A recent issue of Opera News reveals that Lorin Maazel is the latest to join the "Wagner should have collaborated with a librettist" camp. Still, I agree with this: ... because, upon reflection, don't Wagner Operas contain the best-formed stories in the entire repertory?Funny thing about that... R. Strauss's professional musician father was an virulent anti-Wagnerian- a rather ironic biographical tidbit in the family bearing Germany's "next phase" of program Romanticism, with R. Strauss later being dubbed "Richard II." I remembering reading somewhere that R. Strauss's development profited when he "stopped listening to his father's words and started listening to his namesake's music."

Yeh, his father was one of the French Hornists in the premier of Tannhäuser? Tristan? Something anyway.

A psychodrama of archetypal types, a fascinating mixture of extreme sensuality and high intellectualism, the eternal story of love verses power, an allegorical epic of the failure of traditional values, full of forbidden eroticism, sublime emotion, violent materialism, pure spiritualism, and plenty more! All expressed, somewhat fantastically and literally, with Wagner's motive laden music, which acts as a psychological mirror to the action, and also to the listener's mind.
Not without it's faults- it can be self-indulgent, vulgar, overbearing, boring.
Wagner's poetry and plot can sometimes be too slow, and overlabour the point. But some of his characterisation is inspired. And the psychological interactions are incredible.
But most of all, his music, when fully developed in the later works, fully realises the pure and immediate expression of the human condition by everchanging, always familiar yet always new infinite melody, drawn by dazzling, virtuoso orchestration which remains a major influence on music and culture in general.

I can't find any Wagner that's boring honestly. But if you look at a lot of Wagner's operas with the forest in mind, they appear a bit wanky. If you look at each and EVERY tree, they are masterpieces.

Thanks for the observations, tristanjove and YK. To be sure, any great composer benefits from a more detailed analysis, but what one uncovers in a detailed perusal of Wagner has no ready parallel anywhere else in music (or maybe all of Art, for that matter).

I think one discovers fairly quickly whether the overtures and "bleeding chunks" have some manner of personal resonance. If they don't, odds are longer than the odds concerning most composers that a reassessment will occur. If they do, there remains the chance that one will increase exposure and eventually embrace entire music-dramas in appreciation.

A Grove Dictionary entry on Wagner says "[p]redjudice affects judgement of Wagner more than that of almost any other composer." Except for a possible quibble regarding the use of the word 'almost,' the statement seems incontestable on its face.

Before I leave, though, I want to submit a quote from a finer mind than mine, Bernard Shaw, who cautions against intimidation concerning Wagnerian details:

...encouragement is addressed to modest citizens who may suppose themselves to be disqualified from enjoying The Ring by their technical ignorance of the music. They may dismiss such misgivings speedily and confidently. If the sound of music has any power to move them, they will find that Wagner exacts nothing further.
From: The Perfect Wagnerite.

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The hardest knife ill us'd doth lose his edge. Shakespeare- Sonnet 95

I've got them on DVD from the Met conducted by James Levine (with a huge celebrity list to boot) and I have sat through 3 in one day. I don't recommend that, but it can be done. Think of it as watching lord of the rings, but with music, and better writing. The first one is by far the slowest (in my opinion). By the end of the 2nd Opera though, my first time I couldn't even move I was so shaken. And yes, Morris's Wotan is fantastic beyond belief. His Sachs isn't bad either, and his Hollander is pretty solid.

I went to a performance of the Los Angeles Philharmonic today(5-4-08). One of the works on the program (the second half) was Dawn and Siegfried's Rhine Journey, Siegfried's Death and Funeral Music, and Brunnhilde's Immolation from Gotterdammerung sung by Lisa Gasteen and played in a concert version by the LA Phil conducted by Esa-Pekka Salonen. The opera performances have the music coming from the orchestra pit rather than the stage. The music seems more forceful in the concert version.

When I was unemployed in the late seventies, I made my self available of our local public libraries record collection. My neighbors were subjected to Solti's Ring cycle more than once. I'm more with agreement with Debussy nowdays. Its strictly highlights only...

Well- the good news is that New York's Metropolitan Opera will be presenting the entire Ring cycle next season. The bad news, unfortunately, is that they've made the decision to treat Wagnerians as "touches" or "marks" rather than as a valued part of their opera community. Let me explain:

Initial sales for a Ring series is limited to subscribers to other opera series (minimum 6 other [lesser quality, IMHO] operas), or "Patron" status (contribution of $2000.00 or more). O.K. a little onerous so far- but it's not uncommon to offer the better seats to the people who put out the big-time Benjamins. But stay with me here...

Each "Ring" opera, in addition to its ticket cost, also carries a "special contribution" cost, which is, in effect, a Wagnerian "surcharge." It is the first time that the Met has done this- and it amounts to price discrimination on Wagner performances.

Oh, and one more thing-- in a decision reminiscent of the "bad old days" of sports event blackouts, the Ring cycle Music Dramas will be excluded from the nationwide HD theatre-casts. Obviously, the Met is counting on enough "marks" to pony up these extra bills. If this happens, it will work out the way they planned. However, I will not be one of those "marks."

