OVERTURE TO “RIENZI, THE LAST OF THE TRIBUNES”
The overture to Rienzi is at the best mere circus music. It is a good thing to hear it once in a while, for it shows that Wagner, on occasion, could be more vulgar than Meyerbeer, whom he so cordially disliked.
Wagner left Königsberg in the early summer of 1837 to visit Dresden, and there he read Bärmann’s translation into German of Bulwer’s Rienzi. And thus was revived his long-cherished idea of making the last of the Tribunes the hero of a grand opera. “My impatience with a degrading plight now amounted to a passionate craving to begin something grand and elevating, no matter if it involved the temporary abandonment of any practical goal. This mood was fed and strengthened by a reading of Bulwer’s Rienzi. From the misery of modern private life, whence I could nohow glean the scantiest material for artistic treatment, I was wafted by the image of a great historico-political event in the enjoyment whereof I needs must find a distraction lifting me above cares and conditions that to me appeared nothing less than absolutely fatal to art.” The overture to Rienzi was completed October 23, 1840. The opera was produced at the Royal Saxon Court Theater, Dresden, October 20, 1842.
The overture is scored for piccolo, two flutes, two oboes, two clarinets, two bassoons, serpent (third bassoon), two valve horns, two plain horns, two valve trumpets, two plain trumpets, three trombones, one ophicleide, kettledrums, two snare drums, bass drum, triangle, cymbals, and strings. The serpent mentioned in the score is replaced by the double bassoon, and the ophicleide by the bass tuba.
All the themes of the overture are taken from the opera itself. The overture begins with a slow introduction, molto sostenuto e maestoso, D major, 4-4. It opens with “a long-sustained, swelled and diminished A on the trumpet,” in the opera, the agreed signal for the uprising of the people to throw off the tyrannical yoke of the nobles. The majestic cantilena of the violins and the violoncellos is the theme of Rienzi’s prayer in the fifth act. The last prolonged A leads to the main body of the overture. This begins allegro energico, D major, 2-2, in the full orchestra on the first theme, that of the chorus, “Gegrüsst sei hoher Tag!” at the beginning of the first finale of the opera. The first subsidiary theme enters in the brass, and it is the theme of the battle hymn (“Santo spirito cavaliere”) of the revolutionary faction in the third act. A transitional passage in the violoncellos leads to the entrance of the second theme—Rienzi’s prayer, already heard in the introduction of the overture—which is now given, allegro, in A major, to the violins. The “Santo spirito cavaliere” theme returns in the brass, and leads to another and joyful theme, that of the stretto of the second finale, “Rienzi, dir sei Preis,” which is developed with increasing force. In the coda, molto più stretto, the “Santo spirito cavaliere” is developed in a most robust manner.
OVERTURE TO “DER FLIEGENDE HOLLÄNDER” (“THE FLYING DUTCHMAN”)
The overture to The Flying Dutchman gives the condensed and essential drama. We are relieved of the avaricious father who is delighted at the thought of handing his daughter to the mysterious stranger; nor does one have to hear the bleatings of the saphead lover. No wonder Senta preferred the Dutchman.
Wagner’s overture is a stormy seascape. The Dutchman knew no calm seas. The music that typifies him is one of Wagner’s happiest inventions. Poor Vanderdecken sings nothing so compelling, not even in his monologue. One hears enough of Senta’s ballad in the overture; one is not tempted to laugh at the operatic spinning wheels that stick when they should revolve; one does not find Wagner trying to write with Italian melodiousness.
The overture was sketched at Meudon near Paris in September, 1841, and completed and scored at Paris in November of that year. In 1852, Wagner changed the ending. In 1860 he wrote another ending for the Paris concerts.
It opens allegro con brio in D minor, 6-4, with an empty fifth, against which horns and bassoons give out the “Flying Dutchman” motive. There is a stormy development, through which this motive is kept sounding in the brass. There is a hint at the first theme of the main body of the overture, an arpeggio figure in the strings, taken from the accompaniment of one of the movements in the Dutchman’s first air in Act I. The storm section over, there is an episodic andante in F major in which wind instruments give out phrases from Senta’s ballad of the Flying Dutchman (Act II). The episode leads directly to the main body of the overture, allegro con brio in D minor, 6-4, which begins with the first theme. This theme is developed at great length with chromatic passages taken from Senta’s ballad. The “Flying Dutchman” theme comes in episodically in the brass from time to time. The subsidiary theme in F major is taken from the sailors’ chorus, “Steuermann, lass’ die Wacht!” (Act III). The second theme, the phrase from Senta’s ballad already heard in the andante episode, enters fortissimo in the full orchestra, F major, and is worked up brilliantly with fragments of the first theme. The “Flying Dutchman” motive reappears fortissimo in the trombones. The coda begins in D major, 2-2. A few rising arpeggio measures in the violins lead to the second theme, proclaimed with the full force of the orchestra. The theme is now in the shape found in the allegro peroration of Senta’s ballad. It is worked up energetically.
The overture is scored for piccolo, two flutes, two oboes, English horn, two clarinets, four horns, two bassoons, two trumpets, three trombones, bass tuba, kettledrums, harp, strings.
