How music grew, from prehistoric times to the present day

by Marion Bauer; Ethel R. Peyser

His Early Operas

He had gone to Vienna with his symphony but showed it to no one; it is said that Mendelssohn saw it but forgot about it. Here he wrote the poem and some poor music for an opera Die Hochzeit (The Wedding) which he tore up the next year.

Then off to Prague went he (1832), and wrote his first libretto, for you must remember he did not go to people like Metastastio or Molière for his libretto but wrote his own. Had he not been a composer he certainly would have been a literary man. In fact, he was, for he wrote more pamphlets and books than many a writer! Yet, he showed his real genius as a composer.

But he was so poor now that he was glad to get a job as a chorus master at the mean salary of 10 florins ($5) a month! It was here he wrote the opera Die Feen (The Fairies) a wildly romantic work, after which he returned again to Leipsic. For the first time he heard Wilhelmine Schroeder-Devrient sing, whose marvelous talent influenced him all his life. In 1834 as a conductor of a troupe with headquarters in Magdeburg, he tried to produce his second opera the tragic Das Liebesverbot (Forbidden Love), modeled after Shakespeare’s Measure for Measure; but it was so badly given that it was a dismal failure. The second was like Bellini and Auber, both of whom he admired and it was too early in his life (twenty-one) to show new ways of composing.

Soon he went to Königsberg, where (1836) he married Wilhelmina Planer, a young actress whom he met in the theatre, and he spent the year trying to get his Magdeburg troupe out of difficulties. Later he was given a post in Riga.

While at Riga his duty was to lead orchestral concerts, at many of which Ole Bull the Norwegian violinist played, here too, he read Rienzi of Bulwer-Lytton, the English writer, and wrote a libretto and opera on the showy model of Meyerbeer. He said himself that it “out-Meyerbeered Meyerbeer.” Leaving hastily, debts and all, with Rienzi in his hand, he went to Paris (the goal of all composers) in a sailing vessel, with his new wife and a dog named Robber, stopping over in England. The trip took four long perilous weeks. From the sailors he learned the story of the Flying Dutchman, which he afterwards used in his opera of that name.

We wish we could tell you the whole story of this gale-tossed, unhappy mariner, the Flying Dutchman, and how at last he found happiness and relief from storms and troubles of life by finding his mate in the maiden Senta. You will love the music and the story which is woven about Senta in the beautiful ballad bearing her name.

In this opera, Wagner first used the leit-motif or leading theme (particularly in the overture) which he used as we use a name or description of a person, idea or thing, except that he used them in music instead of in words. For example, when Senta comes in to the story, either as someone’s thought or as a person, or when she is spoken of, her theme is heard, woven into the music. So it is when Siegfried appears in the operas of the Ring of the Nibelungen, you hear the Siegfried theme; when the Gold is mentioned, you hear the Gold theme; or if the Giants appear, their theme is heard,—so it is with the Dragon and everything connected with the story. You hear in some form, their name plates, as it were, and so by listening, you can follow just what is going on through the music. This is one of the things that Wagner developed, though Gluck and others had attempted to use it.

During his stay in Paris, he had a struggle for existence and did everything possible to gain a livelihood, while striving to get a hearing for his compositions. He wrote, in his misery, the Faust Overture, the first work to win recognition.

He went to see Meyerbeer on his way to Paris, for Meyerbeer was very popular and his approval could have aided poor Richard. Some say Meyerbeer helped him and others say he did not. Wagner gained little from him. Even when he first went to see Liszt, who later became his best friend, it is said that Liszt snubbed him. Wagner never stopped writing his theories for the papers, and a hot-headed young scribbler he was! Yet withal he submitted the story of The Flying Dutchman to the director of the Paris Opera House who rejected it as an opera, but gave the story to Dietsch, the conductor, to write the music. This did not daunt Wagner, who, after a defeat, worked harder or his next task. So he wrote another Flying Dutchman, story and music and orchestration in seven weeks!