THE MENTOR 1916.02.01, No. 100,
The Ring of the Nibelung

LEARN ONE THING
EVERY DAY

FEBRUARY 1 1916

SERIAL NO. 100

THE
MENTOR

Wagner’s Festival House at Bayreuth

THE RING OF THE
NIBELUNG

By HENRY T. FINCK

DEPARTMENT OF
FINE ARTS

VOLUME 3
NUMBER 24

FIFTEEN CENTS A COPY

Do you stand for Richard Wagner or do you not? That question
was enough to sever friendships fifty years ago. It created a
riot at the Paris Opera in 1861. Wagner’s Art admitted of no
compromise. It was either Gospel or Apocrypha, and it had to be
accepted as one or the other. It commanded enthusiastic admiration
or provoked strident resentment. Many came to rail and remained
to worship. Some came in curiosity and left in dismay.
For half a century Richard Wagner was the center of bitter conflict.
But the people listened to him and seemed to appreciate and understand.
In the blackest hours, the messages of Franz Liszt, Wagner’s
best friend, sustained him: “be of good cheer, the people are
with you.” So through half a century the Music Drama withstood
the assaults of criticism and ridicule—and the burden of
proof now rests with the opposition.

The secret of Wagner’s success with the people and of his
influence on dramatic art lies in his naturalness of expression.
His dramas are epic poems of primitive elemental life, and they
breathe the fresh, vigorous spirit of the morning of time. His
music commands our interest even before we fully understand. It
makes an irresistible appeal to our feelings. His art is the art that
conceals art. His music seems to us so natural. As the dramatic
situation rises in intensity, so his music seems to lift us on an ever-swelling
flood until we are moved to our depths—though we may
not know why. We are simply conscious of having assisted at
something which has swept us momentarily out of ourselves into a
world of throbbing emotion. And the proportions of the drama
before us are so well determined that it is hard to say which of all
the various scenes has touched us most. It is as though we had
walked in a great forest where the rich variety and completeness
of nature’s handiwork had been so absorbing that the memory could
not recall vividly the outlines of single objects. We get a certain
intellectual satisfaction from following the details of Wagner’s Art,
but the supreme enjoyment is in the effect of mass.

RICHARD WAGNER—Portrait by Franz von Lenbach

THE MUSIC DRAMA

Monograph Number One in The Mentor Reading Course

Music drama, as Mr. Finck says, is quite different from
Opera. In Wagner’s early years opera, for the most part,
was a weak, vapid thing dramatically, the plot foolish and
flat, the music a string of songs, duets, quartets, and choruses
connected by dull recitative. The music was showy,
and of a kind to display the skill of the singer rather than the composer.
And prima donnas at times in their vanity would embellish this most
florid music with additional vocal flourishes.

Richard Wagner composed operas before he perfected his Music
Drama, but in several of these operas—The Flying Dutchman, Tannhäuser,
and Lohengrin—he gave plain intimations of the principles which
he developed later in what he called “The Art Work of the Future.”
Instinctively he reached out toward his ultimate object in art before he
had fully formulated his ideas; and the composers whom he admired
were those who had made music a means of true, dramatic expression—Gluck,
Mozart and Weber, in opera, and Schubert in song. All of them
made music the expression of the composer’s intentions as against the vanity
of the singer. Mozart defeated the despotic methods of prima donnas
in some cases by making his arias so difficult technically that the singers
could not add any embellishments of their own. But, while insisting on
the claims of the composer, none of these great musicians thought of
allowing the drama to determine the form and style of the music. That
is an essential principle in the Music Drama. The music does not simply
accompany the drama—it is itself the very expression of the drama. The
Rhine music, 135 bars, opening Rheingold, is not simply an appropriate
accompaniment to the flow of the river. It is the river translated into
musical form—so much so that if played in a concert room apart from
the scene of the murky Rhine depths, in which the Rhine Maidens are
circling, it would have no meaning. And while a great deal of Wagner’s
music lends itself readily to concert production, and is popular as such,
the interest in it is a combined music and dramatic one.

The Music Drama is not a single art. It is a manifold art, combining
the arts of poetry, painting, sculpture, and music. Wagner contended
that the arts strayed away and fell backward after the days of the glory of
Greek Drama, because each art tried to develop and perfect itself separately
in its own way. Wagner asserted that the way to the true, full, perfected
art work was to reunite these arts in the Music Drama. This theory he set
forth in many writings, and finally expressed in his compositions. His
Music Drama, therefore, gives full expression for the poet in the text of
the play, for the painter in the scenic effects, for the sculptor in the
statuesque groups on the stage, and for the composer in the musical expression
which completes the combination.

And none of these contributors, not even the composer, dominates or
controls the others—not even accompanies them. The elements of the
Music Drama are more closely interwoven than that. The contributing
arts are amalgamated in one single complete art.

And this is what Wagner called “The Art Work of the Future.”

PREPARED BY THE EDITORIAL STAFF OF THE MENTOR ASSOCIATION
ILLUSTRATION FOR THE MENTOR, VOL. 3, No. 24, SERIAL No. 100
COPYRIGHT, 1916, BY THE MENTOR ASSOCIATION, INC.