OVERTURE TO TANNHÄUSER
Tannhäuser und der Sängerkrieg auf Wartburg, Romantic Opera in three acts, book and music by Wagner, was produced at the Royal Opera House in Dresden, under the direction of the composer, on October 19, 1845.
The overture was written in Dresden, probably in March-April, 1845. The first performance of it as a concert piece was at a concert at Leipsic for the benefit of the Gewandhaus Orchestra Pension Fund, February 12, 1846. Mendelssohn conducted it from manuscript.
Wagner’s own programme of the overture was published in the Neue Zeitschrift of January 14, 1853. It was written at the request of orchestral players who were rehearsing the overture for performance at Zurich. The translation into English is by William Ashton Ellis.
“To begin with, the orchestra leads before us the Pilgrims’ Chant alone; it draws near, then swells into a mighty outpour, and passes finally away.—Evenfall; last echo of the chant. As night breaks, magic sights and sounds appear, a rosy mist floats up, exultant shouts assail our ears, the whirlings of a fearsomely voluptuous dance are seen. These are the Venusberg’s seductive spells, that show themselves at dead of night to those whose breast is fired by daring of the senses. Attracted by the tempting show, a shapely human form draws nigh; ’tis Tannhäuser, Love’s minstrel.... Venus, herself, appears to him.... As the Pilgrims’ Chant draws closer, yet closer, as the day drives farther back the night, that whir and soughing of the air—which had erewhile sounded like the eerie cries of souls condemned—now rises, too, to ever gladder waves; so that when the sun ascends at last in splendor, and the Pilgrims’ Chant proclaims in ecstasy to all the world, to all that lives and moves thereon, Salvation won, this wave itself swells out the tidings of sublimest joy. ’Tis the carol of the Venusberg itself, redeemed from curse of impiousness, this cry we hear amid the hymn of God. So wells and leaps each pulse of Life in chorus of Redemption; and both dissevered elements, both soul and senses, God and Nature, unite in the atoning kiss of hallowed Love.”
The overture is scored for piccolo, two flutes, two oboes, two clarinets, two bassoons, four horns, three trumpets, three trombones, bass tuba, kettledrums, cymbals, triangle, tambourine, and strings.
PRELUDE TO “LOHENGRIN”
We remember how at one of Theodore Thomas’s concerts at Central Park Garden in New York—it was in the ’seventies—when this prelude was played we heard strong hissing from many who would not have “the music of the future.” And so today there are “lovers of music” who cannot endure the music of the present and swear it cannot be the music of future, for they have ears but they do not and will not hear.
“Ephraim is joined to idols; let him alone.”
Lohengrin, an opera in three acts, was performed for the first time at the Court Theater, Weimar, August 28, 1850. Liszt conducted.
Liszt described the prelude as “a sort of magic formula which, like a mysterious initiation, prepares our souls for the sight of unaccustomed things, and of a higher signification than that of our terrestrial life.”
Wagner’s own explanation has been translated into English as follows:
“Love seemed to have vanished from a world of hatred and quarreling; as a lawgiver she was no longer to be found among the communities of men. Emancipating itself from barren care for gain and possession, the sole arbiter of all worldly intercourse, the human heart’s unquenchable love-longing again at length craved to appease a want, which, the more warmly and intensely it made itself felt under the pressure of reality, was the less easy to satisfy, on account of this very reality. It was beyond the confines of the actual world that man’s ecstatic imaginative power fixed the source as well as the outflow of this incomprehensible impulse of love, and from the desire of a comforting sensuous conception of this supersensuous idea invested it with a wonderful form, which, under the name of the ‘Holy Grail,’ though conceived as actually existing, yet unapproachably far off, was believed in, longed for, and sought for. The Holy Grail was the costly vessel out of which, at the Last Supper, our Saviour drank with His disciples, and in which His blood was received when out of love for His brethren He suffered upon a cross, and which till this day has been preserved with lively zeal as the source of undying love; albeit, at one time this cup of salvation was taken away from unworthy mankind, but at length was brought back again from the heights of heaven by a band of angels, and delivered into the keeping of fervently loving, solitary men, who, wondrously strengthened and blessed by its presence, and purified in heart, were consecrated as the earthly champions of eternal love.
“This miraculous delivery of the Holy Grail, escorted by an angelic host, and the handing of it over into the custody of highly favored men, was selected by the author of Lohengrin, a knight of the Grail, for the introduction of his drama, as the subject to be musically portrayed; just as here, for the sake of explanation, he may be allowed to bring it forward as an object for the mental receptive power of his hearers.
“The prelude is scored for three flutes, two oboes, English horn, two clarinets, bass clarinet, four horns, three trumpets, three trombones, bass tuba, kettledrums, cymbals, and strings.”
PRELUDE AND LIEBESTOD FROM “TRISTAN UND ISOLDE”
The subject of Tristan und Isolde was first mentioned by Wagner in a letter to Liszt in the latter part of 1854; the poem was written at Zürich in the summer of 1857, and finished in September of that year. The composition of the first act was completed at Zürich, December 31, 1857 (some say, but only in the sketch); the second act was completed at Venice in March, 1859; the third act at Lucerne in August, 1859.
