful for his work.
Wagner rethought and comprehended his artistic positions; moreover, he formulated the main tasks that, in his opinion, faced art in a number of theoretical works (among them the treatise “Opera and Drama” - 1851) is especially important. He embodied his ideas in the monumental tetralogy “The Ring of the Nibelung” - the main work of his entire life.
The basis of the grandiose creation, which fully occupies 4 theatrical evenings in a row, was made up of tales and legends dating back to pagan antiquity - the German “Song of the Nibelungs”, the Scandinavian sagas included in the Elder and Younger Edda. But pagan mythology with its gods and heroes became for the composer a means of knowledge and artistic analysis of the problems and contradictions of contemporary bourgeois reality.
The content of the tetralogy, which includes the musical dramas “Das Rheingold” (1854), “Walkyrie” (1856), “Siegfried” (1871) and “Death of the Gods” (1874), is very multifaceted - the operas feature numerous characters who enter into conflict with each other complex relationships, sometimes even into cruel, irreconcilable struggle. Among them is the evil Nibelung dwarf Alberich, who steals a golden treasure from the daughters of the Rhine; The owner of the treasure, who managed to forge a ring from it, is promised power over the world. Alberich is opposed by the light god Wotan, whose omnipotence is illusory - he is a slave to the agreements he himself has concluded, on which his dominion is based. Having taken the golden ring from the Nibelung, he brings upon himself and his family a terrible curse, from which only a mortal hero who owes him nothing can save him. His own grandson, the simple-minded and fearless Siegfried, becomes such a hero. He defeats the monstrous dragon Fafner, takes possession of the treasured ring, awakens the sleeping warrior maiden Brunhilda, surrounded by a sea of fire, but dies, struck down by meanness and deceit. Along with him, the old world, where deception, self-interest and injustice reigned, also perishes.
Wagner's grandiose plan required completely new, previously unheard of means of implementation, a new operatic reform. The composer almost completely abandoned the hitherto familiar number structure - complete arias, choruses, ensembles. Instead, they were replaced by lengthy monologues and dialogues of the characters, unfolded into an endless melody. Broad melodiousness merged with declamation in vocal parts of a new type, in which a melodious cantilena and catchy speech characteristics were incomprehensibly combined.
The main feature of Wagner's operatic reform is associated with the special role of the orchestra. He is not limited to just supporting the vocal melody, but leads his own line, sometimes even coming to the fore. Moreover, the orchestra becomes the bearer of the meaning of the action - it is in it that the main musical themes are most often heard - leitmotifs, which become symbols of characters, situations, and even abstract ideas. The leitmotifs smoothly transform into each other, are combined in simultaneous sound, are constantly modified, but each time they are recognized by the listener, who has firmly grasped the semantic meaning assigned to us. On a larger scale, Wagnerian musical dramas are divided into extended, relatively complete scenes, where broad waves of emotional ups and downs, tension build-ups and releases occur.
Wagner began to implement his great plan during the years of Swiss emigration. But the complete impossibility of seeing on stage the fruits of his titanic work, truly unparalleled in power and tirelessness, broke even such a great worker - the writing of the tetralogy was interrupted for many years. And only an unexpected turn of fate - the support of the young Bavarian king Ludwig, inspired new strength in the composer and helped him complete, perhaps, the most monumental creation of the art of music, which was the result of the efforts of one person. To stage the tetralogy, it was built in the Bavarian city of Bayreuth, where the entire tetralogy was first performed in 1876 exactly as Wagner intended it.
In addition to The Ring of the Nibelung, Wagner created in the second half of the 19th century. 3 more capital works. This is the opera “Tristan and Isolde” (1859) - an enthusiastic hymn to eternal love, sung in medieval legends, colored with anxious forebodings, permeated with a sense of the inevitability of a fatal outcome. And along with such a composition immersed in darkness, the dazzling light of the popular festival crowned the opera “Die Meistersinger of Nuremberg” (1867), where in an open competition of singers the most worthy, marked by a true gift, wins, and self-satisfied and stupidly pedantic mediocrity is put to shame. And finally, the master’s last creation - “Parsifal” (1882) - an attempt to musically and scenically represent the utopia of universal brotherhood, where the seemingly indestructible power of evil was defeated and wisdom, justice and purity reigned.
Wagner occupied a completely exceptional position in European music of the 19th century - it is difficult to name a composer who would not have been influenced by him. Wagner's discoveries influenced the development of musical theater in the 20th century. - composers learned lessons from them, but then moved in different ways, including those opposite to those outlined by the great German musician.
M. Tarakanov
The significance of Wagner in the history of world musical culture. His ideological and creative appearance
Wagner is one of those great artists whose work had a great influence on the development of world culture. His genius was universal: Wagner became famous not only as the author of outstanding musical works, but also as a wonderful conductor, who, along with Berlioz, was the founder of the modern art of conducting; he was a talented poet-playwright - the creator of librettos for his operas - and a gifted publicist and musical theater theorist. Such versatile activity, combined with ebullient energy and a titanic will in establishing his artistic principles, attracted widespread attention to Wagner’s personality and music: his ideological and creative achievements caused heated debate both during the composer’s lifetime and after his death. They have not subsided to this day.
“As a composer,” said P. I. Tchaikovsky, “Wagner is undoubtedly one of the most remarkable personalities in the second half of this (that is, the 19th. - M.D.) centuries, and his influence on music is enormous." This influence was multifaceted: it extended not only to the musical theater, where Wagner worked most of all as the author of thirteen operas, but also to the expressive means of musical art; Wagner's contribution to the field of program symphony is also significant.
“...He is great as an opera composer,” said N. A. Rimsky-Korsakov. “His operas,” wrote A. N. Serov, “... entered the German people and became a national treasure in their own way, no less than the operas of Weber or the works of Goethe or Schiller.” “He was gifted with a great gift of poetry, powerful creativity, his imagination was enormous, his initiative was strong, his artistic skill was great...” - this is how V. V. Stasov characterized the best sides of Wagner’s genius. The music of this remarkable composer, according to Serov, opened up “unknown, immense horizons” in art.
Paying tribute to Wagner's genius, his daring courage as an innovative artist, leading figures of Russian music (primarily Tchaikovsky, Rimsky-Korsakov, Stasov) criticized some tendencies in his work that distracted from the tasks of real depiction of life. Wagner's general artistic principles and his aesthetic views as applied to musical theater were subjected to especially fierce criticism. Tchaikovsky briefly and aptly said about this: “While I admire the composer, I have little sympathy for what is the cult of Wagner’s theories.” Wagner's favorite ideas, images of his operatic work, and methods of their musical embodiment were also disputed.
However, along with well-aimed critical remarks, there is an intense struggle for the assertion of national identity Russian musical theater, so different from German operatic art, sometimes caused biased judgments. In this regard, M. P. Mussorgsky very correctly noted: “We often criticize Wagner, but Wagner is strong and powerful because he probes art and tugs at it...”.
An even more fierce struggle arose around the name and cause of Wagner in foreign countries. Along with enthusiastic fans who believed that from now on theater should develop only along Wagner’s path, there were also musicians who completely rejected the ideological and artistic value of Wagner’s works and saw in his influence only detrimental consequences for the evolution of musical art. The Wagnerians and their opponents took irreconcilably hostile positions. While sometimes expressing fair thoughts and observations, with their biased assessments they rather confused these issues rather than helping to resolve them. Such extreme points of view were not shared by the largest foreign composers of the second half of the 19th century - Verdi, Bizet, Brahms - but even they, recognizing Wagner’s genius, did not accept everything in his music.
Wagner's work gave rise to conflicting assessments, because not only his multifaceted activity, but also the composer's personality itself was torn apart by severe contradictions. By one-sidedly emphasizing any one aspect of the complex image of the creator and man, Wagner’s apologists, as well as detractors, gave a distorted idea of his significance in the history of world culture. To correctly determine this meaning, one must understand Wagner's personality and life's work in all its complexity.