RICHARD WAGNER’S DREAM—From the painting by Schweninger

THE FESTIVAL HOUSE AT BAYREUTH

Monograph Number Two in The Mentor Reading Course

It was in 1870 that Wagner’s dream of a theater of his own
gave promise of full realization. In 1864 King Ludwig of
Bavaria, at the age of nineteen, gave Wagner his patronage,
and backed him financially. By this means, in the years
1865-1870 Tristan, Meistersinger, Rheingold, and Walküre
were performed in Munich. The King wanted the festival house there,
but the court and the populace regarded this plan with jealous resentment.
Moreover, Wagner preferred a more remote place better suited
to fostering a new art undertaking. So the little town of Bayreuth was
chosen. Wagner obtained from the municipality a free grant of land for a
festival-theater and his own house. The architect Gottfried Semper was
commissioned to prepare definite plans. Everything was settled but the
money, and the estimated cost was 1,125,000 francs. Wagnerian societies
were formed all over Europe, and in the United States, and the
interest of financial men in Germany was secured. The foundation stone
of the Festival-Theater was laid with great ceremony by Wagner himself
on May 22, 1872, the 59th anniversary of his birth. The work of
construction proceeded rapidly, although the subscriptions were short of
the total sum required. Ludwig made up the amount lacking.

Thus, after forty years of struggle, Wagner saw his colossal project
realized in 1876, when the Festival-Theater was opened for the production
of the Ring of the Nibelung. Three representations of the Ring took
place during the summer of that year. Then for six years it was impossible
to open the theater for want of money. In 1882 Parsifal was
produced there, and since then festival performances have taken place
there about every two years. Wagner, however, died in 1883, so he saw
only two of his own great music festivals.

The theater was a model in its way—which means in Wagner’s way.
It was planned entirely with the thought of the performance and not at
all for the display of the audience. It contains 1344 seats, arranged in a
fan-shaped amphitheater. There are thirty rows of seats, and at the
very back of the hall there are nine boxes, reserved for royalty and for
Wagner’s invited guests. Above the boxes there is a large gallery containing
200 seats. The orchestra is sunk, and invisible. Musicians descend
on steps a long way under the stage into a kind of cave, which has
received the name in Bayreuth of “the mystic abyss.” The space reserved
for the stage is even larger than the hall. The curtain divides the
building almost into two equal parts. There is no foyer for the public.
The audience steps out readily from any of the rows in the auditorium
directly into the outer air, and can find refuge and refreshment in one of
the many cafe restaurants in the vicinity. On the same floor with the
royal boxes an annex was built in 1882, which affords entertainment
rooms for privileged guests.

The spirit that permeates the Festival-Theater is one of unselfish
devotion. The characteristic of everyone who takes part there is a
complete surrender of personal interests. Each one comes to Bayreuth
with a sole purpose of contributing the utmost to the festival play. Therefore,
no one, singer or members of the orchestra or chorus, instructors or
conductors, scene shifters or aides, receive any salary or reward. Their
travel expenses are paid and they are lodged in Bayreuth at the expense
of the administration—that is all. And in return they are treated not
as paid artists, but as honored guests.

PREPARED BY THE EDITORIAL STAFF OF THE MENTOR ASSOCIATION
ILLUSTRATION FOR THE MENTOR, VOL. 3, No. 24, SERIAL No. 100
COPYRIGHT, 1916, BY THE MENTOR ASSOCIATION, INC.

THE VALKYR’S RIDE—From the Painting by K. Dielitz

DAS RHEINGOLD

Monograph Number Three in The Mentor Reading Course

In the beginning Gold, the symbol of human desire, lay in the
bed of the Rhine. It was worshipped and attended by the
daughters of the Rhine. Then it was stolen from them. In the
end it was restored to them, but between the beginning and
the end it carried its curse through many tragic chapters.

This treasure was called the Rheingold, and, when wrought into a
ring it gave its owner universal power. One condition only went with
the Rheingold,—he who owned it must renounce love forever.

Three beautiful Maidens of the Rhine guarded the gold, and Alberich,
the ugly King of the Nibelungs—the dwarfs who lived underground—tried
to make love to them. They rejected him scornfully, and
so the dwarf, seeing the gold in the river and knowing its power, forswore
love forever, and seizing the treasure, bore it off to his underground home.

Just at this time Wotan and the other gods were building a marvellous
castle. They did not have the strength to build this palace by
themselves, so they had called the giants to their aid. For their pay
Wotan promised them the goddess of youth, Freia. As her loss would
bring old age and decay upon the gods, he never meant to keep his
promise—a habit of Wotan’s, by the way. He trusted to the cunning
of Loge (Ló-gee), the Fire god, to get him out of the predicament.

When appealed to, however, Loge declared that after searching all
heaven and earth, he could find no way out of the difficulty. But he also
reported that he had heard of the stealing of the Rheingold, and suggested
that perhaps the giants would take the ring of the Nibelung in place of
Freia if the gods could get it away from Alberich. The giants, between
whom and the Nibelungs a feud had existed for a long time, knew that if
Alberich kept the ring he would have dominion over them. So they
agreed that if the gods would get them the Rhine treasure they would give
up their claim to Freia.

Therefore Wotan and Loge descended to Nibelheim. There they
found Alberich gathering together a great hoard of treasure by the aid
of the magic ring. Furthermore, Mime, one of his lieutenants, had made
him a helmet by which he could change his shape or become invisible.
Loge suggested that, to prove the power of the helmet, Alberich change
himself into a toad. The dwarf did this, and the gods promptly seized
and bound him. They then forced him to give up the helmet and the
ring. Alberich had to agree, but he uttered a curse on the ring that
brought death and destruction to everyone who owned it.

When the giants came for their reward, they placed their tall spears
upright in the ground before Freia, and demanded a pile of gold high
enough to conceal her. However, when all the gold was heaped together,
and even the magic helmet added to the pile, there was still a chink
through which the eye of the goddess could be seen. To fill this the giants
demanded the ring. Wotan did not want to part with this, but the goddess
Erda appeared and warned him against the curse, so he added it to
the heap.

