Let's get Godwin's law sorted straight away. Wagner's politics and associations with others are of absolutely no interest to me, and stand as no justification for not listening to his music. After all, I'd happily read 'Mein Kampf' if it was any good.

Based on my limited experience - and everyone who starts the classical journey begins with limited experience and usually follows what first attracts them - I find his work powerful and exciting, but overblown. Some nice tunes that outstay their welcome. I can listen in small doses. And as discussed elsewhere, the operatic singing style is unappealing (to me).

Here's a classic example...

Just to be clear. Mine is a personal response, and I recognise that the cliche of Wagner is easy to reject without giving the real Wagner a fair hearing. I'm not here to mock those who adore his works.

Oh, I suppose I should add that I can admire the skill in the prolonged delayed orgasm of Tristan and Isolde and it's shame it's suffered so much ridicule in the use of adverts and comedy sketches. What one might ask is why the music has suffered such ridicule where other established classics haven't: I don't believe it's because of the political background.

 

Wagner and his disciples: "...madmen, enemies of music to the knife, who, not born for music and conscious of their impotence...their being is to prey on the ailing trunk, until it becomes putrid and rotten." Unsigned, London, 1855

How can I add to that?

But in fact, it does sound like some sort of fungus.

 

Wagner and his disciples: "...madmen, enemies of music to the knife, who, not born for music and conscious of their impotence...their being is to prey on the ailing trunk, until it becomes putrid and rotten." Unsigned, London, 1855

How can I add to that?

Well fair enough. At least you didn't blame it on the ballet.

 

I think I don't have the intelligence to understand him properly. Or it might be the German language I find difficult to love, I even struggle with Die Zauberflöte for that reason. I don't have a problem with Italian, French, Russian or Czech.

Opera by my first love, Verdi, is easy for me to understand.

 

Opera is like cheese. You like some and yet don't like or won't even try others. Even just the mere thought of some makes you feel sick. Time mellows your feelings and your taste buds change and you start listening to things you wouldn't touch with a stick years ago and rue the missed oppertunities

 

Opera is like cheese.

Thank you again - a wonderful insight. Unfortunately the carry-through fails, at least for me - as the years have accumulated, yet there are no cheeses I rue not trying. Perhaps opera is actually more like fruit? I always regret not having eaten more fruit.

 

The music is so complex and beautiful that it draws you in and consumes too much of your time. There are so many details that you get lost in them, like this for example.

Someone once wrote this comment about a particular recording of the prologue in Gotterdammerung.

One of the first CDs I bought back in 1984 was one of Knappertsbusch/ Wagner chunks on Decca. During the Dawn section from Act I of Götterdämmerung there is a huge blunder just as the sun blazes forth: the trombones miss their entry, which throws the rest of the orchestra out; it only takes a few seconds for the VPO to get on track again nevertheless, the performance is spoilt. There should have been a re-take and, yes, Culshaw was absolutely right to have preferred Solti and the results entirely vindicate his choice.


This is the recording in question. When do the trombones miss their entry? Where are the few seconds where the orchestra is thrown off balance?

Can someone tell me when this actually happens? I've spend some time trying to find the missing trombones but to no avail.

 

Another thing which puts me off, The Ring anyway, is the fantasy theme. Possibly the same reason why I can't get into The Hobbit or any of Tolkien's stuff.

 

Oh my. I don't think we can be friends now.

 

Compared to Verdi I see Wagner being addicted to gadgetry. All his characters, especially in Die Ring des Nibelungen, are feeble: Who is Wotan without a spear, who are the Rhinemaidens without Rhinegold, and so on (who is this bloke without the Tarnkappe? who are the gods without a Walhalla?...) It reminds me of young people being glued to the newest gadget (Iphone 6, 7, 8 ...). Without this gadget they feel utterly lost and they are nowhere & nobody. The problem for me is that this religious gadget-veneration blocks my getting involved into the story. (Otello has a blackened face, but this only has a dramatic effect; it doesn't have any influence on Otello's character).

 

Compared to Verdi I see Wagner being addicted to gadgetry. All his characters, especially in Die Ring des Nibelungen, are feeble: Who is Wotan without a spear, who are the Rhinemaidens without Rhinegold, and so on (who is this bloke without the Tarnkappe? who are the gods without a Walhalla?...) It reminds me of young people being glued to the newest gadget (Iphone 6, 7, 8 ...). Without this gadget they feel utterly lost and they are nowhere & nobody. The problem for me is that this religious gadget-veneration blocks my getting involved into the story. (Otello has a blackened face, but this only has a dramatic effect; it doesn't have any influence on Otello's character).