A double knot of contradictions characterizes Wagner. On the one hand, these are contradictions between worldview and creativity. Of course, one cannot deny the connections that existed between them, but the activities composer Wagner was far from coinciding with the activities of Wagner, the prolific writer-publicist, who expressed many reactionary thoughts on issues of politics and religion, especially in the last period of his life. On the other hand, both his aesthetic and socio-political views are sharply contradictory. A rebellious rebel, Wagner already arrived at the revolution of 1848-1849 with an extremely confused worldview. It remained so during the years of the defeat of the revolution, when reactionary ideology poisoned the composer’s consciousness with the poison of pessimism, gave rise to subjectivist sentiments, and led to the establishment of national-chauvinist or clerical ideas. All this could not but affect the contradictory nature of his ideological and artistic quests.
But Wagner is truly great in that, despite subjective reactionary views, despite their ideological instability, objectively reflected the essential aspects of reality in artistic creativity, revealed - in an allegorical, figurative form - the contradictions of life, exposed the capitalist world of lies and deceit, exposed the drama of great spiritual aspirations, powerful impulses for happiness and unaccomplished heroic deeds, broken hopes. Not a single composer of the post-Beethoven period in foreign countries of the 19th century was able to raise such a large complex of burning issues of our time as Wagner. Therefore, he became the “ruler of thoughts” of a number of generations, and his work absorbed large, exciting problems of modern culture.
Wagner did not give a clear answer to the vital questions he posed, but his historical merit lies in the fact that he posed them so sharply. He was able to do this because he permeated all his activities with a passionate, irreconcilable hatred of capitalist oppression. No matter what he expressed in theoretical articles, no matter what reactionary political views he defended, Wagner in his musical work was always on the side of those who sought the active use of their powers in establishing a sublime and humane principle in life, against those who were mired in the swamp bourgeois well-being and self-interest. And, perhaps, no one else has been able to show with such artistic persuasiveness and power the tragedy of modern life, poisoned by bourgeois civilization.
A sharply expressed anti-capitalist orientation gives Wagner's work enormous progressive significance, although he was unable to understand the complexity of the phenomena he depicted.
Wagner is the last major romantic artist of the 19th century. Romantic ideas, themes, images were entrenched in his work even in the pre-revolutionary years; they were developed by him later. After the revolution of 1848, many prominent composers, under the influence of new social conditions, as a result of a sharper exposure of class contradictions, switched to other topics and switched to realistic positions in their coverage (the most striking example of this is Verdi). But Wagner remained a romantic, although his inherent inconsistency was reflected in the fact that at different stages of his activity, either the features of realism or, conversely, reactionary romanticism more actively appeared.
This commitment to romantic themes and the means of expressing them placed him in a special position among many of his contemporaries. The individual properties of Wagner’s personality, who was always dissatisfied and restless, also had an effect.
His life is full of unusual ups and downs, passions and periods of boundless despair. I had to overcome countless obstacles to promote my innovative ideas. Years, sometimes decades, passed before he was able to hear the scores of his own compositions. One had to have an ineradicable thirst for creativity in order to work in these difficult conditions the way Wagner worked. Serving art was the main motivation of his life. (“I exist not to earn money, but to create,” Wagner proudly declared). That is why, despite cruel ideological mistakes and breakdowns, relying on the progressive traditions of German music, he achieved such outstanding artistic results: following Beethoven, he sang the heroics of human daring, like Bach, with an amazing richness of shades he revealed the world of human spiritual experiences and, following the path Weber, embodied images of German folk legends and tales in music, and created magnificent pictures of nature. Such a variety of ideological and artistic solutions and perfection of mastery are characteristic of the best works of Richard Wagner.
Themes, images and plots of Wagner's operas. Principles of musical dramaturgy. Features of musical language
Wagner as an artist emerged in the conditions of social upsurge in pre-revolutionary Germany. During these years, he not only formalized his aesthetic views and outlined ways to transform musical theater, but also defined a circle of images and subjects close to himself. It was in the 40s, simultaneously with Tannhäuser and Lohengrin, that Wagner thought through the plans for all the operas he worked on in the following decades (The exceptions are “Tristan” and “Parsifal”, the concept of which matured during the years of the defeat of the revolution; this explains the stronger influence of pessimistic moods than in other works.). He mainly drew material for these works from folk legends and tales. Their content, however, served him original a point for independent creativity, not ultimate purpose. In an effort to emphasize thoughts and moods close to modern times, Wagner subjected folk poetic sources to free processing, modernized them, because, he said, every historical generation can discover in myth my topic. His sense of artistic proportion and tact betrayed him when subjectivist ideas took precedence over the objective meaning of folk legends, but in many cases, when modernizing plots and images, the composer managed to preserve the vital truth of folk poetry. The mixing of such different tendencies is one of the most characteristic features of Wagnerian drama, both its strengths and weaknesses. However, referring to epic plots and images, Wagner gravitated towards them purely psychological interpretation - this, in turn, gave rise to an acutely contradictory struggle between the “Siegfried” and “Tristan” principles in his work.
Wagner turned to ancient legends and legendary images because he found great tragic plots in them. He was less interested in the real situation of distant antiquity or the historical past, although here he achieved a lot, especially in “Die Meistersinger of Nuremberg”, in which realistic tendencies were more pronounced. But above all, Wagner sought to show the spiritual drama of strong characters. A modern epic of the struggle for happiness he consistently embodied in various images and plots of his operas. This is the Flying Dutchman, persecuted by fate, tormented by his conscience, passionately dreaming of peace; this is Tannhäuser, torn apart by a contradictory passion for sensual pleasure and for a moral, harsh life; this is Lohengrin, rejected and not understood by people.
The struggle of life in Wagner's view is full of tragedy. Passion burns Tristan and Isolde; Elsa (in Lohengrin) dies after breaking the prohibition of her beloved. The inactive figure of Wotan is tragic; through lies and deceit he achieved illusory power, which brought grief to people. But the fate of Wagner’s most vital hero, Sigmund, is also tragic; and even Siegfried, far from the storms of life's dramas, this naive, powerful child of nature, is doomed to a tragic death. Everywhere and everywhere - a painful search for happiness, a desire to accomplish heroic deeds, but they are not allowed to come true - lies and deceit, violence and deceit have entangled life.
According to Wagner, salvation from suffering caused by a passionate desire for happiness lies in selfless love: it is the highest manifestation of the human principle. But love should not be passive - life is affirmed in achievement. Thus, the calling of Lohengrin - the defender of the innocently accused Elsa - is the fight for the rights of virtue; feat is Siegfried's ideal in life; his love for Brünnhilde calls him to new heroic deeds.
All Wagner's operas, starting with his mature works of the 40s, have features of ideological community and unity of musical and dramatic concept. The revolution of 1848-1849 marked an important milestone in the ideological and artistic evolution of the composer, increasing the inconsistency of his creativity. But basically the essence of the search for means of embodying a certain, stable range of ideas, themes, and images remained unchanged.
Wagner permeated his operas unity of dramatic expression, for which he unfolded the action in a continuous, continuous stream. The strengthening of the psychological principle, the desire for a truthful transmission of the processes of mental life, necessitated such continuity. Wagner was not alone in such quests. This was also achieved, each in his own way, by the best representatives of opera art of the 19th century - Russian classics, Verdi, Bizet, Smetana. But Wagner, continuing what his immediate predecessor in German music Weber had outlined, most consistently developed the principles end-to-end development in the musical and dramatic genre. He merged individual opera episodes, scenes, even paintings into a freely developing action. Wagner enriched the means of operatic expression with the forms of monologue, dialogue, and large symphonic structures. But paying more and more attention to depicting the inner world of the characters by depicting externally scenic, effective moments, he introduced into his music features of subjectivism and psychological complexity, which in turn gave rise to verbosity and destroyed the form, making it loose and amorphous. All this exacerbated the inconsistency of Wagnerian dramaturgy.