The MET has proven aggressive in their importuning efforts towards me. It was my special pleasure to inform them that their pricing decisions have made it FAR LESS (rather than more) likely that I will ever contribute to them.

Come the fall, I've resolved to be more involved in seeking out live-music performances. My quest, however, will NOT involve the MET. Not now.

When Decca released their "Wagner/Bayreuth Festival" 33-cd set (for c. $65), I thought "this might not be the last salvo in the Wagner budget competition." Today, I got word that opera d'oro is launching the Furtwängler/Scala "Ring" for c. $45. Since the latter is saddled with mono sound and a noisy audience (I guess any audience would sound noisy, when contrasted to the patrons of Bayreuth), the former remains much the better buy. Still, it's enough to make me wonder "what next on the Wagner release front?"

I guess I got the answer to this question today.

For many years, Wagner was the only opera I could tolerate. Just to see what it was like, I'd bought a record of highlights (Rita Hunter as Brunnhilde), disliked it, but somehow kept returning to it, and eventually ended up playing it every day.

So I was hooked. I scraped together every penny I could (this was back in the 70s) to buy a complete set - Bohm's Bayreuth live version (Solti was out of reach financially) - and played it and played it, night after night, head stuck in the libretto. Went to see Rita Hunter and English National Opera do Gotterdammerung, which I think remains one of the supreme musical experiences of my life. Years later, when cash was in better supply, I added the Goodall ENO set to the collection, but somehow it never quite gripped me in the way Bohm had.

In those days, I either listened to one of the operas complete, or not at all, but as the years went by I became far less purist, and now don't think twice about putting on the 2CD set of Solti highlights, or the Bohm highlights for that matter. Over half a lifetime Wagner gradually just permeated my being. I'm not sure I understand it in any way I could express sensibly (I've read Donington's book but I'm not convinced that it changed the way I listen). What I love is the flavour of it - just hanging out there with 'the guys', listening to those tunes weaving in and out of everything, laden with what seem to be meanings beyond words, all experienced against that vast mythic backdrop. It's true that these days I'm more likely to be listening to Massenet than Wagner; but I'd never have found my way to Massenet if I hadn't ploughed such a deep Wagnerian furrow first.

My first and only opera experience was a year or two ago sitting down to watch the complete Ring cycle, the 1980 version with Pierre Boulez and the Orchester der Bayreuther Festspiele. Hey - if I want to explore something I don't just dabble! I rented the DVD's and watched them a few days apart. I must say I was completely fascinated and soon forgot I was even watching / listening to an opera. I found Donald McIntyre's Wotan to be quite over the top in a good way.

This production goes from vaguely traditional costumes and sets in Das Rheingold, evolving to more modern costumes and sets by the end of Gotterdammerung. It would have been nice to have seen a more traditional staging for my first time, but I guess no one does that any more.

I'll never forget the experience - so I'm not inclined to repeat it any time soon.

I know that feeling. The productions I saw were those done by English National Opera (Goodall) in the 1970s, and the sets were minimal but hugely atmospheric. They seemed timeless - as if the events were unfolding (appropriately enough) in some alternative dimension of existence. That became definitive, for me - so that listening to the Ring, ever after, I 'saw' those sets in my mind, and like you, I wouldn't want those images disturbing.

Thanks for the posts, Elgarian. I suspect that it hasn't, and that's a good thing. Now, what follows should be preceded by the disclaimer "in my dilettente opinion..." The Howitzer responsible for the hulking derelict wreck where once stood Donington's 'Jungian interpretation' of The Ring can be found in the "Objectivity in Interpretation" section of Deryck Cooke's I Saw the World End. Sample passage:
The defect of Jungian interpretation is that it imposes its own categories on the work interpreted... in HAMLET, say, Ophelia would have to be Hamlet's anima, Claudius his shadow, and Gertrude the Terrible Mother, and the whole work would have to be treated as a therapeutic development of the psyche; likewise, the last stage would have to be nobody's actual death, but a general rebirth, except for the shadow, which would disappear, leaving the psyche in one final healthful state of transformation- and the peculiar quality of the masterpiece HAMLET unilluminated.
BWAHHAHAHaha!

I feel as though I'm in sincere agreement with you on the recordings front. My good friend Guarnerius and I used to talk about how it's much more significant to talk about the special qualities of Wagner than to get into a "recycled water" battle about whether this version or that is the best gateway for musical understanding. Oh, I have preferences, to be sure- and have discussed them spiritedly. However, the more I listen, the more I recognize that a number of versions of The Ring are suitable for getting a measure of the genius of the work. I understand that price has been (and will be) a barrier to the acquisition of some. In such cases, I think we should heed the French proverb and not let the best become the enemy of the good. I believe that Solti, Keilberth, Böhm, and Janowski all make for good "live-with it" versions. No question there are others, too- I just haven't heard them all the way through.

One position I do hold passionately, though, is that Wagnerian sonorities are such that it's a disservice to one's own enjoyment to settle for a non-stereo version the the Ring Cycle- and mono cycles should be reserved as an alternate option for those who aspire to collect multiple versions.