The curse immediately began its work. Fafner, one of the giants,
claimed the greater part of the hoard of gold for himself. When Fasolt,
the other giant, resented this, he slew him. This was but the first of the
many tragedies that followed the ring.

A beautiful rainbow bridge now appeared, spanning the valley, and
over this the gods passed, and entered their new palace of Walhall.

PREPARED BY THE EDITORIAL STAFF OF THE MENTOR ASSOCIATION
ILLUSTRATION FOR THE MENTOR, VOL. 3, No. 24, SERIAL No. 100
COPYRIGHT, 1916, BY THE MENTOR ASSOCIATION, INC.

WOTAN’S FAREWELL (Die Walküre)—From the painting by K. Dielitz

DIE WALKÜRE

Monograph Number Four in The Mentor Reading Course

Wotan and the rest of the gods were in a serious dilemma.
They must not get back the cursed ring, for its possession
would bring ruin. And yet if they left it with the giant
Fafner, Alberich might recover it and make the gods his
slaves. There was only one way out of the dilemma. The
ring must go to someone whom the gods need not fear. As long as no
enemy had the ring, the gods were safe enough in their new citadel.
This was guarded by the Valkyr Maidens, nine of them, all daughters of
Wotan and Erda. Their mission was to follow mortals in combat and
to carry the fallen heroes on their horses to Walhall to form its guard.
Having provided for present safety, Wotan looked to the future.
He went to the earth and, uniting himself with a mortal woman, under
the name of Wälse, meaning “wolf,” he founded the formidable race of
the Wälsungs—Siegmund and Sieglinde—on whom he set his hopes.

Sieglinde, grown to maturity, was carried off and married against her
will to the rough hunter, Hunding. One night to the hut where Hunding
and Sieglinde were living came Siegmund, a fugitive, wearied with conflict,
and battered by the storm. He had been fighting with Hunding,
and had entered the very home of his enemy. Sieglinde came in and
found him lying exhausted by the hearth. She gave him a refreshing
draught. Then came Hunding, to whom Siegmund told his story, thereby
revealing himself as his host’s foe. Hunding would not fight him in his
own home, but challenged him to combat the next day.

That night Siegmund and Sieglinde discovered their identity, and
decided to fly together. At the wedding feast of Hunding and Sieglinde
a mysterious stranger, who was none other than the god Wotan himself,
had thrust up to its hilt in the trunk of the tree which supported their
dwelling, a sword which he said could only be withdrawn by the bravest
of men. Siegmund proved his right to the sword by drawing it forth with
ease. Then the two Wälsungs fled out into the night.

Wotan knew of the inevitable conflict between Hunding and Siegmund,
and he summoned Brünnhilde, the Valkyr, and ordered her to give
Siegmund aid. But Fricka, the wife of Wotan, the ever jealous guardian
of the proprieties, demanded that Siegmund be killed. Against his will,
Wotan yielded and commanded Brünnhilde to see that Siegmund lost the
combat. Wotan also told Brünnhilde of the ring, and of the fatal spell.
The giant Fafner, in the form of a dragon, guarded this ring. It could
only be won by a hero unaided by the gods. Wotan thought that he
had such a hero in Siegmund, but Siegmund was not a free agent, since
Wotan had been the moving spirit in all his actions.

Brünnhilde then appeared to Siegmund and told him of his fate, but
her heart melted at the despair of the lovers, and when the fight began
she protected the hero. Wotan thereupon appeared and interposed his
spear, causing Siegmund to be killed. The sword, “Nothung,” was
shivered into many pieces. Brünnhilde fled with Sieglinde.

For her disobedience Wotan revoked the divinity of Brünnhilde. He
condemned her to wed the mortal who should rouse her from the slumber
into which he was about to cast her. The Valkyr besought him that
none but the bravest hero on earth should awaken her. Wotan granted
her wish, and promised that she should be guarded by magic fire. Wotan
then kissed Brünnhilde, and cast her into slumber. He struck his staff
on the rocks, and summoned Loge, the Fire God. In answer, flames
sprang up and surrounded the sleeping Valkyr maiden.

PREPARED BY THE EDITORIAL STAFF OF THE MENTOR ASSOCIATION
ILLUSTRATION FOR THE MENTOR, VOL. 3, No. 24, SERIAL No. 100
COPYRIGHT, 1916, BY THE MENTOR ASSOCIATION, INC.

SIEGFRIED SLAYS THE DRAGON (Siegfried)—From the Painting by K. Dielitz

SIEGFRIED

Monograph Number Five in The Mentor Reading Course

In the depths of a mighty forest stood a hut, and there dwelt
a brave, strong, handsome youth in company with a mean
little dwarf. Every day the dwarf was busy forging a sword.

The dwarf was Mime, brother of Alberich, the king of
the Nibelungs; and the youth was Siegfried, the son of Siegmund
and Sieglinde. After Brünnhilde had been cast into slumber by
Wotan, Mime took upon himself the care of Sieglinde. When she died, he
brought her son up to manhood. This was not kind heartedness on the
part of Mime, but crafty wisdom. He knew that Siegfried was destined
to be a mighty hero, and he hoped that the youth might slay Fafner, the
dragon, and recover the ring for the Nibelungs.

Sieglinde had entrusted to Mime the pieces of the sword Nothung,
and although the dwarf knew that no other weapon would serve for the
slaying of Fafner, he also realized that he was unequal to the task of
forging the pieces together again. Therefore he kept trying to make
other swords for Siegfried to use, but the youth broke them all.