One of the important means of its expressiveness is the leitmotif system. It was not Wagner who invented it: musical motifs that evoked certain associations with specific life phenomena or psychological processes were used by the composers of the French Revolution of the late 18th century, by Weber and Meyerbeer, and in the field of symphonic music by Berlioz, Liszt and others. But Wagner differs from his predecessors and contemporaries in his broader, more consistent use of this system (The fanatical Wagnerians made a fair mistake in studying this issue, trying to give every theme, even intonation, a leitmotif meaning and endow all leitmotifs, no matter how brief, with almost comprehensive content.).
Any mature Wagner opera contains twenty-five to thirty leitmotifs that permeate the fabric of the score (However, in operas of the 40s the number of leitmotifs does not exceed ten.). He began composing the opera by developing a musical theme. So, for example, in the very first sketches of “The Ring of the Nibelung” the funeral march from “The Death of the Gods” is depicted, which, as said, contains a complex of the most important heroic themes of the tetralogy; First of all, the overture was written for “Die Meistersinger” - it enshrines the main thematic theme of the opera, etc.
Wagner's creative imagination is inexhaustible in inventing themes of remarkable beauty and plasticity, in which many essential phenomena of life are reflected and generalized. Often these themes provide an organic combination of expressive and figurative principles, which helps to concretize the musical image. In the operas of the 40s, the melodies are extended: the leading themes-images outline different facets of phenomena. This method of musical characterization continues in his later works, but Wagner’s predilection for vague philosophizing sometimes gives rise to impersonal leitmotifs that are intended to express abstract concepts. These motives are brief, devoid of the warmth of human breath, incapable of development, and have no internal connection with each other. So along with themes-images arise themes-symbols.
Unlike the latter, the best themes of Wagner's operas do not live separately throughout the work, they do not represent unchanging, isolated formations. Quite the opposite. The leading motifs contain common features, and together they form certain thematic complexes that express shades and gradations of feelings or details of a single picture. Wagner brings different themes and motifs together through subtle changes, comparisons or combinations of them at the same time. “The composer’s work on these motifs is truly amazing,” wrote Rimsky-Korsakov.
Wagner's dramatic method and his principles of symphonization of opera scores had an undoubted influence on the art of subsequent times. The largest composers of musical theater in the second half of the 19th and 20th centuries took advantage, to one degree or another, of the artistic achievements of the Wagnerian leitmotif system, although they did not accept its extremes (for example, Smetana and Rimsky-Korsakov, Puccini and Prokofiev).
The interpretation of the vocal principle in Wagner's operas is also noted for its originality.
Fighting against superficial, uncharacteristic melody in a dramatic sense, he argued that vocal music should be based on the reproduction of intonations, or, as Wagner said, accents of speech. “Dramatic melody,” he wrote, “finds support in verse and language.” There are no fundamentally new points in this statement. During the 18th-19th centuries, many composers turned to the embodiment of speech intonations in music in order to update the intonation structure of their works (for example, Gluck, Mussorgsky). Wagner's sublime declamation introduced a lot of new things into the music of the 19th century. From now on, it was impossible to return to the old patterns of operatic melody. Singers performing Wagner's operas also faced unprecedentedly new creative challenges. But, based on his abstract and speculative concepts, he sometimes unilaterally emphasized declamatory elements to the detriment of song elements, subordinating the development of the vocal element to symphonic development.
Of course, many pages of Wagner's operas are filled with full-blooded, varied vocal melody, conveying the finest shades of expressiveness. The operas of the 40s are rich in such melodicism, among which “The Flying Dutchman” stands out for its folk-song composition, and “Lohengrin” for its melodiousness and heartfelt warmth. But in subsequent works, especially in “Die Walküre” and “Die Meistersinger,” the vocal part is endowed with great content and acquires leading importance. One can recall Sigmund’s “spring song”, the monologue about the sword Notung, the love duet, the dialogue between Brünnhilde and Sigmund, Wotan’s farewell; in “Die Meistersinger” - songs by Walter, monologues by Sax, his songs about Eve and the Shoemaker Angel, quintet, folk choirs; in addition - songs of sword forging (in the opera “Siegfried”); Siegfried's story on the hunt, Brünnhilde's dying monologue (“Death of the Gods”), etc. But there are also pages of the score where the vocal part either takes on an exaggeratedly pompous tone, or, on the contrary, is relegated to the role of an optional appendage to the orchestral part. Such a violation of the artistic balance between the vocal and instrumental principles is characteristic of the internal inconsistency of Wagner's musical dramaturgy.
Wagner's achievements as a symphonist are indisputable; he consistently affirmed the principles of programming in his work. His overtures and orchestral introductions (Wagner created four operatic overtures (for the operas “Rienzi”, “The Flying Dutchman”, “Tannhäuser”, “Die Meistersinger”) and three architecturally completed orchestral introductions (“Lohengrin”, “Tristan”, “Parsifal”).), symphonic intermissions and numerous paintings provided, according to Rimsky-Korsakov, “the richest material for visual music, and where Wagner’s texture turned out to be suitable for a given moment, there he turned out to be truly great and powerful in the power of the plasticity of his images, thanks to the incomparable , its brilliant instrumentation and expression.” Tchaikovsky equally highly regarded Wagner’s symphonic music, noting its “unprecedentedly beautiful instrumentation” and “amazing richness of harmonic and polyphonic fabric.” V. Stasov, like Tchaikovsky or Rimsky-Korsakov, who condemned Wagner’s operatic work for many things, wrote that his orchestra “is new, rich, often dazzling in color, in poetry and charm of the strongest, but also the most delicate and sensually charming colors... ."
Already in the early works of the 40s, Wagner achieved brilliance, fullness and richness of orchestral sound; introduced a triple cast (in “The Ring of the Nibelung” - a quadruple cast); used the range of strings more widely, especially due to the upper register (his favorite technique is the high arrangement of string chords divisi); gave a melodic purpose to brass instruments (such is the powerful unison of three trumpets and three trombones in the reprise of the Tannhäuser overture or the unisons of brass on a moving harmonic background of strings in Ride of the Valkyries and The Spell of Fire, etc.). By mixing the sound of the three main groups of the orchestra (strings, wood, brass), Wagner achieved flexible, plastic variability of the symphonic fabric. High contrapuntal skill helped him in this. Moreover, his orchestra is not only colorful, but also characteristic, sensitively reacting to the development of dramatic feelings and situations.
Wagner also appears to be an innovator in the field of harmony. In search of the strongest expressive effects, he intensified the tension of musical speech, saturated it with chromatisms, alterations, complex chord complexes, created a “multi-layered” polyphonic texture, and used bold, extraordinary modulations. These quests sometimes gave rise to exquisite tension in style, but never acquired the character of artistically unjustified experiments.
Wagner sharply opposed the search for “musical combinations for their own sake, only for the sake of their inherent sharpness.” Addressing young composers, he implored them to “never turn harmonic and orchestral effects into an end in themselves.” Wagner was an opponent of groundless daring; he fought for the truthful expression of deeply human feelings and thoughts, and in this regard, he maintained contact with the progressive traditions of German music, becoming one of its most outstanding representatives. But throughout his long and complex life in art, he was sometimes carried away by false ideas and deviated from the right path.
Without forgiving Wagner for his errors, noting the significant contradictions of his views and creativity, rejecting the reactionary features in them, we highly value the brilliant German artist, who upheld his ideals with principle and conviction, enriching world culture with wonderful musical creations.