I disagree, Otello's race can be said to have deep effect on his character, by making him an outsider in the eyes of those around him.

 

It has everything to do with the music, the aesthetic, and nothing else. God knows some other great composers who wrote music which transports many to this day were less than pleasant persons. So, take it for granted, for me, the artist is forever separate from the art. [I have first hand experience at 'what can come out' compared to 'what / who I am' -- and have many times heard much the same from others who compose.]

Wagner's music does not 'breathe' much. He had a notion of 'endless melody' but forgot that normally, people take a breath: there are natural 'pauses' which make speech that much more speech-like and believable which (imo) are almost entirely absent in the majority of his works.

The seemingly endless sequencing, which is often present, is a technique which in general has me jumping ship if that ship has much of the commodity aboard. That sequencing is the very fundamental premise of Tristan -- an evening laden with sequencing. [As a friend of mine commented upon a two hour Riverdance broadcast, "Imagine, two hours of that!"]

I 'judge' any and all vocal music (any genre or format) first only on its musical content, and only long after on its textual content and intent and then if the goal of incorporating the two elements is 'successful,' I only consider text -- at all -- if and only if the music and only the music has pulled me in via its 'import.' For a vocal work, anything less than the music first 'drawing you in and giving you some of the emotional import' without knowing a thing of or about the text, I consider a fail.

There is much in Wagner's scores which is remarkable. There is much I find tedious: far too much sequencing; in the orchestration often endless arpeggiation in the strings, the strings often treated more as 'padding' in general; in the writing itself, very little counterpoint (which I have a preference for, regardless of 'what genre' that counterpoint is or how it is used).

I think Tristan is a masterwork, a wholly effective score, and one hell of a wringer as a piece of musical theater. The Ring just does not 'carry me' for an instant. I very much like and admire his one abstract (absolute) chamber orchestral piece, "Siegfried's Idyll," because of its abstractness of form, the lack of any real literal reference, and its clarity. I would like Wagner more if he had pursued this avenue of musical thought more often. (Siegfried Idyll, too, is a "masterwork.")

Wagner, did, historically, expand tonality to an extreme, the first true and superbly accomplished use of progressive tonality, an extended music dialogue which avoids cadences, his more than intelligent handling of a high chromaticism. Without the fact of Wagner, later music would not have happened as it did, the 'busting' of common practice tonality, chord function, and high chromaticism are all present and accounted for in Wagner.

To the textual aspect: I find all of the ring 'just too silly.' There is "silly" in a lot of opera, nearly a convention where we are asked to suspend reality and accept what is there presented. A long aria, and that a virtuoso display, from a heroine in the very last throes of tuberculosis being just one of many more 'unbelievable' moments found in the genre. A not so due-to-syphilis crazed Nero in Monteverdi -- occasions of theatrical lunacy or historically inaccurate libretti are plentiful. Wagner's mosh on the ring legend is, for me, truly a mosh, and very difficult to take seriously as theater.

Wagner's aesthetic (not mine, admittedly) pervades all his other scores -- as should be expected and as they should be -- of course then they are still filled too with all those aspects of the music itself which just 'do not work for me.'

Genius issues aside, I think Wagner had a very 'bourgeois' sense of theater and drama, and that, for the most part, was his audience of the time. He was, in his own time, remarkably forward looking in what music and music theater could be, while at the same time -- again for me -- there is something horribly banal about the subject and its dramatic treatment, reflected in an 'Average Joe' taste for the cheesier more commonplace theater tricks / schtick (i.e. what is 'dramatic?') and that pervades much of the music... That "Leitmotif" business, to me is painfully simplistic, banal and... well, I agree with Debussy, who likened the device to "A musical phone directory." Wagner, in his 'banality' as I think of 'banal', was consistent

All the above should demonstrate, I hope, two things.
1.) A lot of reaction for or against any composer's work is ultimately a matter of personal preference.
2.) There is no problem or dichotomy in not caring for (despising, even) a composers work while still being able to fully acknowledge that composer had the greatest of skill, and that they were one of 'the great ones.'