Wagner himself frequently conducted the prelude and Love-Death, arranged by him for orchestra alone, in the concerts given by him in 1863. At those given in Carlsruhe and Löwenberg the programme characterized the prelude as Liebestod and the latter section, now known as Liebestod, as Verklärung (Transfiguration).
The prelude, langsam und schmachtend (slow and languishingly), in A minor, 6-8, is a gradual and long-continued crescendo to a most sonorous fortissimo; a shorter decrescendo leads back to pianissimo. It is free in form and of continuous development. There are two chief themes: the first phrase, sung by violoncellos, is combined in the third measure with a phrase ascending chromatically and given to the oboes.
These phrases form a theme known as the “Love Potion” motive, or the motive of “Longing”; for passionate commentators are not yet agreed about the terminology. The second theme, again sung by the violoncellos, a voluptuous theme, is entitled “Tristan’s Love Glance.”
The prelude is scored for three flutes (and piccolo), two oboes, English horn, two clarinets, bass clarinet, three bassoons, four horns, three trumpets, three trombones, bass tuba, kettledrums, harp, and the usual strings.
Wagner wrote this explanatory programme:
“A primitive old love poem, which, far from having become extinct, is constantly fashioning itself anew, and has been adopted by every European language of the Middle Ages, tells us of Tristan and Isolde. Tristan, the faithful vassal, woos for his king her for whom he dares not avow his own love, Isolde. Isolde, powerless to do otherwise than obey the wooer, follows him as bride to his lord. Jealous of this infringement of her rights, the Goddess of Love takes her revenge. As the result of a happy mistake, she allows the couple to taste of the love potion which, in accordance with the custom of the times, and by way of precaution, the mother had prepared for the husband who should marry her daughter from political motives, and which, by the burning desire which suddenly inflames them after tasting it, opens their eyes to the truth and leads to the avowal that for the future they belong only to each other. Henceforth, there is no end to the longings, the demands, the joys and woes of love. The world, power, fame, splendor, honor, knighthood, fidelity, friendship, all are dissipated like an empty dream. One thing only remains: longing, longing, insatiable longing, forever springing up anew, pining and thirsting. Death, which means passing away, perishing, never awakening, their only deliverance.... Powerless, the heart sinks back to languish in longing, in longing without attaining; for each attainment only begets new longing, until in the last stage of weariness the foreboding of the highest joy of dying, of no longer existing, of the last escape into that wonderful kingdom from which we are furthest off when we are most strenuously striving to enter therein. Shall we call it death? Or is it the hidden wonder-world from out of which an ivy and vine, entwined with each other, grew up upon Tristan’s and Isolde’s grave, as the legend tells us?”
PRELUDE TO “DIE MEISTERSINGER VON NÜRNBERG”
The idea of the opera occurred to Wagner at Marienbad in 1845. He then sketched a scenario which differed widely from the one finally adopted. It is possible that certain scenes were written while he was at work on Lohengrin; there is a legend that the quintet was finished in 1845. Some add to this quintet the songs of Sachs and Walther. Wagner wrote to a friend on March 12, 1862: “Tomorrow I hope at least to begin the composition of Die Meistersinger”—the libretto was completed at Paris in 1861. He worked at Biebrich on the Rhine in 1862 on the music. The prelude was sketched in February of that year. The instrumentation was completed in the following June.
He wrote to his friend Dr. Anton Pusinelli from Penzing near Vienna on March 14, 1864: “I have tried with the greatest care to ensure myself the proper leisure for completing the Meistersinger by next winter. Unfortunately, everything has been very difficult for me because my continual indisposition and my sad frame of mind have kept company with my other trials, so as to make it more difficult for me to have any desire for work.” He wrote again to Pusinelli in a long letter about his “poor wife” Minna, questioning whether he should return to her: “Under favorable conditions I finally can complete my Meistersinger. Very probably this work will quickly become popular, and it can bring in good returns for me. But one can’t count on this, and my life from month to month must not depend on such possibilities; for if I have no ‘good inspirations,’ then I have nothing to write down, and with continual worries I no longer have very good inspirations now.”
At Lucerne on May 10, 1866, he wrote that he had won for a little time the quiet for creating “a great and joyful work. Wish me this success and—perhaps I dare to say it—wish it to the world!” He had already completed Act I and was progressing well with Act II, which was finished in December.
In 1868 he wrote from Lucerne: “In Dresden I had in mind an attempt to procure some guarantee for the Meistersinger against abominable incompetence of the Kapellmeisters there, and with what a nice reception was I met there!” The principal Kapellmeister was Julius Rietz, who was hostile to Wagner, as he had been at Leipsic.
The prelude is scored for piccolo, two flutes, two oboes, two clarinets, two bassoons, four horns, three trumpets, three trombones, bass tuba, kettledrums, triangle, cymbals, harp, and the usual strings.