One day Siegfried, angry at Mime’s continued failure to make him a
suitable sword, rushed out of the cabin in anger. Then a stranger, who
was none other than Wotan himself, in the guise of a Wanderer, appeared
to Mime, and in a contest of riddles, forced from Mime the confession of
his failure, and then revealed to him that Nothung could only be forged
anew by one to whom fear was unknown. When Siegfried returned,
Mime admitted his inability to forge the sword, and told the youth to
try it himself. As Siegfried knew no fear, he was successful. Then Mime
told Siegfried that he would lead him to the dragon Fafner.

Siegfried, led by Mime, came to the dragon’s cave, and, in a wood-scene
of great beauty, sat listening to the song of birds, and replied to
them joyously with his horn. Fafner, the dragon, was finally roused by
Siegfried’s horn, and came out of his cave breathing threats and fiery
blasts. After a mighty battle, Siegfried slew him.

Siegfried’s hand was scorched by the fiery blood of the dragon, and he
placed it to his lips to cool it. On tasting the blood, he was able to understand
the song of a bird that told him to take possession of both the ring
and the helmet, and to be on guard against Mime. Consequently, when
the dwarf attempted to give him a poisoned drink, Siegfried killed him.

Then the bird told Siegfried of Brünnhilde, who could only be wakened
from her slumber by one who knew no fear, and who could penetrate the
ring of magic fire. Siegfried said that he had never known what fear was,
and he followed the bird to where the Valkyr maiden slumbered.

In the meantime, in his perplexity, Wotan summoned Erda and
sought counsel with her. Could she tell him how to stop the rolling wheel
of destruction? But Erda’s wisdom could avail him nothing now, and
Wotan resigned himself to the downfall of the gods. Then he confronted
Siegfried on his way to Brünnhilde and barred his way with a spear to
test his courage and strength. Without hesitation, Siegfried cut the spear
in two with his sword, and made his way through the flames to the summit
of the mountain, where he found Brünnhilde sleeping on a rock under
a fir tree. Siegfried gazed at the slumbering maiden in amazement.
Then, removing Brünnhilde’s helmet, he woke her with a kiss. At first
she shrank in terror from her fate. Then, recognizing Siegfried as the
son of Siegmund and as the bravest hero in the world, whose coming she
had herself foretold, she confessed her love for him, and yielded in ecstasy
to his embrace.

PREPARED BY THE EDITORIAL STAFF OF THE MENTOR ASSOCIATION
ILLUSTRATION FOR THE MENTOR, VOL. 3, No. 24, SERIAL No. 100
COPYRIGHT, 1916, BY THE MENTOR ASSOCIATION, INC.

BRÜNNHILDE SLUMBERING, GUARDED BY MAGIC FIRE—From the Painting by Hermann Hendrich

DIE GÖTTERDÄMMERUNG

Monograph Number Six in The Mentor Reading Course

While Siegfried and Brünnhilde were happy together, Siegfried
must needs go forth to seek further adventures. He
gave Brünnhilde the ring as a pledge of fidelity, and she presented
him with her shield and her horse, Grane.

Siegfried journeyed along the Rhine to the palace of the
Gibichungs, Gunther and his sister, Gutrune. Hagen, their half brother,
the son of Alberich, lived there with them. Alberich had imposed upon
Hagen the task of regaining the ring. Therefore, on seeing Siegfried, he
began to plot. Gutrune, at his suggestion, gave the hero a magic drink,
which made him love her, and forget Brünnhilde. So, when Gunther
expressed his desire for a wife, Siegfried promised him the Valkyr Brünnhilde,
claiming as a reward, the hand of Gutrune.

In the meantime, Brünnhilde, awaiting the return of Siegfried, was
visited by another Valkyr, Waltraute, who begged her to give up the
fatal ring to the Rhine maidens, and so save the Gods from destruction.
But this Brünnhilde refused to do, counting Siegfried’s love a greater
treasure than her lost divinity.

Siegfried then appeared to her in the form of Gunther, which he had
assumed by means of the magic helmet. He forced the ring from her,
and commanded her to accept Gunther as her husband. Brünnhilde was
taken by her new husband to the palace of the Gibichungs. When she
arrived there, and saw Siegfried with Gutrune, she at once accused him of
having betrayed both herself and Gunther. The crafty Hagen then promised
Brünnhilde and Gunther to avenge them on Siegfried.

A hunting party was arranged, and during it Siegfried, who had
become separated from the others, was met by the three Rhine Maidens,
who entreated him to give back the Ring. He refused, even when they
told him that his refusal would mean that he should die that day.

Then the others of the party came up, and during the meal Hagen
gave Siegfried a magic potion, under the influence of which memory
returned to him, and he told the story of Mime, the dragon, and the
forest bird. As he was in the midst of his tale, two ravens flew out of the
thicket behind him, and he turned to look at them. Hagen immediately
speared him in the back, the only vulnerable spot in his body. Brünnhilde
had made the hero invulnerable with this exception, for she knew
that in battle he would never turn his back to the enemy. Siegfried fell
dying, his last words a passionate greeting to Brünnhilde, whom now he
recalled with rapture as his beloved wife. His body was placed on his
shield, and slowly the funeral procession marched back to the castle.

At the hall Hagen claimed the Ring, and when Gunther opposed him,
Hagen killed him. But when he attempted to snatch the Ring from
Siegfried’s finger, the hand of the dead hero rose in awful warning.

Brünnhilde then appeared, knowing the truth at last, and proclaimed
Siegfried the victim of tragic fate.

A funeral pyre was raised, on which the body of Siegfried was laid.
Brünnhilde tenderly drew the Ring from his finger, and cast it to the
Rhine. She threw a torch under the funeral pyre and, as the flames rose,
she grasped her faithful steed, Grane, by the mane, and charged with him
into the flames. The waters of the Rhine then rose and flooded the castle
of Gunther. Hagen was dragged beneath the waters. All was submerged,
and above the general catastrophe, Walhall was consumed. The twilight
of the gods had come. “The old order changeth, yielding place to new.”

