214 music, philosophy, and modernity
between the present and the past.^1 Indeed, they can often involve a
notional future, as Ernst Bloch suggests of Wagner’s works’ transcen-
dence, in the direction of a utopian future, of his immediate contexts
and assumptions.
In certain respects, then, it does not matter what went on in Wagner
the individual. His moral person would not be the endlessly discussed
topic it is but for his music’s revolutionary impact on the culture of
his era and since. This impact involves not only its use for Nazi propa-
ganda,^2 but also its revolutionary effects on the very idea of what music
can be and do, and its enduring value to its listeners. The question is
therefore whether Wagner’s musical work is so vitiated by the ‘internal’
elements which contribute to an anti-Semitic world-view that its posi-
tive achievements are eclipsed. Those in Israel and elsewhere who find
themselves unable to separate Wagner from the Holocaust have every
right to reject his work, but theirs cannot be the last word for everyone.
Daniel Barenboim’s gesture at the concert in Israel in 2001 , when he
played theTristanprelude as an encore, of discussing it with the audi-
ence and acknowledging that some people would wish to leave, seems
to me to enact the attitude which is appropriate in this most sensitive
of contexts.
The very difficulty of getting to a point where one can begin to inves-
tigate Wagner’s relationship to our concerns is an index of the intensity
associated with judgements about music in this phase of modernity.
Wagner’s theoretical and polemical texts are not the main focus here,
though they can be where he is at his most obnoxious. The real issue
is the impact of his music dramas.^3 This impact makes Nietzsche’s dis-
cursive engagements with Wagner into a paradigmatic case for the rela-
tionship between philosophy and music in modernity. An evaluation of
Wagner’s work in the terms of the present book cannot cover most of
the issues involved, not least because my amateur musicological com-
petence does not suffice for an appropriate investigation of the music.
It is also impossible for reasons of space to expound the basic detail of
the works’ plots, characterisation, etc.: this has anyway been done else-
where on numerous occasions (see, e.g., Newman 1991 ). Those not
1 The musicologist Hans Keller remarked that ‘We have period instruments, but we do not
have period ears.’
2 Magee ( 2002 ) points out that, apart from Hitler, most of the leading Nazis actually had
no time for Wagner.
3 On the issue of whether Wagner writes ‘music dramas’ or ‘operas’, see Thomas Gray’s
comments in Samson 2002 : 387 – 93.