Wagner in his Autobiography tells how the idea of Die Meistersinger formed itself; how he began to elaborate it in the hope that it might free him from the thrall of the idea of Lohengrin; but he was impelled to go back to the latter opera. The melody for the fragment of Sachs’ poem on the Reformation occurred to him while going through the galleries of the Palais Royal on his way to the Taverne Anglaise. “There I found Truinet already waiting for me and asked him to give me a scrap of paper and a pencil to jot down my melody, which I quietly hummed over to him at the time.” “As from the balcony of my flat, in a sunset of great splendor, I gazed upon the magnificent spectacle of ‘Golden’ Mayence, with the majestic Rhine pouring along its outskirts in a glory of light, the prelude to my Meistersinger again suddenly made its presence closely and distinctly felt in my soul. Once before had I seen it rise before me out of a lake of sorrow, like some distant mirage. I proceeded to write down the prelude exactly as it appears today in the score, that is, containing the clear outlines of the leading themes of the whole drama.”
Wagner conducted the two overtures. The hall was nearly empty; there was a pecuniary loss. This was a sore disappointment to Wagner, who had written to Weissheimer on October 12, 1862: “Good: Tannhäuser overture, then. That’s all right for me. For what I now have in mind is to make an out-and-out sensation, so as to make money.” He had proposed to add the prelude and finale of Tristan to the Prelude to “Die Meistersinger”; but his friends in Leipsic advised the substitution of the overture to Tannhäuser. There was not the faintest applause when Wagner came on the platform; but the prelude to Die Meistersinger was received with such favor that it was immediately played a second time.
One critic wrote of the Meistersinger prelude, “The overture, a long movement in moderate march tempo, with predominating brass, without any chief thoughts and without noticeable and recurring points of rest, went along and soon awakened a feeling of monotony.” The critic of the Mitteldeutsche Volkzeitung wrote in terms of enthusiasm. The Signal’s critic was bitter in opposition. He wrote at length and finally characterized the prelude as “chaos,” a “tohu-wabohu and nothing more.”
A SIEGFRIED IDYL
Cosima Liszt, daughter of Franz Liszt and the Countess d’Agoult, was born at Bellagio, Italy, on Christmas Day, 1837. She was married to Hans von Bülow at Berlin, August 18, 1857. They were divorced in the fall of 1869.
Richard Wagner married Minna Planer on November 24, 1836, at Königsberg. They separated in August, 1861. She died at Dresden, January 25, 1866.
Wagner and Cosima were married at Lucerne, August 25, 1870. Their son, Siegfried Wagner, was born at Triebschen, near Lucerne, on June 6, 1869.
In a letter to Frau Wille, June 25, 1870, Wagner wrote of Cosima: “She has defied every disapprobation and taken upon herself every condemnation. She has borne to me a wonderfully beautiful boy, whom I can boldly call ‘Siegfried’; he is now growing, together with my work; he gives me a new long life, which at last has attained a meaning. Thus we get along without the world, from which we have wholly withdrawn.”
The Siegfried Idyl was a birthday gift to Cosima. It was composed in November, 1870, at Triebschen. Hans Richter received the manuscript score on December 4, 1870. Wagner gave a fine copy of it to Cosima. Musicians of Zürich were engaged for the performance. The first rehearsal was on December 21, 1870, in the foyer of Zürich’s old theater. The Wesendocks were present. Wagner conducted a rehearsal at the Hôtel du Lac, Lucerne, on December 24. Christmas fell on a Sunday. Early in the morning the musicians assembled at Wagner’s villa in Triebschen. In order to surprise Cosima, the desks were put on the stairs and the tuning was in the kitchen. The orchestra took its place on the stairs, Wagner, who conducted, at the top; then the violins, violas, wood-wind instruments, horns, and at the bottom the violoncello and the double bass. Wagner could not see the violoncello and the double bass; but the performance, according to Richter, was faultless. The orchestra was thus composed: two first violins, two second violins, two violas (one played by Richter, who also played the few measures for a trumpet), one violoncello, one double bass, one flute, one oboe, two clarinets, one bassoon, two horns. Richter, in order not to excite Cosima’s suspicions, practised for some days the trumpet part in the empty barracks. “These daily excursions and several trips to Zürich awakened the attention of Mme Wagner, who thought I was not so industrious as formerly.” The performance began at 7.30 A. M. The Idyl was repeated several times in the course of the day, and in the afternoon Beethoven’s Sextet was performed without the variations.
The Idyl was performed at Mannheim on December 20, 1871, in private and under Wagner’s direction. There was a performance on March 10, 1877, in the Ducal Palace at Meiningen. Wagner conducted. The score and parts were published in February, 1878. The first performance after publication was at a Bilse concert in Berlin toward the end of February, 1878. The music drama Siegfried was then so little known that a Berlin critic said the Idyl was taken from the second act. And Mr. Henry Knight, a passionate Wagnerite, wrote verses in 1889 in which he showed a similar confusion in mental operation.
This composition first bore the title Triebschener Idyll. The score calls for flute, oboe, two clarinets, bassoon, trumpet, two horns, and strings.
Siegfried was born while Wagner was at work on his music drama Siegfried. The themes in the Idyl were taken from this music drama, all save one: a folk-song, “Schlaf’, mein Kind, schlaf’ein”; but the development of the themes was new.
“THE RIDE OF THE VALKYRIES,” FROM “DIE WALKÜRE”
After an instrumental introduction to Act III of The Valkyrie, the curtain rises.