M. Druskin
If we want to make a list of characters, scenes, costumes, objects that abound in Wagner's operas, a fairy-tale world appears before us. Dragons, dwarfs, giants, gods and demigods, spears, helmets, swords, trumpets, rings, horns, harps, banners, storms, rainbows, swans, doves, lakes, rivers, mountains, fires, seas and ships on them, miraculous phenomena and disappearances, bowls of poison and magical drinks, disguises, flying horses, enchanted castles, fortresses, duels, inaccessible peaks, sky-high heights, underwater and earthly abysses, blooming gardens, sorceresses, young heroes, disgusting evil creatures, immaculate and eternally young beauties , priests and knights, passionate lovers, cunning sages, powerful rulers and rulers suffering from terrible spells... Needless to say, magic, witchcraft reigns everywhere, and the constant background of everything is the struggle between good and evil, sin and salvation , darkness and light. To describe all this, the music must be magnificent, dressed in luxurious clothes, full of small details, like a great realistic novel, inspired by the fantasy that feeds adventure and chivalric novels in which anything can happen. Even when Wagner narrates ordinary events commensurate with ordinary people, he always tries to get away from everyday life: to depict love, its charms, contempt for danger, unlimited personal freedom. All his adventures arise spontaneously, and the music turns out natural, flowing as if there were no obstacles in its path: it has a power that dispassionately embraces all possible life and turns it into a miracle. She easily and outwardly nonchalantly moves from pedantic imitation of pre-19th century music to the most stunning innovations, to the music of the future.
The multifaceted activities of Richard Wagner occupy an outstanding place in the history of world culture. Possessing enormous artistic talent, Wagner proved himself not only as a brilliant musician - composer and conductor, but also as a poet, playwright, critic and publicist (16 volumes of his literary works include works on a variety of issues - from politics to art).
It is difficult to find an artist around whom there would be as fierce controversy as around this composer. The heated controversy between his supporters and opponents went far beyond Wagner's contemporary era, and did not subside even after his death. At the turn of the 19th - 20th centuries, he truly became the “ruler of thoughts” of the European intelligentsia.
Wagner lived a long and stormy life, marked by sharp changes, ups and downs, persecutions and exaltations. It included police persecution and patronage of the “powers of this world.”
He was born on May 22 1813. in Leipzig in the family of a police official who died in the year his son was born. The future composer was raised by his stepfather, the talented actor Ludwig Geyer. Geyer moved his family to Dresden, whose opera house was known throughout the country - it was headed by Weber. One of the most powerful musical impressions of Wagner’s childhood was the impression of Weber’s “The Magic Shooter,” heard under the baton of the author himself.
Unlike many other great composers, Wagner was not a music-obsessed child prodigy: until he was 17 (!) years old, he did not receive real professional musical training. At the age of 17, for only 6 months he studied with the cantor of St. Thomas in Leipzig (Weinlig). At the same time, as an artist, in the broad sense of the word, Wagner was formed very early thanks to his passion for art - theater and literature (the works of Homer, Shakespeare, Goethe, Schiller).
Wagner first took the path of a professional musician in 1833, when at the age of 20 he began his conducting career. He worked in opera houses Wurzburg, Magdeburg, Konigsberg, Riga. At the same time, in the 30s, his first works appeared: piano sonatas, a symphony in C major, early operas - “Fairies” and “The Ban of Love” (the first is based on a fairy tale by the Italian playwright Gozzi, the second is based on a Shakespeare comedy).
Paris crisis
At the end of the 30s (1839), in search of success and recognition, Wagner, together with his wife, actress Minna Planer, went to Paris, however, the 3 years spent in the French capital became for him a time of “lost illusions” and the collapse of hopes. He was unable to stage any of his operas; his financial situation reached the brink of poverty. Neither the support of the French composer Meyerbeer, nor the energy of Wagner himself, who worked hard and hard, helped: his third opera, “Rienzi” and the overture “Faust,” were written in Paris.
The disappointment of the Parisian years grew in Wagner into hatred of the entire bourgeois culture, the symbol of which the capital of France henceforth became for him. At the same time, the ideological crisis experienced by Wagner was of great importance for his future creative path:
- he is aware of the acute contradictions between the aspirations of the composer-genius and the banal tastes of the public, thirsty for entertainment;
- Wagner has a new appreciation for the greatness of German culture (as evidenced, in particular, by the short story written by Wagner "Pilgrimage to Beethoven"). Far from his homeland, Wagner felt especially strongly that he was a German. He begins to be interested in German history and German-Scandinavian mythology. From now on, national stories will accompany him until the end of his career.
Operas of the 40s
Since 1842 Wagner Dresden, where the premieres of “Rienzi” and “The Flying Dutchman” took place. The production of “Rienzi” was a resounding success, which resulted in Wagner’s invitation to the post of conductor of the Dresden Opera House. “The Flying Dutchman,” where the composer “became himself” for the first time, on the contrary, was received coldly (precisely because of its novelty). But Wagner did not follow the lead of the public, and the next Dresden operas - Tannhäuser - continued the line begun by The Flying Dutchman.
The operas of the 1940s form a kind of triad, differing significantly from the three earlier operas. All of them are written based on national German plots, all adjacent to German romantic opera in its various varieties. In all three operas of the Dresden period, the composer transfers the meaning of ancient legends to the contemporary world of capitalist relations, trying to embody the problem of the artist in modern society:
- in The Flying Dutchman - an artist who is looking for ways to the hearts of people;
- in “Tannhäuser” there are two possibilities that open up before the artist - the path of external glory and the thorny path of the true creator;
- in Lohengrin - the hostility of modern society towards a creative, extraordinary personality.
The main thing that unites these three operas in Wagner’s creative development is that they gradually prepared his operatic reform. The 40s, thus, were an extremely important stage in the composer’s creative path - a period of gaining creative maturity (after the imitation of early operas). Moreover, this was the time of the most active political activity Wagner.
Wagner always responded warmly to events in public life. His sympathy for the Polish rebels and sympathy for the participants in the July Revolution of 1830 in France is known. His revolutionary spirit naturally led him to the barricades during the May uprising in Dresden in 1849. This was largely facilitated by constant communication with fellow conductor August Reckel, the future leader of the Dresden Uprising. Another leader of the uprising was the Russian revolutionary Mikhail Bakunin, whose anarchist ideas made a lasting impression on Wagner. The brutal suppression of the uprising in Dresden forced the composer to flee abroad.
Years of Swiss exile (1849-1859)
The composer spent 10 long years in Switzerland as a political emigrant. The first years of emigration (1849-51) occupy a completely exceptional place in Wagner’s creative development. At this time, not only social activities, but even music as such fade into the background for him. Living alone in Zurich, the composer is trying to comprehend everything that has just happened in revolution-ridden Europe. He thinks about the role of the revolution in the development of art and outlines new creative tasks for himself personally. One after another, his most important literary works appeared: “Art and Revolution”, “Artwork of the Future”, “Opera and Drama”, “Address to My Friends”. Criticizing the current state of the operatic genre, Wagner sets out here the basic principles of its reform. In Switzerland, the full text of “The Ring of the Nibelung” was completed in the first edition, the beginning of which dates back to the revolutionary year of 1848. The tetralogy was created with long interruptions and was completed 10 years before the composer’s death. In emigration, only the first two dramas were created - Das Rheingold and Valkyrie.
The period of “Swiss exile” ended with the drama “Tristan and Isolde” - Wagner’s most personal work. The period of work on it - the mid-50s - is perhaps the most difficult in the entire biography of the composer. Forced emigration, material and everyday difficulties, lack of genuine interest in his work - all this caused Wagner real torment. The two main events of this period were his love for Mathilde Wesendonck (the strongest love feeling that Wagner had to experience, but also the most doomed - Matilda was the wife of the composer’s friend and patron, the wealthy banker Otto Wesendonck) and his acquaintance with the book of the German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer “The World as will and idea." “Tristan and Isolde” reflected both the philosopher’s ideas, translated into the mainstream of Wagner’s own beliefs, and the feeling of tragically hopeless love.
Continuation of wanderings
Having received a political amnesty, Wagner unsuccessfully tries to find work in his homeland, his wanderings continue. To earn a living, he performs a lot as a conductor. For example, his concerts in Russia (Moscow and St. Petersburg), in which Beethoven’s symphonies and symphonic episodes of Wagner’s operas were performed, were a huge success. At the same time, productions of Wagner's works on the stages of opera houses are not realized (Tannhäuser failed scandalously when Wagner tried to stage it in Paris; the drama Tristan and Isolde, after 77 rehearsals at the Vienna Theater, was declared unperformable).