 

...very little counterpoint (which I have a preference for, regardless of 'what genre' that counterpoint is or how it is used).

A shame, because he seems to have been quite handy at counterpoint. Listen to the Die Meistersinger prelude from about six minutes in...

My view is that Wagner is easily the best composer of the 19th century post-Beethoven, or would have been had he written more music.

 

Wagner said that in Beethoven's music, "All is melody". This means that the whole texture becomes one line; the whole music we hear becomes a single driving force. We as listeners interact with this force, the overall effect being one of great consonance, the resolution of emotional and large-scale dissonance. Beethoven's music is, as we know, universal; listened to and appreciated in this way by everyone. Therefore Beethoven was able to create a counterpoint that encompasses the whole world...

Ok, that all translates to "Go Beethoven!" But I do think that this idea (in Wagner's case aesthetic) of 'all is melody' is an important aspect of why these composers were less contrapuntal in an obvious way than other composers. If the music is supposed to have one voice, how can it have multiple voices?

Disclaimer: the first paragraph was meant as a mildly humorous speculation. Given the confusion about sarcasm on the internet I thought it best to clarify.

 

But I do think that this idea (in Wagner's case aesthetic) of 'all is melody' is an important aspect of why these composers were less contrapuntal in an obvious way than other composers.

Similarly, although Beethoven loved Bach and know a lot of his clavier music very well indeed, he didn't speak of Bach's prowess in counterpoint. He called Bach "the father of harmony."

 

I'll give it straight:

- I don't much like the 'bigger is better' type aesthetic
- I think his music could have done with a fair bit of editing (I concur with Rossini's famous comments, that Wagner's operas have wonderful moments but dreadful quarters of an hour) - in other words, I find him very long-winded
- His politics definitely does colour my negative assessment of him (so too do some of his fans online who I have been unwise to be entagled/ensnared myself in discussions with - they often exhibit qualities of megalomania and intolerance of diversity of opinion)
- Too highbrow, too much philosophy and pseudo-religious aspects

Positives of Wagner which I admit:
- As a great innovator, very influential on many types of music (from high to low art - from 'serious' composers like Mahler, Schoenberg, Messiaen to composers of musicals and film musics)
- As a major composer of second half of the 19th cnetury
- As one of the great composers of opera

 

Wagner has divided listeners, fans, critics, and musicologists from the very beginning . There's something about his music that gets some people's goat , not only his Nazi associations . Many people could not stand his music long before the Nazi era .
I've never been one of these misguided souls, fortunately , and even though I don't approve of his anti-semitism in the least , I've never let it get in the way of my admiration for his works .
For some people, his operas are insufferably long and boring . Others fnd the music noisy and bombastic.
Others think the librettos he wrote on his own are terrible (they aren't at all). Some think his plots are ridiculous and the characters too . Not true . More than a few have misunderstood his use of leitmotifs, and mock them for reappearing whenever a character comes on stage , which is not really their function .
Quite a few people find his use of alliteration in the Ring unintenionally comic .
Now we come to the unfortunate hijacking of his works by Hitler. Many people assume that the Ring
glorifies the Teutonic triumph of Germans over Jews and other subhumans . Wrong ! Nothing could be farther form the truth . The Ring in fact is about the way that lust for power and riches corrupts everything and leads to catastrophe .
The final address of Hans Sachs to Walther and the crowd in Die Meistersinger has been misconstrued by many to be about the need for Germans to go out and conquer the world and slaughter Jews ! Again,wrong !
It has to do with the need for a people to preserve its cultural heritage in the face of misfortune and being oppressed by others .
There are no Jewish characters in the Wagner operas, no discussions of Jews or Judaism, and not a single anti-semitic statement by any of them . Wagner's operas are about HUMAN RELATIONSHIPS, not antisemtism .

 

Wagner has divided listeners, fans, critics, and musicologists from the very beginning . There's something about his music that gets some people's goat , not only his Nazi associations . Many people could not stand his music long before the Nazi era .
I've never been one of these misguided souls, fortunately , and even though I don't approve of his anti-semitism in the least , I've never let it get in the way of my admiration for his works .
...

To be honest, the thing that gets up my goat so to speak is that he's far from being typical of opera. Which kind of explains his 'cult' following. Also, his untouchability, his elevation to a god. There was a recent article here by an Australian musician saying the money they'll be blowing on the Wagner Ring next year in Melbourne could be put to better use. Again, I could do a thread with a link to his opinion, but I won't for fear of being shot down by various people here.