PREPARED BY THE EDITORIAL STAFF OF THE MENTOR ASSOCIATION
ILLUSTRATION FOR THE MENTOR, VOL. 3, No. 24, SERIAL No. 100
COPYRIGHT, 1916, BY THE MENTOR ASSOCIATION, INC.

THE RING OF THE NIBELUNG

By HENRY T. FINCK

Music Editor of the New York Evening Post, Author of “Life of
Richard Wagner” and many other works

MENTOR GRAVURES

RICHARD WAGNER By Franz von Lenbach

RICHARD WAGNER’S DREAM By Schweninger

SIEGFRIED SLAYS THE DRAGON By K. Dielitz

MENTOR GRAVURES

WOTAN’S FAREWELL By K. Dielitz

BRÜNNHILDE SLUMBERING GUARDED BY MAGIC FIRE By Hermann Hendrich

THE VALKYR’S RIDE By K. Dielitz

BRÜNNHILDE

From a Painting by S. de Ivanowski, studied from Mdme. Olive Fremstad

THE MENTOR · DEPARTMENT OF MUSIC · FEBRUARY 1, 1916

Entered at the Postoffice at New York, N. Y., as second-class matter.
Copyright, 1916, by The Mentor Association, Inc.

In the leading operatic centers the four music dramas constituting
Richard Wagner’s Ring of the Nibelung are often performed separately;
but once a year—sometimes twice—they are all given within a week
or two, in proper order,—“Rheingold,” “Walküre” (vol-keer-a), “Siegfried”
(seeg-freed), and “Götterdämmerung” (get-ter-dem-mer-ung) as a
special “Nibelung cycle,”—and such a cycle is looked on by the highest
class of music lovers as a great festival, and is followed with concentrated
attention in all its wonderful details.

Wagner himself gave his “Ring” (as it is often called for short) the subtitle
“Bühnenfestspiel” (bee-nen-fest-speel), or stage-festival play. It was in the
summer of 1876 that he first gave it to the world, in a specially constructed
theater in Bayreuth, Bavaria; and he did this in accordance with a plan
conceived by him as a necessity more than a quarter of a century before.

To understand why he regarded such a festival as a necessity we must
know something about the operatic situation at the time when he composed
this colossal and revolutionary work. The originators of Italian
opera, who lived at Florence three centuries ago, held that the play (or
libretto) in an opera was as
important as the music. In
their eagerness to make it
possible for the hearer to understand
every word of the
text they banished all flowing
melody in favor of a dry recitative,
halfway between speech
and song, one of them actually
boasting of their “noble contempt
for melody.”

INTERIOR, BAYREUTH OPERA HOUSE

This, naturally, led to a reaction,
which went so far to
the side of melody that finally
nobody listened except when the prima donna or the tenor sang a brilliant
aria, the play being entirely ignored.

FELIX MOTTL

One of the leading conductors
at the early festival performances
at Bayreuth

Efforts to curb the singers and restore the play to honor were made
by several composers, the most important of them being Gluck (1714-1787).
So thoroughly was he imbued with the
importance of the play in an opera that he once
wrote, “Before I begin to work I try to forget
above all things that I am a musician.” Yet in his
operas, too, the arias remain the principal points
of interest, as they do in the operas of his successors,
Rossini, Bellini, Donizetti, Mozart, Weber.

DR. HANS RICHTER

The famous conductor, in
charge of the orchestral forces
at Bayreuth in 1876 and after

Moreover—and this is the most important
point—in Gluck’s operas, as Wagner himself
pointed out in 1850, “aria, recitative, and ballet,
each complete in itself, stand as unconnected side
by side as they did before
him, and still do, almost always,
to the present day.”

It was this defect of the
opera—this incoherence of
its parts—that Wagner set
himself the task of remedying.
The result was the
Music Drama—the “Artwork of the Future,” as
exemplified in the Ring of the Nibelung as well as
in “Tristan and Isolde,” “Die Meistersinger”
(mice-ter-singer), and “Parsifal.”

DIFFERENT FROM ORDINARY OPERAS

These seven music dramas differ radically in
their structure from what had been known for
centuries as operas. Operas are made up of “set
numbers”; that is, solo arias, duos, ensembles
(ahnsahmbles) for three or four voices, besides
choruses, instrumental pieces, and dances.
Wagner also himself wrote some operas: “The
Fairies,” “Rienzi,” “The Flying Dutchman,”
“Tannhäuser” (ton-hoi-ser), and “Lohengrin,”
in all of which there are set numbers
which are played and sung once and do
not recur.

Beginning with the “Flying Dutchman,”
however, we have, besides the set numbers
which do not recur, others which do recur, and
these are the far-famed “motives” (German,
leitmotive), usually called
“leading motives,” or
guiding themes.

LUDWIG II OF BAVARIA

The young king who befriended
Wagner and made his plans possible

COSIMA WAGNER

Daughter of Franz Liszt, formerly
wife of Hans von Bülow,
who now as Wagner’s
widow manages the affairs at
Bayreuth

RICHARD AND COSIMA WAGNER

From a photograph taken about 1872

A leading motive
may be defined as a
characteristic melody,
or succession of chords like the majestic strains of
the Walhall music, the heavy clumsy musical
tread of the giants, or the virile, heroic motive of
Siegfried, which is sounded by the orchestra whenever
in the course of the drama the personage or
the dramatic idea with which it is associated comes
forward or is referred to in the text.