It is surprising that it was precisely during this difficult time for the composer that his most optimistic creation, “Die Mastersingers of Nuremberg,” was created. The plot, borrowed from the life of medieval artisans, led to a close connection with German folk song culture.
The last period of creativity. Bayreuth.
In 1864, Wagner's fate changed dramatically: the young Bavarian king Ludwig II invited him to Munich, the capital of Bavaria. A passionate admirer of Wagner's work, Ludwig does everything possible to implement the composer's creative plans. Wagner's dream of his own opera house comes true: it was built in Bayreuth. Not only material well-being comes to the composer. He also finds a real family hearth in union with a selflessly devoted companion - Liszt's daughter Cosima.
In the last period of his work, Wagner returned to work on The Ring of the Nibelung. He completed the drama "Siegfried" (3rd drama of the tetralogy) and wrote "Death of the Gods" (4th). The entire tetralogy was performed in its entirety at the grand opening of the Bayreuth theater in 1874.
The logical conclusion of the composer’s career was “Parsifal,” which reflected the complex picture of the worldview of the late Wagner. “Parsifal” summed up the artist’s long thoughts about the fate of humanity.
Six months after the premiere, on February 13, 1883, while on vacation in Venice Wagner died suddenly on the threshold of his 70th birthday.
The 4th opera - “The Flying Dutchman”, close in time to “Rienzi”, in its style is adjacent to the next, Dresden period.
In his will, the composer prohibited the staging of Parsifal for 30 years after his death, anywhere except Bayreuth.
Richard Wagner (full name Wilhelm Richard Wagner, German: Wilhelm Richard Wagner). Born May 22, 1813 in Leipzig - died February 13, 1883 in Venice. German composer and art theorist. A major reformer of opera, Wagner had a significant influence on European musical culture, especially German.
Wagner's mysticism and ideologically charged anti-Semitism influenced German nationalism at the beginning of the 20th century, and later National Socialism, which surrounded his work with a cult, which in some countries (especially Israel) caused an “anti-Wagner” reaction after World War II.
Wagner was born into the family of an official, Karl Friedrich Wagner (1770-1813). Under the influence of his stepfather, actor Ludwig Geyer, Wagner, being educated at the Leipzig school of St. Thomas, in 1828 began studying music with the cantor of the Church of St. Thomas, Theodor Weinlig, and in 1831 began his musical studies at the University of Leipzig. In 1833-1842 he led a hectic life, often in great need in Würzburg, where he worked as a theater choirmaster, Magdeburg, then in Königsberg and Riga, where he was a conductor of musical theaters, then in Norway, London and Paris, where he wrote the Faust overture "and the opera "The Flying Dutchman". In 1842, the triumphant premiere of the opera “Rienzi, Last of the Tribunes” in Dresden laid the foundation for his fame. A year later he became court bandmaster at the royal Saxon court. In 1843, his half-sister Cicilia had a son, Richard, the future philosopher Richard Avenarius. Wagner became his godfather. In 1849, Wagner took part in the Dresden May Uprising (where he met) and after the defeat fled to Zurich, where he wrote the libretto of the tetralogy “The Ring of the Nibelung”, the music of its first two parts (“Das Rheingold” and “Die Walküre”) and the opera "Tristan and Isolde". In 1858 - Wagner visited Venice, Lucerne, Vienna, Paris and Berlin for a short time.
To a much greater extent than all European composers of the 19th century, Wagner saw his art as a synthesis and as a way of expressing a certain philosophical concept. Its essence is expressed in the form of an aphorism in the following passage from Wagner’s article “The Work of Art of the Future”: “Just as a person will not be freed until he joyfully accepts the bonds connecting him with Nature, so art will not become free until the reasons to be ashamed of connection with life.”
From this concept stem two fundamental ideas: art should be created by a community of people and belong to this community; The highest form of art is musical drama, understood as the organic unity of word and sound. The first idea was embodied in Bayreuth, where the opera house for the first time began to be treated as a temple of art, and not as an entertainment establishment; the embodiment of the second idea is the new operatic form “musical drama” created by Wagner. It was its creation that became the goal of Wagner’s creative life. Some of its elements were embodied in the composer’s early operas of the 1840s - “The Flying Dutchman”, “Tannhäuser” and “Lohengrin”. The theory of musical drama was most fully embodied in Wagner’s Swiss articles (“Opera and Drama”, “Art and Revolution”, “Music and Drama”, “Artwork of the Future”), and in practice - in his later operas: “Tristan and Isolde” ", the tetralogy "The Ring of the Nibelung" and the mystery "Parsifal".
According to Wagner, musical drama is a work in which the romantic idea of a synthesis of arts (music and drama) is realized, an expression of programming in opera. To implement this plan, Wagner abandoned the traditions of the operatic forms that existed at that time - primarily Italian and French. He criticized the first for its excesses, the second for its pomp. He fiercely criticized the works of the leading representatives of classical opera (Rossini, Meyerbeer, Verdi, Aubert), calling their music “candied boredom.”
Trying to bring opera closer to life, he came up with the idea of end-to-end dramatic development - from beginning to end, not only of one act, but of the entire work and even a cycle of works (all four operas of the Ring of the Nibelung cycle). In the classical opera of Verdi and Rossini, individual numbers (arias, duets, ensembles with choirs) divide a single musical movement into fragments. Wagner completely abandoned them in favor of large through vocal-symphonic scenes flowing into one another, and replaced arias and duets with dramatic monologues and dialogues. Wagner replaced overtures with preludes - short musical introductions to each act, inextricably linked with the action at a semantic level. Moreover, starting from the opera Lohengrin, these preludes were performed not before the curtain opened, but already with the stage open.
External action in Wagner's later operas (especially in Tristan and Isolde) is reduced to a minimum; it is transferred to the psychological side, to the area of the characters' feelings. Wagner believed that the word is not capable of expressing the full depth and meaning of internal experiences, therefore, it is the orchestra, and not the vocal part, that plays the leading role in the musical drama. The latter is entirely subordinated to orchestration and is considered by Wagner as one of the instruments of the symphony orchestra. At the same time, the vocal part in musical drama represents the equivalent of theatrical dramatic speech. There is almost no songfulness or ariosity in it. Due to the specificity of vocals in Wagner’s operatic music (exceptional length, mandatory requirement of dramatic skill, merciless exploitation of the extreme registers of voice tessitura), new stereotypes of singing voices were established in solo performing practice - Wagnerian tenor, Wagnerian soprano, etc.
Wagner attached exceptional importance to orchestration and, more broadly, to symphonism. Wagner's orchestra is compared to an ancient choir, which commented on what was happening and conveyed the “hidden” meaning. Reforming the orchestra, the composer created a tuba quartet, introduced a bass tuba, a contrabass trombone, expanded the string group, and used six harps. In the entire history of opera before Wagner, not a single composer used an orchestra of such a scale (for example, “The Ring of the Nibelung” is performed by a four-piece orchestra with eight horns).
Richard Wagner - Ride of the Valkyries
Richard Wagner - The Entry of the Gods into Valhalla
Wagner's innovation in the field of harmony is also generally recognized. He greatly expanded the tonality he inherited from the Viennese classics and early romantics by intensifying chromaticism and modal alterations. By weakening (straightforward among the classics) the unambiguous connections between the center (tonic) and the periphery, deliberately avoiding the direct resolution of dissonance into consonance, he imparted tension, dynamism and continuity to the modulation development. The hallmark of Wagnerian harmony is considered to be the “Tristan chord” (from the prelude to the opera “Tristan and Isolde”) and the leitmotif of fate from “The Ring of the Nibelungs”.