The other thing is that there is the spectre of the Holocaust there. I am very sensitive to those that died in that, one of the most horrible crimes of mass murder known to man. So there are connotations there, like the word Holocaust meaning a burnt offering. I'm sure I don't need to relate to which opera that comes to mind easily with that. Of course, some countries (not only Israel but also East Europe, where horrible atrocities where committed by the Nazis and their collaborators) also put under the carpet not only music by Wagner but other composers promoted by the Nazis, which in their minds was a symbol of subjugation and oppression.

So I am sensitive to this. As for goings on on this forum, I don't forget them. It is, I think up to more level headed Wagnerites like yourself superhorn and emiellucifuge to bring into line those on this forum who are prone to be not as sensitive, and dare I say exhibit similar bigoted and fanatical attitudes to the regime which idolised Wagner and his ideologies.

So I don't think all Wagnerites are like that, but the job to bring them into line is by you, their fellow fans, not people like me. I am not a fan and was put off Wagner by them. When I came to this forum, I was pretty neutral on Wagner. I thought the fascistic attitude to do with him was history. Then I found out that the ghosts of the past live on, online. After being on the rough end of the stick with some of these people, I got rid of all my Wagner cd's earlier in the year. It came to that.

But its the same with any zealots. Their tactics have the opposite effect to what they're hoping to achieve. It puts people off, big time.

& the only reason I'm voicing these things is I think that this thread is the right place to do it. I would not 'troll' a thread on this forum solely about Wagner and his music. Since this thread asks those of us who don't like Wagner why we don't like him, I take it I can extrapolate on my thoughts here as I have done (& hopefully not come to grief with various 'characters' on this forum).

 

It took me twenty five years of loving opera before I got into Wagner. I've listened to and watched a lot of Rings since, and love the music (although I do agree with the "could do with some editing" camp). But I'm definitely not fanatical about him. His most mystical Late-Romantic themed opera, Parsifal, is simply too overblown for my rather rationalist 18th century character. And I'm not keen on the dramatic themes of Tristan either. I don't buy all the longing for death.

 

mamascarlatti, I don't much listen to Wagner beyond the very fine bloody gobbets of orchestral stuff. But I have gotten, somehow, the impression that he confuses religion with sex in some of his operas, especially Tristan. Do you think this is correct?

 

Its not a confusion but quite a deliberate idea that can be found through a lot of Buddhist teaching as well as the philosophy of Schopenhauer.

 

Well, I don't have much time really, so I have not read the whole thread... The only time I do sometimes dislike Wagner is when the Master's genius makes me stay up until the small hours of the night, listening to his 4-hour operas and I simply do not possess the willpower to leave them and go to bed. I wake up a few hours later with a headache and "sand" in my eyes and my first thought is "I hate you, Master!"

 

Well really now you're being unreasonable.
There is nothing Disney or petty and bourgois about philosophy. Philosophy stands next to science as a pillar of our understanding of the world. "more intellectual and philosophical a piece of art is the better." this is a statement of personal preference and cannot be true or untrue, and even if I do tend to like art that has some philosophical depth this is only a tendency - which is not to say that philosophy is the only thing necessary to make good art, nor to say that philosophy always makes good art.

Wagner happens to have written powerful dramas that have increased my understanding of the human condition. This is a positive I cannot ascribe to Schubert's songs in the same degree.

 

Please, don't read my assessment as a kind of personal attack. I try to understand why I don't like Wagner, and you try to understand why you do. I fully respect your feelings and opinions. But it intrigues me, that exactly what is appealing to you (deeper, more intellectual and philosophical) is for me the cause for not liking. I cannot say that Wagner increases my understanding of the human condition otherwise than that Wagner was a great pretender, a showman with bad sense of timing, similar to his friend Ludwig being a nutty king whose legacy consist of a number of Disney castles.

 

I find it weird, as I am bothered by Wagner's German, but I love Mozart in his German operas. I also have no problem, and I prefer the original German in Johann Strauss II operettas.
I like bits and pieces in Wagner, and I really enjoy his orchestral music, but his opera is painfully boring. I watched the whole ring once, I doubt I'll try again.
Poor Wagner, venerated by some, and disregarded by others.

