The Evidence Of The Hardcore Wagnerian

[Novi]

'I like Wagner's music better than anybody's. It is so loud that one can talk the whole time without other people hearing what one says. That is a great advantage, don't you think so ...'

Lady Henry Wotton, The Picture of Dorian Gray 

[bhodges]

'I like Wagner's music better than anybody's. It is so loud that one can talk the whole time without other people hearing what one says. That is a great advantage, don't you think so ...'

Lady Henry Wotton, The Picture of Dorian Gray 

Somehow I missed this totally hilarious quote, which is really making me laugh over and over.  Thanks so much for posting it.

--Bruce

[Homo Aestheticus]

this entire moronic thread; a thread instigated by the most perverse notion imaginable in connection with Wagner's music-dramas, and a thread that should have died with its very first post.

David,

How can you say that it is the  most  perverse notion imaginable when most Wagner lovers acknowledge the superiority of the music ?

The original poster is someone with an unusual aesthetic sensibility who simply takes the experience one step further.     

[Homo Aestheticus]

I think the original poster hit the nail on the head and I agree with him that Wagner's libretti are not worthy of their music. The music is far deeper and more profound than the literary, political and philosophical ideas the composer was trying to express.

Wagner DOES express his views and ideas, and he DOES tell his stories, and he DOES use myths interestingly, but in general the music far surpasses these stories, plots and ideas. As a literary artist he would have sunk out of sight long ago. I am grateful to his literary imagination for stimulating the musical ideas of the operas. There is ample evidence he could not write great music without literary ideas to fuel it. But I would no more highly honor the finished literary aspects of these works than I would eat the frying pan along with the omelette.

Thank you, Chaszz.

It is amazing how anyone could argue that Wagner's libretti (or any aspect) deserve equal attention.

[Dancing Divertimentian]

The original poster is someone with an unusual aesthetic sensibility who simply takes the experience one step further.     

The original poster being you, of course.

How is omitting the libretto "one step further"?

[karlhenning]

The original poster is someone with an unusual aesthetic sensibility who simply takes the experience one step further.

The original poster being you, of course.

Well apprehended, officer!

[Dancing Divertimentian]

 

[Superhorn]

  It  was Wagner's music that first got me hooked on classical music when I was only abou 13, and I still adore his music, even though I also love a great deal of other music,operatic or other.
  With Wagner, the sheer sensuous appeal of the music is undeniable, but you can't separate the music from the stage action and the character's emotional and psychic states. I grateful that I got to get to know the Wagners operas and so many others from complete recordings ,first on LP and later on Cd,and was able to follow the stories with the help of the booklets with the original text and English translations. I now know the operas so well I don't need the translation any more.

[J.Z. Herrenberg]

Beethoven and Wagner were my first loves (Pastoral and Meistersinger prelude). Dozens of other composers have followed. In Beethoven I liked the drive, the power, the economy, in Wagner the excitement, beauty and grandeur. I am simplifying, of course. But those six characteristics are still what I connect with most in music.