Wagner introduced a developed system of leitmotifs. Each such leitmotif (short musical characteristic) is a designation of something: a specific character or living creature (for example, the Rhine leitmotif in “Das Rheingold”), objects that often act as symbolic characters (ring, sword and gold in “The Ring” , a love drink in "Tristan and Isolde", places of action (leitmotifs of the Grail in "Lohengrin" and Valhalla in "Das Rheingold") and even abstract ideas (numerous leitmotifs of fate and fate in the cycle "The Ring of the Nibelung", longing, a loving gaze in "Tristan and Isolde") Wagner’s system of leitmotifs received the most complete development in “The Ring” - accumulating from opera to opera, intertwining with each other, each time receiving new development options, all the leitmotifs of this cycle as a result unite and interact in the complex musical texture of the final opera “Twilight of the Gods”.
Understanding music as the personification of continuous movement and the development of feelings led Wagner to the idea of merging these leitmotifs into a single stream of symphonic development, into an “endless melody” (unendliche Melodie). The lack of tonic support (throughout the entire opera “Tristan and Isolde”), the incompleteness of each theme (in the entire cycle “Ring of the Nibelung”, with the exception of the climactic funeral march in the opera “Twilight of the Gods”) contribute to a continuous increase in emotions that does not receive resolution, which allows keep the listener in constant suspense (as in the preludes to the operas “Tristan and Isolde” and “Lohengrin”).
A. F. Losev defines the philosophical and aesthetic basis of Wagner’s work as “mystical symbolism.” The key to understanding Wagner’s ontological concept is the tetralogy “The Ring of the Nibelung” and the opera “Tristan and Isolde”. Firstly, Wagner’s dream of musical universalism was fully realized in The Ring.
“In The Ring, this theory was embodied through the use of leitmotifs, when every idea and every poetic image is immediately specifically organized with the help of a musical motif,” writes Losev. In addition, “The Ring” fully reflected his passion for Schopenhauer’s ideas. However, we must remember that we became acquainted with them when the text of the tetralogy was ready and work on the music began. Like Schopenhauer, Wagner senses the dysfunction and even meaninglessness of the basis of the universe. The only meaning of existence is thought to be to renounce this universal will and, plunging into the abyss of pure intellect and inaction, to find true aesthetic pleasure in music. However, Wagner, unlike Schopenhauer, believes that a world is possible and even predetermined in which people will no longer live in the name of the constant pursuit of gold, which in Wagner’s mythology symbolizes the world’s will. Nothing is known for sure about this world, but there is no doubt about its coming after a global catastrophe. The theme of global catastrophe is very important for the ontology of “The Ring” and, apparently, is a new rethinking of the revolution, which is no longer understood as a change in the social system, but as a cosmological action that changes the very essence of the universe.
As for “Tristan and Isolde,” the ideas contained in it were significantly influenced by a short-lived passion for Buddhism and at the same time a dramatic love story for Mathilde Wesendonck. Here the fusion of divided human nature that Wagner had been looking for for so long takes place. This connection occurs with the departure of Tristan and Isolde into oblivion. Thought of as a completely Buddhist fusion with the eternal and imperishable world, it resolves, in Losev’s opinion, the contradiction between subject and object on which European culture is based. The most important is the theme of love and death, which for Wagner are inextricably linked. Love is inherent in man, completely subjugating him, just as death is the inevitable end of his life. It is in this sense that Wagner's love potion should be understood. “Freedom, bliss, pleasure, death and fatalistic predestination - this is what the love potion is, so brilliantly depicted by Wagner,” writes Losev.
Wagner's operatic reform had a significant impact on European and Russian music, marking the highest stage of musical romanticism and at the same time laying the foundations for future modernist movements. Direct or indirect assimilation of Wagnerian operatic aesthetics (especially the innovative “cross-cutting” musical dramaturgy) marked a significant part of subsequent operatic works. The use of the leitmotif system in operas after Wagner became trivial and universal. No less significant was the influence of Wagner’s innovative musical language, especially his harmony, in which the composer revised the “old” (previously considered unshakable) canons of tonality.
Among Russian musicians, Wagner’s friend A. N. Serov was an expert and promoter of Wagner. N. A. Rimsky-Korsakov, who publicly criticized Wagner, nevertheless experienced (especially in his late work) the influence of Wagner in harmony, orchestral writing, and musical dramaturgy. Valuable articles about Wagner were left by the prominent Russian music critic G. A. Laroche. In general, the “Wagnerian” is more directly felt in the works of “pro-Western” composers of Russia in the 19th century (for example, A. G. Rubinstein) than in the works of representatives of the national school. Wagner's influence (musical and aesthetic) is noted in Russia and in the first decades of the 20th century, in the works of A. N. Scriabin.
In the West, the center of the Wagner cult became the so-called Weimar school (self-named New German School), which developed around F. Liszt in Weimar. Its representatives (P. Cornelius, G. von Bülow, I. Raff, etc.) supported Wagner, first of all, in his desire to expand the scope of musical expressiveness (harmony, orchestral writing, operatic dramaturgy). Western composers influenced by Wagner include Anton Bruckner, Hugo Wolf, Claude Debussy, Gustav Mahler, Richard Strauss, Béla Bartok, Karol Szymanowski, Arnold Schoenberg (in his early work) and many others.
The reaction to the cult of Wagner was the “anti-Wagner” tendency, which opposed itself to him, the largest representatives of which were the composer Johannes Brahms and the musical esthetician E. Hanslick, who defended the immanence and self-sufficiency of music, its disconnection from external, extra-musical “stimuli” (see Absolute music). In Russia, anti-Wagner sentiments are characteristic of the national wing of composers, primarily M. P. Mussorgsky and A. P. Borodin.
The attitude towards Wagner among non-musicians (who assessed not so much Wagner’s music as his controversial statements and his “aestheticizing” publications) is ambiguous. Thus, in the article “The Case of Wagner” he wrote: “Was Wagner even a musician? In any case, he was more than something else... His place is in some other area, and not in the history of music: he should not be confused with its great true representatives. Wagner and Beethoven are blasphemy...” According to Thomas Mann, Wagner “saw in art a sacred mystery, a panacea against all the ills of society...”.
Wagner's musical creations in the 20th-21st centuries continue to live on the most prestigious opera stages, not only in Germany, but throughout the world (with the exception of Israel).
Wagner wrote The Ring of the Nibelung with little hope that a theater would be found capable of staging the entire epic and conveying its ideas to the listener. However, contemporaries were able to appreciate its spiritual necessity, and the epic found its way to the viewer. The role of the “Ring” in the formation of the German national spirit cannot be overestimated. In the mid-19th century, when The Ring of the Nibelung was written, the nation remained divided; The Germans remembered the humiliations of Napoleonic campaigns and the Vienna treaties; Recently a revolution thundered, shaking the thrones of the appanage kings - when Wagner left the world, Germany was already united, became an empire, the bearer and focus of all German culture. “The Ring of the Nibelung” and Wagner’s work as a whole, although not only it, was for the German people and for the German idea that mobilizing impulse that forced politicians, intellectuals, military men and the whole society to unite.
The Electronic Jewish Encyclopedia noted that Judeophobia was an integral part of Wagner's worldview, and Wagner himself was characterized as one of the forerunners of anti-Semitism in the 20th century.
Wagner's anti-Semitic speeches caused protests during his lifetime; Thus, back in 1850, the publication of his article “Jewishness in Music” by Wagner under the pseudonym “Freethinker” in the journal “Neue Zeitschrift für Musik” caused protests from professors at the Leipzig Conservatory; they demanded the removal of the then editor of the magazine, Mr. F. Brendel, from the leadership of the magazine. In 2012, Wagner’s article “Jewishness in Music” (based on the decision of the Velsky District Court of the Arkhangelsk Region dated March 28, 2012) was included in the Federal List of Extremist Materials (No. 1204) and, accordingly, its printing or distribution in the Russian Federation is prosecuted by law.