“On the summit of a rocky mountain. On the right a pine wood encloses the stage. On the left is the entrance to a cave; above this the rock rises to its highest point. At the back the view is entirely open; rocks of various heights form a parapet to the precipice. Occasionally clouds fly past the mountain peak as if driven by storm. Gerhilde, Ortlinde, Waltraute, and Schwertleite have ensconced themselves on the rocky peak above the cave; they are in full armor.
“Flashes of lightning break through the clouds, and from time to time a Valkyrie is seen on horseback with a slain warrior hanging from the saddle. We quote John F. Runciman’s description of the Valkyries’ Ride:[51]
“The drama here is of the most poignant kind; the scenic surroundings are of the sort Wagner so greatly loved—tempest amidst black pine woods with wild, flying clouds, the dying down of the storm, the saffron evening light melting into shadowy night, the calm, deep blue sky with the stars peeping out, then the bright flames shooting up; and the two elements, the dramatic and the pictorial, drew out of him some pages as splendid as any even he ever wrote. The opening, ‘The Ride of the Valkyries,’ is a piece of storm music without a parallel. There is no need here for Donner with his hammer; the All-Father himself is abroad in wrath and majesty, and his daughters laugh and rejoice in the riot. There is nothing uncanny in the music: we have that delight in the sheer force of the elements which we inherit from our earliest ancestors: the joy of nature fiercely at work which is echoed in our hearts from time immemorial. The shrilling of the wind, the hubbub, the calls of the Valkyries to one another, the galloping of the horses, form a picture which for splendor, wild energy, and wilder beauty can never be matched.
“Technically, this Ride is a miracle built up of conventional figurations of the older music. There is the continuous shake, handed on from instrument to instrument, the slashing figure of the upper strings, the kind of basso ostinato, conventionally indicating the galloping of horses, and the chief melody, a mere bugle call, altered by a change of rhythm into a thing of superb strength. The only part of the music that ever so remotely suggests extravagance is the Valkyries’ call; and it, after all, is only a jodel put to sublime uses. Out of these commonplace elements, elements that one might almost call prosaic, Wagner wrought his picture of storm, with its terror, power, joyous laughter of the storm’s daughters—storm as it must have seemed to the first poets of our race....
“It is worth looking at the plan of this Ride—which is, be it remembered, only the prelude to the gigantic drama which is to follow. After the ritornello the main theme is announced, with a long break between the first and second strains; and again a break before it is continued. Then it sounds out all its glory, terse, closely gripped section to section, until the Valkyries’ call is heard; purely pictorial passages follow; the theme is played with, even as Mozart and Beethoven played with their themes, and at the last the whole force of the orchestra is employed, and Wagner’s object is attained—he has given us a picture of storm such as was never done before, and he has done what was necessary for the subsequent drama—made us feel the tremendous might of the god of storms.”
The arrangement for concert use calls for these instruments: two piccolos, two flutes, three oboes, English horn, three clarinets, bass clarinet, three bassoons, eight horns, three trumpets, four trombones, bass tuba, kettledrums, side drum, cymbals, triangle, and the usual strings.
PRELUDE TO “PARSIFAL”
Wagner, with his theatrical sense, was right: this music is not so impressive when it is performed, no matter how well, outside of the Bayreuth theater consecrated to the music dramas. We heard Parsifal the year it was produced at Bayreuth. No performance of the prelude has since awakened the same emotions. There was the silence of deep devotion; the presence of the worshipers, fanatics in the great majority; the expectation of marvelous scenes to come as the wailing first phrase rose from the unseen orchestra. Put this prelude in the conventional opera house, or in the concert hall, and it cannot be ranked with Wagner’s greatest works.
The prelude to Parsifal was composed at Bayreuth in September, 1877. The first performance was a private one in the hall of the Villa Wahnfried at Bayreuth, on December 25, 1878, to celebrate the birthday of Cosima Wagner. The prelude was performed as a morning serenade by the Meiningen Court Orchestra, led by Wagner. The performance was repeated the evening of the same day, when guests were invited.
The score and orchestral parts were published in October, 1882. Parsifal, “a stage-consecration-festival play” in three acts, book and music by Richard Wagner, was first performed at Bayreuth for the patrons, July 26, 1882. The first public performance was on July 30, 1882. Hermann Levi conducted.
Wagner’s version of the story of Percival, or, as he prefers, Parsifal, is familiar to all. There is no need in a description of the prelude to this music drama of telling the simple tale or pondering its symbolism. The ethical idea of the drama is that enlightenment coming through conscious pity brings salvation. The clearest and the sanest exposition of the prelude is that included by Maurice Kufferath in his elaborate essay, Parsifal (Paris: Fischbacher, 1890). We give portions of this exposition in a greatly condensed form:
Without preparation the prelude opens with a broad melodic phrase, which is sung later in the great religious scene of the first act, during the mystic feast, the Lord’s Supper.
The phrase is sung, at first without accompaniment, in unison by violins, violoncello, English horn, clarinet, bassoon, sehr langsam (lento assai), A flat major, 4-4. This motive is repeated by trumpet, oboes, and half the first and second violins in unison against rising and falling arpeggios in the violas and remaining violins, repeated chords for flutes, clarinets, and English horn, and sustained harmonies in bassoons and horns. This theme is known as the motive of the “Last Supper.” The second phrase of the motive is given out and repeated as before.