Today Wagner’s early operas seem simple to
all; but the German
audiences that first
heard them, more
than sixty years ago,
found them hard nuts to crack. His “Rienzi,”
being in the flashy Meyerbeer style much
admired at that time, won great favor,
although it is the poorest of his works. His
next work, “The Flying Dutchman,” was so
novel in style that the audiences did not
know what to make of it. “Tannhäuser”
was still more Wagnerian; while his “Lohengrin”
seemed so far beyond the possibility
of public approval that he could not get it
accepted for performance, even in Dresden,
where he was conductor!

This was only one illustration of the
hard set conditions of the operatic situation.
Wagner had so many reasons for dissatisfaction
that he joined the revolutionary
uprising in 1849. This uprising was soon crushed, and Wagner, with the
aid of Liszt, escaped to Switzerland, the great asylum of political fugitives.
Twelve years elapsed before he was allowed to return to Germany.

THE RHINE DAUGHTERS. FROM RHEINGOLD. Photographed from the stage performance

For six years he did not compose another opera, devoting his time
instead to writing essays in which he tried to explain the aim of his “Artwork
of the Future.” Nobody paid any attention to these essays. The
consequence was that, as he wrote to Liszt, “I lead here entirely a dream
life: if I awake, it is to suffer.” He suffered because, among other things,
he heard from many sources that the performances of his operas given in
German cities were so bad that it was hard to understand how anyone
could possibly enjoy them.

A MUSICIAN’S DREAM

If these comparatively simple operas were so badly sung and played,
what would happen to the more advanced and ultra-Wagnerian work
which now began to ripen in his brain,—the four music dramas constituting
the “Ring”? Their performance, he realized, would be impossible in
the opera houses of Berlin, Dresden, Leipsic, and other cities, as managed
and manned at that time. He had to fall back on his “dream-life.” And
he dreamt a wonderful dream,—a dream of Bayreuth, of a specially built
theater with singers and players selected by himself for their correct performance
of his next work. This dream was not realized till twenty-six
years later!

This next work was at first intended to be a music drama complete in
itself, to be called “Siegfried’s Death.” On thinking the matter over,
however, Wagner concluded that the poem was too full of matter for one
play. Consequently he wrote a “Young Siegfried” to precede—and prepare
for—“Siegfried’s Death” (the name of which was changed to “Götterdämmerung,”
or “Dusk of the Gods”); then for the same reason he
wrote “Die Walküre,” to precede “Siegfried”; and finally “Rheingold,”
as a prelude to the other three.

SIEGMUND AND SIEGLINDE. FROM DIE WALKÜRE. Photographed from the stage performance

BRÜNNHILDE’S SUMMONS TO
SIEGMUND

From Die Walküre

While the poems were thus written in inverse order, the plot of the
whole cycle had been in his mind, and written down, before he wrote any
of the verses; and the music, of course, was composed in proper order,
beginning in 1853 with “Rheingold.”

Wagner not only wrote the poems of all his stage works, but he was a
great dramatic poet. The full value of his poems, however, can be appreciated
only in connection with the music, just as the music makes its
deepest appeal in connection with the poem and the action. And yet his
music alone is compelling enough; for Wagner concerts, at which the music
is played without the words, are among the most popular of concerts.

ALBERT NIEMANN

Noted tenor who created the role of
Siegmund in the original performances
of Die Walküre at Bayreuth
in 1876

What we should specially bear in mind is that the music in ordinary
operas is simply associated with the dramatic poem, or libretto, whereas
in the Ring the two are identified; or, as Wagner once expressed it, in the
music drama the poem and the music are “like two pairs of lips in a kiss,
each giving to and taking from the other.”

To practical persons Wagner’s life in Switzerland must seem deplorable.
He spent six years writing theoretical essays the sales of which
hardly paid for his paper and ink. Then he began to write and compose
his cycle of four Nibelung dramas, which he
felt sure would never bring him in a penny,
even if he succeeded (which he doubted) in
ever getting them performed. But Wagner
was not a practical man,—he was a genius,—he
could no more help creating the Ring of the
Nibelung than a volcano can help erupting
when the time comes.

He finished “Rheingold”; he finished “Die
Walküre”; he began “Siegfried,” and got as
far as the middle of it when he was compelled
to stop because of lack of funds. The royalties
from his operas (which since his death have
netted his heirs over a million dollars) were at
that time trifling. Liszt and other friends
helped him; but all his efforts to help himself
failed. For rehearsing and conducting the
London Philharmonic concerts during the season
of four months he got one thousand dollars,
or half what in recent times Jean de Reszke used
to earn in four hours by singing one of the
Wagner roles! He finally concluded that in order to finish the Ring he
must write a separate opera that might be performed at once and bring
him in some money. The result was “Tristan and Isolde”; but this was
as far ahead of the times as the Ring, and no
opera house attempted it till six years after its
completion in 1859.

KING LUDWIG TO THE RESCUE

In despair, he next composed “Die Meistersinger.”
This, being a comic opera and full of
pleasing melody, would, he felt sure, turn the
tide. It did so; but before this occurred important
things happened.

Encouraged by the success of a series of concerts
he had given in Russia, he spent his
money recklessly in Vienna, and borrowed
more, at usurious rates, because he had been
invited for another tour in Russia. Through
no fault of his own, this came to naught, and
he had to fly from Vienna to escape a debtor’s
prison. First he went to Switzerland, then to
Stuttgart. In a moment of despair he had
bought a pistol to end his life; but better
counsel prevailed, and he decided to hide in
the Swabian Alps, there to complete the score
of his comic opera. The wagon had already
been ordered, and he was packing his trunk, when a card was brought
up with the name of Baron Pfistenmeister, court secretary of the
king of Bavaria.