Wagner was categorically against having the Jew Hermann Levi conduct the premiere of Parsifal, and since it was the king's choice (Levi was considered one of the best conductors of his time and, along with Hans von Bülow, the best Wagnerian conductor), Wagner demanded until the last moment for Levi to be baptized. Levi refused.
In 1864, having achieved the favor of the Bavarian king Ludwig II, who paid his debts and continued to support him, he moved to Munich, where he wrote the comic opera Die Meistersinger of Nuremberg and the last two parts of the Ring of the Nibelungs: Siegfried and Twilight of the Gods. In 1872, the foundation stone for the Festival House was laid in Bayreuth, which opened in 1876. Where the premiere of the tetralogy The Ring of the Nibelung took place on August 13-17, 1876. In 1882, the mystery opera Parsifal was staged in Bayreuth. That same year, Wagner went to Venice for health reasons, where he died in 1883 of a heart attack. Wagner is buried in Bayreuth.
RICHARD WAGNER
ASTROLOGICAL SIGN: GEMINI
NATIONALITY: GERMAN
MUSICAL STYLE: ROMANTIC
IMPORTANT WORK: “ROAD OF THE VALKYRIES” FROM THE OPERA “VALKYRIE” (FIRST PRODUCED - 1870)
WHERE COULD YOU HEAR THIS MUSIC: FOR EXAMPLE, IN THE MOVIE - APOCALYPSE NOW 1979) WHEN THE HELICOPTERS DECEND SHARPLY TO ATTACK A PEACEFUL VIETNAMES VILLAGE
WISE WORDS: "THIS CYCLE (THE RING OF THE NIBELUNG) WILL BE... THE GREATEST WORK EVER KNOWN TO NOW."
When Wagner composed the opera cycle “The Ring of the Nibelung”, his imagination ran wild. He envisioned a special, ritual performance of his operas with the goal of spiritual enlightenment of all Germans. When the last note is played, the specially built wooden theater and all four opera scores will have to be burned to the ground. Once the message contained in the music is understood, the world will no longer need these scores.
No one except himself took the composer's claims seriously. Another thing is surprising: how could Wagner be taken seriously in principle? This guy fervently believed that Jews all over the world were dreaming of how to destroy him, and that opera had magical powers that could save humanity. Nevertheless, no matter how absurd his ideas were, Wagner always found those who nodded sympathetically to his speeches, and then handed the composer thick wads of bills.
Did Wagner's admirers really sympathize with his views? Or, listening to his music and marveling at the scale and originality of his talent, they began to think that the person who wrote all this could not be a completely inveterate type?
WAGNER'S YOUTH
There are many ambiguities in the origins of Richard Wagner. His mother, Johanna Rosina, changed her last name as a girl in order to hide her connection with a certain German prince. The composer's father could have been her first husband, Carl Friedrich Wagner, who died when Richard was only a few months old, or her second husband, Ludwig Geyer, whom Johanna married after more than a brief widowhood.
Geyer, an actor by profession, involved the whole family in his theatrical endeavors - as a result, Richard grew up behind the scenes. He was overcome by ambitious desires; inspired by Hamlet, he decided to debut with a tragedy in verse that would instantly make him famous. For two years he secretly composed his “masterpiece”; finally, having written more than four thousand lines, Richard presented the play to his family, confident that they would be stunned by his unique talent. But the sisters only made fun of the stilted melodrama composed by their brother. Richard felt insulted and humiliated, but did not back down. Determined to show everyone what he was worth, Wagner focused on music. He learned to play the piano as a child, and now began to study the theory of composition and orchestration. His ultimate goal was to create an opera. Wagner considered opera the highest form of art. Combining drama, poetry, music and theatrical performance, opera offered audiences a comprehensive intellectual and emotional experience - one that the composer believed had the power to lift people to a higher level of existence. Over time, Wagner became the leading exponent of the new German school of music and the most ardent proponent of the creation of the Gesamtkunstwerk, or “total work of art.”
RUN, WAGNER, RUN
In 1834, relatives worked hard and found Wagner a position as conductor of a musical theater in Magdeburg. There he met Christiana Wigelmina (Minna) Planer, an actress of dubious reputation. Minna saw in Wagner a chance for stability and security. She was mistaken on all counts about the composer's character, but by the time Minna realized this, they were already married. Subsequently, Wagner lost his job more than once and fell into exorbitant debt. The most humiliating episode of his career was his escape from Riga in the cargo hold of a ship, where Wagner hid with his wife and a huge dog named Robert.
Then he lived in poverty in Paris until the Dresden theater agreed to stage his opera Rienzi, the Last Tribune. This was Wagner's first success on the opera stage, loud enough for the composer to be offered the prestigious position of conductor at the royal Saxon court. For several years, Wagner diligently went to work for the Saxon princes, and in the evenings he talked with radical republicans and sometimes even with anarchists. Therefore, in 1849, when an uprising broke out in Dresden, Wagner rushed to the barricades: he distributed anti-monarchist pamphlets and guarded the tower, lined from the inside with mattresses in which bullets got stuck. The uprising was defeated, and Wagner faced trial, prison, and possibly execution. He fled to Weimar, where Franz Liszt ensured (financially too) Wagner's departure from Germany along with Minna, a dog named Pele and a parrot. Minna did not have time to pack Wagner's library, and the books went to creditors.
Soon after these events, Minna decided that she had had enough of this life. Wagner probably breathed a sigh of relief, since he no longer needed to hide his connections on the side. He definitely had the gift of pleasing aristocrats, who spared no expense on him. Wagner settled in Zurich; forced downtime as a conductor pushed him into active composing. The idea for the Ring of the Nibelung series, based on German and Scandinavian myths, was born in Zurich; It was there that Wagner completed the first two operas of the cycle - Das Rheingold in 1854 and Die Walküre in 1856.
THE MAD KING LUDWIG AND THE CRAZY DAUGHTER OF LEAF
In 1860, German authorities granted Wagner a partial amnesty. He began to travel around the cities, trying to negotiate the production of his operas. In 1861, the premiere of Tannhäuser (in French translation) took place in Paris, which ended in complete failure, and the Vienna premiere of Tristan and Isolde, after seventy-seven rehearsals, was eventually canceled, recognizing the overly complex music and scenery as “not fundamentally staged.” The composer greeted 1864 as a beggar.
Then, as if a good fairy waved her magic wand over his head, Wagner’s fate changed dramatically. In this case, the role of the good fairy was unexpectedly played by eighteen-year-old Ludwig II of Bavaria, a handsome and eccentric king who, according to rumors, had a weakness for young grooms. Ludwig truly adored Wagner's music. Having ascended the throne, the first thing he did was invite the composer to Munich, pay his debts and assign him a generous salary. In a word, a miracle happened.
Wagner presented the king with only one condition: could it be possible to find a job at court for his good friend Hans von Bülow? Von Bülow was a talented composer and former protégé of Franz Liszt, but it was not these circumstances that aroused Wagner’s ardent desire to help his friend’s career. He was much more excited by von Bülow's wife and Franz Liszt's daughter Cosima. Ludwig graciously respected the composer's request, and the von Bülows settled on the same street as Wagner. Cosima soon became pregnant and in 1865 gave birth to a daughter, Isolde. There were no questions among those around about which of the two composers created this Isolde.
The Munich people were shocked. They were also dismayed by the amount Ludwig spent on lavish productions of Wagner's operas and by the composer's influence over the Bavarian government. Eventually Ludwig was forced to ask his "house" composer to leave the city.
Wagner returned to Switzerland, but not alone, but with Cosima. In 1867, their second daughter, Eva, was born, and in 1869, their son Siegfried. Here even the resigned von Bülow's patience ran out, and in 1870 he divorced Cosima. Since Minna died back in 1866, nothing prevented the wedding of Wagner and Cosima. Until the end of her days, Cosima tirelessly promoted the work of her second husband.