Without any other transition than a series of broken chords, the trombones and the trumpets give out the second theme, the “Grail” motive, because it serves throughout the music drama to characterize the worship of the holy relic. It is a very short theme, which afterwards will enter constantly, sometimes alone, sometimes in company with other themes, often modified in rhythm, but preserving always its characteristic harmonies. As William J. Henderson says: “The second theme of the prelude is that of the Grail itself, which is here presented to us in a different musical aspect from that of the Lohengrin score. There the Grail was celebrated as a potency by which the world was aided, while here it is brought before us as the visible embodiment of a faith, the memento of a crucified Saviour.”[52] This theme is not original with Wagner. The ascending progression of sixths, which forms the conclusion of the theme, is found in the Saxon liturgy and is in use today in the “Court” Church at Dresden. Mendelssohn employed it in the Reformation symphony; therefore, zealous admirers of Mendelssohn have accused Wagner of plagiarism. The two masters, who knew Dresden well, probably were struck by the harmonic structure of this conclusion, and they used it, each in his own way. Anyone has a personal right to this simple formula. The true inventor of the “Amen” is unknown; the formula has been attributed to Silvani. Its harmonic nature would indicate that it belongs to the seventeenth century, but there are analogous progressions in Palestrina’s Masses. The “Grail” motive is repeated twice.
Then, and again without transition, but with a change of tempo to 6-4, comes the third motive, that of “Belief.” The brass first proclaims it.
The strings take up the “Grail” theme. The “Belief” motive reappears four times in succession, in different tonalities.
A roll of drums on A flat is accompanied by a tremolo of double basses, giving the contra F. The first motive, the “Lord’s Supper,” enters first (wood-wind, afterwards in the violoncellos). This time the motive is not completed. Wagner stops at the third measure and takes a new subject, which is repeated several times with increasing expression of sorrow. There is, then, a fourth theme derived from the “Lord’s Supper” motive. The first two measures, which are found in simpler form and without the appoggiatura in the “Supper” theme, will serve hereafter to characterize more particularly the “Holy Lance” that pierced the side of Christ and also caused the wound of Amfortas, the lance that drew the sacred blood which was turned into the communion wine; the lance that fell into the hands of Klingsor, the Magician.
At the moment when this fourth theme, which suggests the sufferings of Christ and Amfortas, bursts forth from the whole orchestra, the Prelude has its climax. This prelude, like unto that of Lohengrin, is developed by successive degrees until it reaches a maximum of expression, and there is a diminuendo to pianissimo.
Thus the synthesis of the whole drama has been clearly exposed. That which remains is only a peroration, a logical, necessary conclusion, brought about by the ideas expressed by the different themes. It is by the sight of suffering that Parsifal learns pity and saves Amfortas. It is the motive of the “Lord’s Supper” that signifies both devotion and sacrifice; that is to say Love, and Love is the conclusion. The last chords of the expiring lament lead back gently to the first two measures of the “Lord’s Supper” motive, which, repeated from octave to octave on a pedal (E flat), end in a series of ascending chords, a prayer, or a supplication. Is there hope? The drama gives the answer to this question full of anguish.
The prelude is scored for three flutes, three oboes, English horn, three clarinets, bass clarinet, three bassoons, double bassoon, four horns, three trumpets, three trombones, bass tuba, kettledrums, and strings.
“GOOD FRIDAY SPELL,” FROM “PARSIFAL”
When Parsifal turns slowly towards the meadow, a hymn of tender thanksgiving arises from the orchestra. The melody is played by flute and oboe, which muted strings sustain. In the development of this theme occur several figures—“Kundry’s Sigh,” the “Holy Supper,” the “Spear,” the “Grail” harmonies, the “Complaint of the Flower Girls,” which are all finally absorbed in the “Good Friday” melody. This pastoral is suddenly interrupted by the sound of distant bells, sounding mournfully from afar.
Gurnemanz and Kundry robe Parsifal. They set out for Montsalvat.
When Gurnemanz blesses Parsifal and salutes him king, horns, trumpets, and trombones play the “Parsifal” motive, which is developed imposingly and ends with the “Grail” theme, intoned by the whole orchestra fortissimo. A series of chords leads to the motives of “Baptism” and “Faith.”
CARL MARIA
VON WEBER
(Born at Eutin, Oldenburg, December 18, 1786; died at London, June 5, 1826)
Mr. William Apthorp frequently spoke of the “Weberian flourish,” of the chivalric spirit shown, not only in Weber’s overtures to Euryanthe and Oberon, but in much of his music for the piano. Weber’s operas are wholly unknown as stage works to the younger generation. Oberon is a dull opera, with some beautiful music. Euryanthe, too, is dull, dull beyond redemption, although at Dresden years ago we saw a most carefully prepared performance, for the cult of Weber in that city was then firmly established, and nowhere else was Der Freischütz so admirably performed. Yet Weber was a mighty man in his day, influencing composers of other countries than his own, praised to the skies by Berlioz and Wagner. The latter had good reason for his enthusiasm; the influence of Euryanthe is observed in his early operas. Weber was a romanticist of the E. T. A. Hoffmann order. The music for the scene of the Wolf’s Glen in Der Freischütz is in no need of fireworks and ghostly apparitions for its terrifying effects. There is charming fairy music in Oberon. Then there is the mysterious largo in the Euryanthe overture. The grand arias, the set pieces for a soprano, with the final allegro section better suited to an orchestral instrument than the human voice, are now singularly out of fashion, but what could be better as music for a particular text than that for the opening scenes of Der Freischütz? The three overtures will long preserve the composer’s name.