SIEGFRIED AND FAFNER THE DRAGON. From the painting by Hermann Hendrich

Ludwig II had but recently ascended the throne of Bavaria. He was
very young, and very enthusiastic over Wagner’s operas. He knew that
the great composer needed help, and one of his first actions was to send
his secretary to find him. He was promptly brought to Munich, where
he was enabled to live in luxury at the king’s expense. Not only were
his operas staged at once, but also two of his music-dramas,—“Tristan
and Isolde” and “Die Meistersinger.”

He now returned to his “Siegfried,” which, with tears in his eyes, he
had abandoned in the middle of the second act. His plan was to complete
this and “Götterdämmerung,” and then have the whole “Ring” staged
in a new theater to be specially constructed in Munich. The king cordially
approved this plan; but the courtiers and the populace, jealous of
the great composer because of the influence he had on the king, made
such a row over it that Wagner left the city to complete his work elsewhere.

BAYREUTH AND THE FIRST FESTIVAL

AMALIA MATERNA

Famous dramatic soprano who created
the role of Brünnhilde in the
original performance at Bayreuth

MAX ALVARY

Popular tenor who created the role
of Siegfried in America in 1887 and
sang it at the 100th American performance
in New York, in 1895

The inhabitants of Munich have had reason to regret their action in
opposing the plans of their king and Wagner. Since Wagner’s death in
1883 a score or more of festivals have been held at Bayreuth, bringing
millions of profit to that Bavarian town, all of which the Munichers
might have had. Bayreuth was chosen partly
because it was within the realm of Wagner’s
royal friend, partly because of its picturesque
surroundings, and partly because of its seclusion.
Special inducements had been offered
him to build the Nibelung Theater at the
famous summer resort, Baden-Baden; but he
did not wish to produce his great and revolutionary
work before audiences of mere pleasure-seekers.
He had spent a quarter of a century
in creating an entirely new German artwork,
free from all foreign elements and operatic fripperies,
and he wanted to submit it to serious
music lovers, who would be sufficiently interested
to take a trip
to remote Bayreuth.

Edison, the wizard
inventor, who
never spared himself
in work, said not
long ago that genius
was one per cent inspiration and ninety-nine
per cent perspiration.

Wagner’s “Ring” is certainly a miracle of
inspiration; yet when one reads of how much
hard work he bestowed on its production after
the infinite pains he had taken in creating it,
one feels tempted to say that Edison did not
exaggerate. Monumental proof of Wagner’s
indefatigable industry is afforded by two volumes,
one containing his business letters, the
other his letters to the artists during the preparations
for the Bayreuth festivals of 1876 and
1882, over both of which he presided personally.
He spent a whole summer visiting all
the German opera houses and picking out the
artists most suitable for each of the forty-nine
solo parts in the “Ring.” With most of these
he corresponded personally, and also went over
their parts with them before the rehearsals on the stage. The orchestra
was made up with the same attention to individual merit; while the
scenic features were genuine works of art.

The Nibelung Festival of 1876 was a most important event in the
history of music. Among those who attended it were two emperors
(William I of Germany and Don Pedro of Brazil), King Ludwig II, the
grand dukes of Weimar, Baden, and Mecklenburg, together with many
other representatives of the European aristocracy; while among those
who represented the musical nobility were Liszt, Grieg, and Saint Saëns.
On all these, as on the ordinary mortals assembled,
the “Ring” made an indelible impression.

THE PASSING OF SIEGFRIED. From the painting by Hermann Hendrich

CONQUEST OF EUROPE AND AMERICA

That there were shortcomings it is needless
to say; for everything was so new and difficult
to the artists. Nor were the funds sufficient to
enable Wagner to realize all his intentions.
The cost of seats ($75 for the four performances—which
were thrice repeated) kept many
enthusiasts from attending, and the result was
a deficit of $37,500.

GUSTAV SIEHR

Who created the role of Hagen in
Götterdämmerung, at Bayreuth,
1876

LILLI LEHMANN

Celebrated dramatic soprano, who took
part in original Bayreuth performances
and was the leading interpreter of Wagner
roles in America for years

SIEGFRIED IN GÖTTERDÄMMERUNG

Photographed from Max Alvary

This deficit, while it was a cruel blow to
Wagner, was for the world a blessing in disguise;
for it made it impossible for him to
carry out his plan of reserving the future performances
of the Nibelung’s Ring for Bayreuth
alone. There were no available funds;
so King Ludwig, who had contributed $50,000
toward the expenses of the Nibelung scenery,
got the privilege of producing the whole “Ring”
in Munich. Other cities soon followed, and so
great was the success that Wagner permitted
Angelo Neumann, manager of the Leipsic
Opera, to organize a traveling Wagner
Theater for producing the “Ring” throughout
the cities of Germany, as well as in
Italy and other countries. These performances
were, fortunately, given under the
conductorship of Anton Seidl, who had been
Wagner’s secretary for several years, and
concerning whom Wagner wrote, “No other
conductor knows as he does the proper
tempi [changes of pace] of my music or how
the action on the stage must be suited to
the music. Seidl learned these things from
me. He will conduct the Nibelungen better
for you than anyone else.”

AMERICAN PERFORMANCES

Fortunately, also, it was this same Anton
Seidl who conducted the first performances
of the “Ring” in America,
beginning with “Siegfried” in 1887. “Die
Walküre” had previously been produced
under Leopold
Damrosch. The success in these cases was
immediate; for the Metropolitan Opera
House had imported the leading Wagnerian
singers from Germany.

