Of his turbulent personal life which involved him in numerous and often complex love affairs, mention need here be made only of his relations with Cosima, daughter of Liszt, and wife of Hans von Buelow. Wagner and Cosima fell in love while the latter was still von Buelow’s wife. They had two illegitimate children before they set up a home of their own at Lake Lucerne; and one more (Siegfried) before they were married on August 25, 1870.
Wagner’s creative career divides itself into two phases. In the first he was the composer of operas in more or less a traditional style. To the accepted formulas of operatic writing, however, he brought a new dimension—immense musical and dramatic power and invention. In the second phase he was the prophet of a new order in music, the creator of the music drama. It is from the works of his first phase that salon or pop orchestras derive selections that have become universal favorites—sometimes overtures, sometimes excerpts. For these earlier works abound with such a wonderful fund of melody, emotion, expressiveness and dramatic interest that they have become popular even with those operagoers to whose tastes the later Wagner is perhaps too subtle, complex, elusive, or garrulous.
From The Flying Dutchman (Der fliegende Hollaender) comes a dramatic overture. This opera—text by the composer based on an old legend adapted by Heinrich Heine—was first performed at the Dresden Opera on January 2, 1843. “The Flying Dutchman” is a ship on which the Dutchman must sail until he achieves redemption through the love of a faithful woman. Only once in every seven years is he permitted to go ashore to find that love. He finally achieves his redemption through Senta. They both meet their final doom together in a raging sea which swallows up the ship.
Turbulent music, intended to describe a storm at sea, opens the overture. We then hear the theme of the Dutchman in the horns and bassoons. The stormy music returns and subsides as a motive from Senta’s beautiful second-act ballad, “Traft ihr das Schiff” is presented. This motive brings up the image of Senta herself. A vigorous sailors’ chorus is followed by a return of the Senta motive in full orchestra.
Three selections from The Flying Dutchman are of particular appeal: Senta’s spinning song, “Summ und brumm” and her famous ballad, both from the second act; and the chorus of the sailors in the third act, a rousing chantey, “Steuermann! lass die Wacht.”
Lohengrin was Wagner’s last “opera.” After that he confined himself to music dramas. He completed it in 1848. After its première in Weimar on August 28, 1850 it became one of the most successful operas in Germany of that period. The text, by the composer, was adapted from medieval legends. Lohengrin is a knight of the Holy Grail who becomes Elsa’s champion against Telramund when Elsa is unjustly accused of having murdered Gottfried. Lohengrin arrives on a swan and extracts from Elsa the promise that she must never try to uncover his true identity. After defeating Telramund, Lohengrin marries Elsa who, provoked by Telramund’s wife, cannot stifle her curiosity about her husband’s background and source. He finally must reveal to her that he is a knight of the Holy Grail. Having made that revelation he must leave her forever.
The two familiar orchestral preludes, from the first and third acts, are opposites in mood, texture, and dynamics. The Prelude to Act 1 has spiritual content, a portrait of a heavenly vision wherein the Holy Grail is carried by angels. The main theme is heard quietly in the upper registers of the violins, then repeated by other instruments. This theme is developed into a crescendo and culminates in an exultant statement by trumpets and trombones. Now the theme is given in a decrescendo, and the prelude ebbs away pianissimo, once again in the strings in the upper register.
The Prelude to Act 3 is more robust in character, since it depicts the joy of Elsa and Lohengrin on the eve of their wedding. A forceful melody is pronounced by the full orchestra, succeeded by a second strong theme for the cellos, horns, bassoons in unison; a march-like episode for the wind instruments follows.
What is probably the most famous wedding march ever written comes out of Lohengrin. Its strains are heard after the rise of the curtain for Act 3, Scene 1, as a procession enters the bridal chamber. The chorus hymns a blessing to the marriage couple (“Treulich gefuert”). From one side ladies conduct Elsa, while from the other the King and his men lead Lohengrin. The two processions then meet midstage and Elsa joins Lohengrin to be blessed by the King. The two columns of the procession then refile and march out of the two sides of the stage.
The Mastersingers (Die Meistersinger), while written after Wagner had set forth on his operatic revolution, is the only one of his music dramas with a recognizable operatic ritual: big arias, huge production numbers, even dances. For The Mastersingers is a comedy, the only one Wagner ever wrote. For purposes of comedy some of the traditions of opera still prove useful to Wagner, even if fused with techniques, approaches and esthetics of the music drama. Wagner completed The Mastersingers in 1867—eight years after Tristan and Isolde and more than a decade following the first two dramas of the Ring cycle. The first performance took place in Munich on June 21, 1868. The libretto, by the composer, was set in Nuremberg in the middle 16th century, and its plot revolves around a song contest conducted by the Mastersingers, its winner to receive the hand of lovely Eva, daughter of the cobbler-philosopher, Hans Sachs. Walther von Stolzing, a knight, and Beckmesser, a contemptible town clerk, are the main rivals for Eva. At a magnificent ceremony at the banks of the Pognitz River the contestants sing their offerings. It is Walther’s eloquent “Prize Song” that emerges victorious.