OVERTURE TO THE OPERA “OBERON”
Oberon; or, the Elf-King’s Oath, a romantic opera in three acts, book by James Robinson Planché, who founded it on Villeneuve’s story “Huon de Bordeaux” and Sotheby’s English translation of Wieland’s German poem, “Oberon,” was first performed at Covent Garden, London, on April 12, 1826. Weber conducted. The first performance in New York was at the Park Theatre on October 9, 1828.
Weber was asked by Charles Kemble in 1824 to write an opera for the Theatre Royal, Covent Garden. Weber chose “Oberon” for the subject. Planché was selected to furnish the libretto. In a letter to him, Weber wrote that the fashion of it was foreign to his ideas: “The intermixing of so many principal actors who do not sing—the omission of the music in the most important moments—all these things deprive our Oberon of the title of an opera, and will make him [sic] unfit for all other theaters in Europe, which is a very bad thing for me, but—passons là-dessous.”
Weber, a sick and discouraged man, buckled himself to the task of learning English, that he might know the exact meaning of the text. He therefore took one hundred and fifty-three lessons of an Englishman named Carey and studied diligently, anxiously. Planché sent the libretto to Dresden an act at a time. Weber made his first sketch on January 23, 1825. The autograph score contains this note at the end of the overture: “Finished April 9, 1826, in the morning, at a quarter of twelve, and with it the whole opera. Soli Deo Gloria!!! C. M. V. Weber.” This entry was made at London. Weber received for the opera £500. He was so feeble that he could scarcely stand without support, but he rehearsed and directed the performance seated at the piano. He died of consumption about two months after the production.
Planché gives a lively account of the genesis and production of Oberon. He describes the London public as unmusical. “A dramatic situation in music was ‘caviare to the general,’ and inevitably received with cries of ‘Cut it short!’ from the gallery, and obstinate coughing or other significant signs of impatience from the pit. Nothing but the ‘Huntsmen’s Chorus’ and the diablerie in Der Freischütz saved that fine work from immediate condemnation in England; and I remember perfectly well the exquisite melodies in it being compared by English musical critics to ‘wind through a keyhole.’ ... None of our actors could sing, and but one singer could act, Madame Vestris, who made a charming Fatima.... My great object was to land Weber safe amidst an unmusical public, and I therefore wrote a melodrama with songs, instead of an opera such as would be required at the present day.”
The first performance in Germany of Oberon was at Leipsic, December 23, 1826.
The overture begins with an introduction (adagio sostenuto ed il tutto pianissimo possibile, D major, 4-4). The horn of Oberon is answered by muted strings. The figure for flutes and clarinets is taken from the first scene of the opera (Oberon’s palace; introduction and chorus of elfs). After a pianissimo little march, there is a short dreamy passage for strings, which ends in the violas. There is a full orchestral crashing chord, and the main body of the overture begins (allegro con fuoco in D major, 4-4). The brilliant opening measures are taken from the accompaniment figure of the quartet, “Over the Dark Blue Waters,” sung by Rezia, Fatima, Huon, Scherasmin (Act II, Scene x). The horn of Oberon is heard again; it is answered by the skipping fairy figure. The second theme (A major, sung first by the clarinet, then by the first violins) is taken from the first measures of the second part of Huon’s air (Act I, No. 5). And then a theme is taken from the peroration, presto con fuoco, of Rezia’s air “Ocean! Thou mighty monster” (Act II, No. 13), and given as a conclusion to the violins. This theme ends the first part of the overture. The free fantasia begins with soft repeated chords in bassoons, horns, drums, basses. The first theme is worked out in short periods; a new theme is introduced and treated in fugato against a running contrapuntal counter theme in the strings. The second theme is treated, but not elaborately; and then the Rezia motive brings the spirited end.
OVERTURE TO THE OPERA “DER FREISCHÜTZ”
What would conductors do without these three overtures of Weber? They are to them in time of perplexity what Cavalleria Rusticana and Pagliacci are to opera managers. And yet, in spite of countless performances, the overture to Der Freischütz is not stale. The part song for the horns still charms the ear, although it is now associated with “when the sun glorious” and other sacred words for service in the meeting house. The Samiel motive is still dramatically sinister and brings back memories of the red-cloaked fiend as we have seen him on the German stage. And the clarinet theme, typical of Max, is still worthy of the famous praise of Berlioz. When there is talk of this overture there is frequently a reference to an article about it written by Douglas Jerrold. Was this article ever republished in an edition of Jerrold’s works? Has anyone now living ever read it?