For whom the ring tolls
For Wagner, a new, quiet Swiss period began, only this time with Cosima blowing away the dust from him, and Ludwig financing him - in such favorable conditions, Wagner soon completed The Ring of the Nibelung with the operas Siegfried (1871) and Twilight of the Gods "(1874). These operas were conceived as the very Gesamtkunstwerk that Wagner constantly talked about - a cumulative work of art whose ultimate task was to serve the rebirth of the German nation.
But an ordinary opera house was not suitable for The Ring of the Nibelung, and Wagner decided to build a special theater for his operas, where the entire cycle could be performed annually entirely under his personal direction. Wagner and Cosima's choice fell on Bayreuth, a city in northern Bavaria, where they moved in 1872. Wagner not only delved into everything related to the new theater, from the design of the concert hall to the costumes of the characters, but equally important is that the last word invariably remained with him. With particular zeal, he loved to show singers how they should perform their roles, flitting around the stage like an aging, balding Rhinemaiden.
The first performance took place in August 1876. Among the audience were Prince Friedrich Wilhelm Victor Albert of Prussia (the future Kaiser Wilhelm) and Emperor Pedro II of Brazil. The spectacle was not ideal. The mechanical dragon, instead of horror, caused giggling in the hall, and the ring, which gave the name to the cycle, constantly disappeared somewhere. But most of all, the Wagners were upset when they calculated the cash register and discovered that the net loss from their enterprise amounted to 148,000 marks. Only financial investments from the reliable Ludwig saved the Bayreuth Theater from closure.
Meanwhile, Wagner's health deteriorated, and chest pains became more frequent. The composer and his family spent the winters in Italy, escaping the German frosts. The latest conflict between the spouses is associated with Italy. The bone of contention was the Englishwoman Carrie Pringle, a talented soprano singer. It is unknown how far the relationship between the composer and the singer went, but Cosima, who tirelessly stopped her husband’s hobbies with other women, was always on the alert. When the Wagners arrived in Venice in the winter of 1882, Pringle asked permission to visit them. Her letter provoked a family storm, which ended with Cosima, who rarely sat down at the piano, decisively heading to the instrument and playing a composition by her father, Franz Liszt. Wagner could not stand his former friend, who opposed his daughter’s marriage, and, presumably, Cosima, with the help of music, wanted to hurt her husband more painfully. It is unlikely that Cosima foresaw the consequences of her actions, but the arrow she shot literally struck her husband down. Wagner suffered a massive heart attack from which he died.
The coffin with the composer's body was transported to Bayreuth for burial. Later, a story arose about how Cosima spent the whole day near her husband’s body, not letting him out of her arms, but neither the entries in her diary nor the memories of eyewitnesses confirm this story. However, Cosima really did not let go of Wagner’s legacy. She spent all her energy to the last drop on popularizing the work of Wagner and the Bayreuth Theater. Today, Wagner fans wait ten years for tickets to the festival in Bayreuth - a higher honor, perhaps, cannot be imagined for this brilliant and obnoxious man.
MEET THE WAGNERS
The Bayreuth Festival is famous not only for the tragedies that played out on stage, but also for the passions, often with a melodramatic overtone, that raged behind the scenes and around. Showing an iron grip, Cosima managed the festival until 1907, when she finally considered her son Siegfried old enough to hand over the business to him. The allegedly bisexual Siegfried, deciding to stop rumors about his gay orientation, married the Englishwoman Winifred Klindworth in 1915. Winifred quickly confirmed his worth as a man by giving birth to four children in four years (Wieland, Friedelind, Wolfgang and Verena). Siegfried died in 1930 from a heart attack, and shortly before his death, Winifred met a man who aroused her unconditional delight - the rising star of German politics, Adolf Hitler.
RICHARD WAGNER LOVED CUSTOM-MAILED SILK TROUSERS, LACE LINGERIE AND VELVET ROBE - SO SO MUCH THAT HIS HOME HAD A SPECIAL ROOM PACKED WITH THESE FLIRTATIVE THINGS.
Hitler adored Wagner and often visited Bayreuth; he liked to walk in the garden, playing with Winifred's children. The Fuhrer revered the festival so much that during the war years he allocated state funding to Bayreuth and filled the hall, sending factory workers and soldiers who came home on leave to the performances. The only one of the Wagners who had the common sense to figure out what really lay behind Hitler’s heroic speeches was Friedelind: at the beginning of the war, she fled from Germany to England, where she wrote a number of revealing newspaper articles about the man whom she called “Uncle Wolfie” in her childhood "
The war did take a toll on Bayreuth, and it was not so much the Allied bombing that was to blame as the family's close connection to the Nazi Party. Winifred received a suspended sentence for her friendship with Hitler; however, she claimed (without blinking an eye) that she knew nothing about the policies pursued by the Fuhrer.
Winifred and Wolfgang decided not to interrupt the tradition of festivals. In 1966, Winifred died and Wolfgang continued the family business. In 2008, the Bavarian Minister of Culture handed over the reins of the festival to Wolfgang's daughters, Eva Wagner-Pasquier and Katharina Wagner. There is no doubt that in the twenty-first century, as long as Bayreuth remains in the hands of the Wagners, the composer’s work is not in danger of oblivion.
WAGNER'S "JEWISH QUESTION"
Wagner's anti-Semitism is widely known; It is not entirely clear how, in fact, the composer became an anti-Semite. Some argue that Wagner's views are in keeping with the spirit of the times. It is true that the treatment of Jews in nineteenth-century Europe would shock many today. However, over time, Wagner began to lean towards extreme forms of anti-Semitism.
It is worth noting that Wagner’s hostility towards Jews did not manifest itself in any obvious way until he considered two Jewish composers, Giacomo Meyerbeer and Felix Mendelssohn, his personal enemies. (Mendelssohn's Lutheranism was deliberately ignored by Wagner.) In the cool reception given to his operas by these composers, Wagner saw signs of an alien nature; It’s not far from here to seeing in Meyerbeer and Mendelssohn representatives of an entire enemy camp.
Over time, Wagner created his own intricate and frankly absurd mythology, the cornerstone of which was anti-Semitism. Wagner ruled that the master race, which originated in the East, lost its former power when, having moved to the West, it began to contact Jews and eat meat. (Just don’t think that Wagner himself was a vegetarian; consistency in his beliefs was never characteristic of him.) And now the descendants of the master race, the Aryans, must regain their superhuman status, depriving the Jews of all influence.
If these ideas sound familiar to you, don't be surprised. Hitler, before starting to write Mein Kampf, studied all of Wagner's articles and essays.
POOR RICHARD
Who hasn't criticized Wagner! Ill-wishers always liked to take a ride at his expense. Here is a small selection of critical, if not mocking, statements:
"I've heard that Wagner's music is better than it sounds."
Mark Twain, American writer
“The opera Lohengrin cannot be judged by one performance, but I definitely won’t go see it a second time.”
Gioachino Rossini, Italian composer
“I love Wagner, because for me there is no better music than the sounds that a cat makes when, suspended by its tail, it scratches its claws on the window glass.”
Charles Baudelaire, French poet
“Parsifal is one of those operas that, starting at 6 pm, lasts no less than three hours, although, checking your wristwatch, you discover that it shows 6:20.”
David Randolph, American conductor
“I can’t listen to Wagner for a long time. I have an irresistible itch to conquer Poland.”
Woody Allen, American comedian and director
AND SECRETLY - ALL SO FEMININE...
Richard Wagner always strived to appear as a real man, a brave fighter on the barricades and a menace for women; but he also loved silks and satins, especially pink silks and satins. In fact, Richard Wagner often wore women's underwear.
It is not known exactly when he developed this habit, but already in Zurich, Wagner discovered a passion for custom-made silk trousers, lace underwear and velvet robes. Of course, he had to carefully hide this little oddity. Either he told the dressmaker that the linen was being sewn for Cosima, or the order was sent to the barber. Since it is not appropriate for a man to wander around the house in petticoats, Wagner needed a secret refuge where he could enjoy his acquisitions, and over time, a special room appeared in Wagner’s house, chock-full of delicate silks with roses, ruffles and other airy fringes.
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