Richard Wagner

Classical Music / Composers Datebook:  May 22

 

 

German Composer, Critic, Teacher, 19th-century Orchestra Master 

 
Richard Wagner (May 22, 1813-Feb 13, 1883), born in Leipzig, was an influential German composer, famous for such compositions as Lohengrin, The Ring of the Nibelungs, The Twilight of the Gods, The Flying Dutchman, and The Valkyrie. Self-taught for several years, he eventually found a tutor in Theodor Weinlig.

Wagner revolutionized 19th-century opera concept as a new art form in which musical, poetic, and scenic elements were unified through a theme known as 'leitmotif' (leading motive.)  Allthough grossly arrogant, his genius has adoring fans as well as harsch critics. He founded the Festival Theatre in Bayreuth in 1872, and four years later, in 1876, his masterpiece, The Ring of the Nibelungs, which is a sequence of four operas, was first performed.
Wagner wrote the libretto and music over the course of about twenty-six years, from 1848 to 1874. The four parts that constitute the Ring cycle are, in sequence:

• Das Rheingold (The Rhinegold)
• Die Walküre (The Valkyrie)
• Siegfried
• Götterdämmerung (Twilight of the Gods)

Although individual works of the sequence have occasionally been performed separately, Wagner intended them to be performed in series. A great visionary, his insights and inventiveness in music left a legacy of ideas how music should be performed, including provision of comprehensive and stage directions. In particular, opera to him was a complete work of art, the orchestra and singing should have variety of colours and textures.

Richard Wagner's The 'Ring' Without Words (A Symphonic Synthesis by Lorin Maazel). Uploaded by EuroArtsChannel. Accessed May 22, 2020. Lorin Maazel conducts the Berliner Philharmoniker. Strongly influenced by the comments of Richard Wagner's grandson, Wieland, about the importance of the orchestra in the Ring, Lorin Maazel eventually agreed to produce a symphonic synthesis of the tetralogy, which he called The Ring Without Words, a seventy-five-minute orchestral distillation designed with the express purpose of bringing the magic of these monumental music dramas to a new audience of musically sensitive listeners. Recorded live at Philharmonie Berlin, 2000.

WATCH in YouTube.  (Video no longer allowed in websites / Tel. 22 May 2021.)

Wagner's Operas: 

• Das Liebesverbot (The Ban on Love)  1836
• Rienzi 1842
•  Der fliegende Hollánder (The Flying Dutchman) 1843
• Tannhäuser 1845 (Overture, Klaus Tennstedt, London Philharmonic)
• Lohengrin 1848 (Prelude to Lohengrin, Simon Rattle)
  
• Das Rheingold 1854
• Die Walküre (The Valkyrie) 1856
• Tristan und Isolde (Tristan and Isolde), music drama 1859
• Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg (The Mastersingers of Nuremberg) 1867
• Siegfried 1871
• Götterdämmerung (The Twilight of the Gods), completes the operatic cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen (The Ring of the Nibelungs) 1874
• Parsifal, music drama 1882

Suggested video to watch:

Anna Russell Wagner Ring Cycle Nibelungen Sketch 1953 version.wmv.  Accessed June 12, 2012.
(Note: Anna Russell, née Anna Claudia Russell-Brown was an English–Canadian singer and comedian. She gave many concerts in which she sang and played comic musical sketches on the piano.)


Resource:

Wikipedia. en.wikipedia.org. Accessed May 22, 2010.

Image Credit:

Richard Wagner. Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain. Accessed May 22, 2010.


(c) May 2010.  Updated May 22, 2021. Tel. Inspired Pen Web. All rights reserved.