Der Freischütz, a romantic opera in three acts, book by Friedrich Kind, music by Weber, was performed at Berlin, June 18, 1821. Weber wrote in his diary that the opera was received with “incredible enthusiasm; Overture and Folksong were encored; fourteen out of seventeen music pieces were stormily applauded. Everything went exceedingly well, and was sung con amore. I was called before the curtain and took Mad. [sic] Seidler and Mlle. [sic] Eunike with me as I could not get hold of the others. Verses and wreaths came flying. ‘Soli Deo Gloria.’” Some of these verses were malicious, and reflected on Spontini, much to Weber’s distress.
Weber began work on the overture on February 22, 1820. On May 13 he noted in his diary: “Overture of Die Jägersbraut finished, and with it the whole opera. God be praised, and to Him alone be the glory” (Die Jägersbraut was the original title of the opera; it was kept until into the year 1820, when Weber changed it to Der Freischütz at the advice of Count Bruhl, Intendant of the Berlin Court theaters). Weber heard the music for the first time at a rehearsal of the Dresden Orchestra, June 10, 1820. This was the first music of the opera that he heard.
We have mentioned the success of this overture at Berlin, when it was played as the prelude to the opera and under Weber’s direction; a success that dumfounded the followers of Spontini and settled the future of German opera in the capital. And so, wherever the overture was played, the effect was overwhelming—as in London, where the opera was first performed in English, July 22 (?), 1824, at the English opera house. W. T. Parke wrote: “The music of this opera is such a continued display of science, taste, and melody as to justify any praises bestowed on it. The overture embraces most of the subjects of the airs in the opera, ingeniously interwoven with each other, and is quite original. The grandeur of some passages and the finely contrasted simplicity of others produced an effect which was irresistible. It was vehemently encored.”
Much has been written about the overture, from the rhapsody of Douglas Jerrold to Wagner’s critical remarks concerning the true reading. The enthusiasm of Berlioz is well known: “The overture is crowned Queen; today no one dreams of disputing it. It is cited as the model of the kind. The theme of the slow movement and that of the allegro are sung everywhere. There is one theme that I must mention, because it is less noticed, and also because it moves me incomparably more than all the rest. It is that long, groaning melody, thrown by the clarinet over the tremolo of the orchestra, like unto a far-off lamentation scattered by the winds in the depths of the forest. It strikes home to the heart; and for me, at least, this virginal song, which seems to breathe skyward a timid reproach, while a somber harmony shudders and threatens, is one of the most novel, poetic, and beautiful contrasts that modern art has produced in music. In this instrumental inspiration one can already recognize easily a reflection of the character of Agathe, which is soon to develop in all its passionate purity. The theme is borrowed, however, from the part of Max. It is the cry of the young hunter at the moment when, from his rocky height, he sounds with his eyes the abysses of the infernal glen. Changed a little in outline, and orchestrated in this manner, the phrase is different both in aspect and accent.” Compare with this the remarks of Berlioz in the section on the clarinet in his “Treatise on Instrumentation.” The clarinet, he says, has the precious faculty of producing “distance, echo, an echo of echo, and a twilight sound.... What more admirable example could I quote of the application of some of these shadowings than the dreamy phrase of the clarinet, accompanied by a tremolo of stringed instruments in the midst of the allegro of the overture to Freischütz? Does it not depict the lonely maiden, the forester’s fair betrothed, who, raising her eyes to heaven, mingles her tender lament with the noise of the dark woods agitated by the storm? O Weber!!”
The overture begins adagio, C major, 4-4. After eight measures of introduction there is a part song for four horns. This section of the overture is not connected in any way with subsequent stage action. After the quarter the Samiel motive appears, and there is the thought of Max and his temptation. The main body of the overture is molto vivace, C minor, 2-2. The sinister music rises to a climax, which is repeated during the casting of the seventh bullet in the Wolf’s Glen. In the next episode, E flat major, themes associated with Max (clarinet) and Agathe (first violins and clarinet) appear. The climax of the first section reappears, now in major, and there is use of Agathe’s theme. There is repetition of the demoniac music that introduces the allegro, and Samiel’s motive dominates the modulation to the coda, C major, fortissimo, which is the apotheosis of Agathe.
OVERTURE TO THE OPERA “EURYANTHE”
The overture is not without a certain old-fashioned but veritable pomp; it has the spirit of ceremony which the admirers of Weber call “the chivalric spirit.” It would be perhaps an idle task for an ultra-modern to insist that the only music in this overture that appeals to the men and women of the younger generation is that of the short episode which was originally intended to accompany a pantomimic scene on the stage, a scene of old-fashioned romantic melodrama, with tomb, kneeling heroine, gliding ghost, and an eavesdropping, intriguing woman. In these few mysterious measures Weber thought far beyond his period. The ultra-modern might say that the rest of the music is decorative and that the decorations are substantial till they are cumbrous; that the melodies are like unto a cameo brooch worn by a woman who remembers nights of coquetry and dances long out of fashion; that the few measures of counterpoint show Weber as a plodding amateur. Nevertheless, the conventionally jubilant swing and the impetuous pace still make their way in a concert hall.