The Classical Music Book

182

T

wo things changed beyond

recognition in Wagner’s

lifetime: German opera and

Germany itself. The country that he

grew up in was little more than a

group of loosely linked principalities

and kingdoms, while German opera

before Wagner was fighting a losing

battle against imports from France

and Italy—apart from a few notable

exceptions. Beethoven’s Fidelio,

Moza rt’s Don Giovanni (performed

in German in the German-speaking

lands), and the Romantic operas of

Carl Maria von Weber represented

the only resistance against the

prevailing taste for foreign operatic

imports, often poorly performed in

the various court theatres that were

dotted around Germany.

By the time of Wagner’s death in

1883, Germany was a nation-state.

German opera—or, more correctly,

Wagnerian opera—had conquered

France, Italy, and beyond. Other

composers rushed to emulate his

harmonic adventurousness and his

richly symphonic style and longed

for even a fraction of the quasi-

religious devotion that Wagner’s

vast musical dramas inspired.

The road to Revolution

More than any other composer

before him, Wagner’s own life

and art were intertwined with the

developments—political, historical,

and philosophical—of the world

around him. From an early age,

he was fascinated with how to

combine drama and music, and

increasingly, with how a new sort

of opera could help revitalize the art

form in Germany, as well as inspire

and unite the country itself. He was

unusual among opera composers

in that he always wrote his own

librettos (the words that were set to

music) and did so even in his early

operas. His first opera, Die Feen

COMPLETE ART WORK

The valkyrie Brünnhilde meets the

lovers Siegmund and Sieglinde to warn

Siegmund of his imminent death. This

scene from Wagner’s Die Walküre was

painted by Gaston Bussière (1893).

IN CONTEXT

FOCUS

Complete art work

BEFORE

1821 Weber’s Der Freischütz,

considered to be the first

German Romantic opera,

premieres in Berlin.

1824 Beethoven completes

his Ninth Symphony. In a form

that was traditionally wordless,

Beethoven’s use of words in

the symphony’s finale greatly

influenced Wagner.

1849 After being forced into

exile, Wagner begins a series

of essays setting out a plan for

reforming opera. The first step

later becomes The Ring.

1862 Wagner conducts

Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony

in Bayreuth to celebrate the

laying of the corner stone of

the Festspielhaus.

AFTER

1883 Wagner’s widow Cosima

takes over the running of the

Bayreuth Festival, exercising

iron control until her death

in 1930.

1933 Hitler comes to power

in Germany and, as an ardent

Wagnerian, involves himself

intimately with the running

of the festival.

1976 Bayreuth’s centenary

staging of The Ring, later

widely televised, presents

the work as a critique of

19th-century industrialization.

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