ANTON SEIDL

For years the leading conductor of
Wagner opera in America

THEODORE THOMAS

Noted conductor who worked for
years to make Wagner music known
to the American public

The ground had been well prepared.
Theodore Thomas had labored many years
to educate the public up to Wagner; his
activity culminating in the great Wagner
festival of 1884, for which he imported
three of the leading Bayreuth singers,
Materna, Winkelmann, and Scaria. That
same season Wagner’s operas and music-dramas
began to lead the others at the
Metropolitan, and among the singers who
helped to popularize his works were Lilli
Lehmann, Marianne Brandt, Milka Ternina,
Albert Niemann, Heinrich Vogl (fo-gl),
Max Alvary, Theodor Reichmann, Emil
Fisher, most of whom had studied with
Wagner, besides, somewhat later, Jean and
Edouard de Reszke, Olive Fremstad, Johanna
Gadski, and the Americans Lillian
Nordica, Emma Eames, Louise Homer, and
Geraldine Farrar.

The first of the Nibelung operas heard in
New York was “Die Walküre.” It was sung
at the Academy of Music eight months after the
festival at Bayreuth, but the performance was
in every way inadequate. In a way it was fortunate
for the Wagner cause that Abbey and
Grau lost $250,000 giving operas in Italian and
French during the first season (1883-84) of the
Metropolitan Opera House, just built at a cost
of $1,732,978. That failure induced the directors
to try German opera, and for seven years it
ruled supreme; but the German singers, great
as they were in their own sphere, could not,
with a few exceptions (notably Lilli Lehmann)
do justice to Italian and French works. The
eager desire to hear those again, under more
favorable conditions,
led to a temporary cessation of German opera;
but it so happened that one of the famous singers
engaged for French and Italian opera was
the great tenor, Jean de Reszke, who gradually
became an ardent Wagnerite, eager to appear
in the Nibelung operas. He induced the management
to reengage Seidl and some of the best
German singers, and once more Wagner flourished,
side by side with Verdi and Meyerbeer,
Gounod and Bizet. Wagner now leads in the
number of performances, followed by Puccini
and Verdi. Singers of every nationality now
seek to appear in the Wagner operas, and an
ambition of the great conductors, including
the Italian, Toscanini, is to interpret the
Nibelung’s Ring, of which Liszt wrote: “It
overtops and commands our whole art-epoch
as Mont Blanc does our mountains.”

SUPPLEMENTARY READING

THE OPEN LETTER

Dear Mrs. B—n:

I know exactly how you feel about
Wagner’s music. You write me that your
club is to devote several afternoons to
Wagner and that the preparatory study
that you have to give to it is “too much
like hard work.” You ask, “Why must
it be so? Cannot Wagner’s music be appreciated
without having to master a system
of things as puzzling and difficult as
bezique?”

A very good question. It has been
asked many times. It was answered in a
way some years ago when a very eminent
New York music critic found a young friend
at a Wagner Music Drama poring over a
commentary and busily memorizing the
leading motives instead of listening to the
music. “Go as far with that as your enthusiasm
will carry you,” said the critic.
“Then forget it all—and let the music tell
you its own story.” “But,” was the answer,
“I want to listen intelligently and
not miss any of the meaning of the music
or the text.”

That, Mrs. B—n, is your attitude. You
want to understand the principles of Wagner’s
Art. Good. But don’t make hard
work of it. I have been all through the
experience and I know what it means. I
was a young worshipper at Wagner’s
shrine in the years when Anton Seidl was
making the Music Drama known in
America, and Max Alvary, Lilli Lehmann,
and Emil Fischer filled the leading roles.
Night after night, libretto and commentary
in hand, I sat through hours of Music
Drama until I knew every measure intimately.
I could tick off unerringly each
individual motive as it occurred. Sometimes
four or five of them would be going
at once, but none of them ever escaped
me. By and by I got tired of this academic
exercise and then I made a wonderful
discovery. I found that my labors
had been unnecessary. The music was
plain enough to anyone who was sensitive
to music and who followed the drama
attentively. I discovered this through a
friend whom I took to the Ring of the
Nibelung for the first time. He had not
studied as I had, but when he heard the
quick tapping sound of the hammers in
Rhinegold he did not have to be told that
it was the Nibelung motive. The heavy
tread of the music of the giants was perfectly
plain to him, and so was the mad
galop of the Valkyrs, while the solemn
measures that accompanied the gods across
the rainbow bridge made clear to him the
majesty of Walhall. At one time he
turned to me and said, “I don’t know
what the text books call that musical
theme, but it means ‘Pleading’ to me.”
The “Magic Fire” and “Slumber” music
were eloquently expressive to him, and
whenever he heard the ominous beat of
the kettle-drum he exclaimed without hesitation,
“That means ‘Fate!’”

Of course this is easy in the case of the
motives that are musically descriptive of
their subjects. But it is true also of those
that are merely arbitrary musical symbols,
such, as the motives of the “Wälsung
Family,” or “The Compact.” Your
attention is called to these motives at the
time when they are first played and instinctively
you associate them with their
subjects when they are repeated.

“But,” you may say, “that is not the
way to master the score. A commentary is
surely needed.” A commentary is indeed
a material help. But, after all, you will
have to go to the music finally, so why
not start with the music? It is simply a
question of the best method of learning.
The handbook and commentary method
is like the old grammar and speller—didactic
and dry. Wagner music is a great
deal better than Wagner explanations.
So, go to the music at once and follow it
closely. A great deal that makes up
Wagner’s Art will quickly become apparent
to you. Intelligent, appreciative
commentaries written by scholarly critical
writers are valuable reading, after you
have heard the music. A course of handbook
study before you are familiar with
the music is indeed, as you say, very much
“like hard work.”

Sincerely yours,

W. D. Moffat
Editor

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