 

Wagner dislikers, have any of you ever completely listened through with the German-English (or whatever native language of your choice) libretto in your hands and/or finished a DVD with subtitles of any of these following works: Tristan und Isolde, Die Meistersinger, Gotterdammerung, Parsifal.

Simple yes or no question, no explanation needed or wanted.

Not you, OP. I'm sure you've already done that a hundred times over.

 

No DVD, I listen to CD. Yes all of them except Die Meistersinger, which is for me the worst drag of draggers. Actually I do like Der Fliegende Holländer and Kurt Moll's singing in von Karajan's Parsifal. Wagner's operas I have in von Karajan's, Solti's, Knappertbusch's, Furtwängler's, Kubelik's, Levine's & Thielemann's interpretations. Actually I did see on TV Boulez & Chereau, when it was premiered. So many many hours of listening... and still no affection My listening focuses on the singers, not on Wagner...

 

I probably should have asked this question earlier in the thread. Anyway, do the people who don't like Wagner dislike his orchestral music (preludes, overtures) or do you like the orchestral music but not the opera?

Personally I began listening to his orchestral music well before I ever heard his operas. I absolutely adored all his orchestral music. Recently I have listened to almost all his operas and found that I like them as well. I realize that listening to his operas is a very different experience than listening to his orchestral music.

 

Anyway, do the people who don't like Wagner dislike his orchestral music (preludes, overtures) or do you like the orchestral music but not the opera?

I admire his "bloody gobbets" though mostly their style isn't my favorite. Objectively (as much as I can be) he was an overwhelming orchestral talent and would certainly have been the 19th century's second greatest composer -- if he had written more music. :devil:

 

The Wagner I really like is:

Otto Wagner introduced Academic or Geometric Art Nouveau in Architecture. Now that's mesmerising me, able to grab my full attention, always, again and again. Wagner's operas I listen to, mostly out of longing to hear some voices anew. Wagner's libretti (Die Fliegende Holländer is the exception) I consider to be of bottom drawer quality, Wagner's instrumental music is indeed magnanimous, but what I miss is: architecture, say, the neogothic cathedrals of Anton Bruckner.

My favourite all time bass is probably Kurt Moll, but there is Gottlob Frick too, Boris Christoff, a wealth of Bulgarians, and so on...

 

Wagner's libretti (Die Fliegende Holländer is the exception) I consider to be of bottom drawer quality...

Just out of curiosity, may I ask whose libretti are of the top drawer quality in your opinion?

 

^^OMG! The man himself is 'in the building!' WOW!!! It's the second coming. Let us all to Bayreuth to worship and adore him. & its nearly Christmas!

 

As far as longwinded pomposity goes, Wagner's actually not too bad! :tiphat:

 

What a backhanded compliment! :lol:

 

BTW, in the context of this discussion, something occurred yesterday in a Wagner group on Facebook which is worthy of note, and has actually reinforced my positive feelings concerning those who appreciate Wagner.

Someone posted this wonderful photo of renown bass-baritone, Sir Willard White:

Several group members praised his singing and deemed it regretful that such a talented singer had not played Wotan in a major production. Then out of the blue, a member spoke up and said how patently ridiculous this notion was, given that Wotan is a Teutonic god, going on to say that she believed that if Wagner were still alive, many of the group members might find themselves more in agreement than disagreement with this (detestable) viewpoint. She was immediately shot down for her obviously racist remark. No one supported her position or tried to paper it over and someone went on to say how much she hated racism. When I remarked in the thread that I was shocked that we were in 2012 and seeing such racism and put a , the group owner immediately deleted the entire thread within minutes. After the deletion a member suggested that it might have been good to leave that thread as it would clearly single out the person who had made that vile remark so all could witness (akin to displaying malefactors in the stocks or pillory in a town square, I suppose).

The result is that while this just brings out the point that some have made in this thread, that Wagner may be drawing some whose motives aren't pure, this actually affirms for me once again that as an overall body, Wagner fans are definitely self-policing and definitely are coming to Wagner because of the art, not the politics!

 

"Why do you NOT like Wagner?" Because my attention span was conditioned by Sesame Street.

 

I mostly listen to opera instead of watching it anyway, so for me it really does not matter much, but if I were going to see one live, I would expect the singers to at least attempt to look their role, be it a black Othello or a Teutonic Wotan.