Richard Wagner: A Controversial Titan of Classical Music

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Even if you’re not a lover of classical music, you may have felt that first rush of adrenaline at the top of a ride or shed a tear at the first swell of a well-known piece. These are two among many of the famed compositions of today’s protagonist, one of the titans of music of all ages and genres: Richard Wagner. He left a mark not only on music but also on philosophy, society, and politics of the 19th and 20th centuries. Today, we will explore his personal life, his main works, his controversial views, and finally, we will address the ultimate question of his legacy, which ties his music to the propaganda efforts of the Third Reich. But does he really deserve to be remembered as the soundtrack to an authoritarian regime?

Wilhelm Richard Wagner was born on May 22, 1813, in Leipzig, then part of Saxony, presently in modern-day Germany. The city is remembered for its contributions to arts, literature, and music. Composers like Johann Sebastian Bach, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, and Felix Mendelssohn all worked as organists in the Church of Saint Thomas, the same church where young Richard was baptized. Not a bad start for a future giant of music.

Richard’s father, Carl Friedrich Wagner, a police clerk, died in November 1813 during a typhoid epidemic. A year later, Richard’s mother, Johanna, remarried, this time taking vows with noted actor, painter, and poet Ludwig Meyer. She worked with him in Dresden, taking Richard and his eight siblings along. There is evidence that Johanna and Ludwig had been lovers for a long time and that the artist may have actually been Richard’s biological father. Whatever the truth, Johanna had a strong bond with Richard and encouraged him to develop his creative and artistic side. Unfortunately, the boy soon lost his second father figure when Ludwig died suddenly on November 30, 1821. The Wagners stayed in Dresden for several more years, during which time Richard started taking piano lessons.

He gravitated more towards literature in his early teens and penned his first work, a five-act tragedy called “Leobold and Adelaide.” It was only after a move back to Leipzig in 1827 that young Wagner started taking music more seriously. During the second Leipzig tour, he began taking lessons in harmony and counterpoint and started attending performances of his favorite genre: opera. Richard composed his first serious sonatas and string quartets in the late 1820s. Encouraged by his natural ability, his mother convinced him to enroll at Leipzig University to study musical composition. The young composer flourished; his piano sonata in B-flat major impressed one of his teachers so much that he agreed to give him extra lessons for free.

At this stage, Richard’s compositions were small in scale, focusing on writing string quartets or sonatas for a single instrument. But in the 1830s, Wagner began composing orchestral symphonies and even incidental music for a play, “King Enzio.” This marked his debut in writing for a theatrical production. As he began collecting his first favorable reviews, Richard decided it was time to compose a work in his favorite genre: opera. His inaugural work was “Die Hochzeit” or “The Wedding,” but it remained incomplete. You’d be forgiven for thinking this was an early sign of writer’s block, but Wagner quickly bounced back with new finished works.

Between 1833 and 1836, he composed his first two complete operas. The first one was titled “The Fairies.” In contrast to common practice at the time, Wagner wrote both the music and the libretto. It told the story of the love between a fairy princess and a human, opposed by the fairy’s father, but unfortunately, it was never performed during Wagner’s lifetime. His second opera was “The Ban on Love,” a comic opera based on William Shakespeare’s “Measure for Measure.” This time, Wagner’s work earned a stage production, which promptly flopped after one performance. So if you ever despair about finding success in this life, remember this: even Wagner totally flunked his first three operas. But even these disappointments provided a great opportunity for Wagner to test and develop his musical and philosophical ideas.

While writing “The Fairies” and its follow-up, Wagner became friends with Heinrich Laube, a key figure of the Young Germans’ literary movement. Inspired by their ideals, Wagner started to reject the values of romantic poetry and music that were typical of the early 19th century. Instead, he began developing a new personal vision imbued with pan-Germanism and progressive liberal political thinking derived from the early ideals of the French Revolution. These were political and philosophical sentiments that Wagner shared with many other young European intellectuals who were disappointed by the restoration at the time.

Richard had started courting actress Christine Wilhelmine Planer, known as Mina. Together, they moved to Magdeburg and started working with the Bethmann theatrical company. It was with this troupe that Wagner conducted the premiere of his second completed opera, “The Ban on Love,” in March 1836. The total fiasco that ensued bankrupted Bethmann’s company and left Wagner with few professional prospects. Luckily, Mina was a planner not only in name; she sorted out their next move, which was a relocation to Königsberg, now modern-day Kaliningrad on the Baltic Sea. Here, she took a new job at the city’s main theatre, and the two lovers married on November 24.

Very soon after the arrival of the Wagners, the Königsberg theatre found itself on a slippery slope towards bankruptcy. Richard was also plagued by other troubles; Mina, not exactly the faithful sort of wife, had eloped with a young lover. Help swiftly came from Heinrich Dorn, a conductor Richard knew from his Leipzig days. Dorn secured a post as conductor for Wagner at the German Theater in Riga, modern-day Latvia. This job would give him financial security and maybe even the chance to mend his relationship with Mina. The plan worked—well, sort of. Wagner arrived in Riga in August 1837, and by early 1838, Mina was again by his side. The two enjoyed a better quality of life for a short time, but more problems were not far behind. As the couple lived beyond their means, debts started to accumulate. At the same time, Mina had resumed her infidelities, accepting the courtship of the theater’s very director. In other words, his wife had started dating his boss.

Wagner was also frustrated by the poor quality of the frivolous comedic operas he was forced to conduct. Eventually, this experience proved to be a disappointment. In 1838, the German Theatre did not renew his contract, with debt collectors literally pounding on his door. On July 10, Richard dragged Mina to the harbor, and the two escaped on a smuggler’s ship amidst a formidable sea storm. Their destination? Paris. As the ship navigated the waves and winds, let’s ponder this man’s life so far. For a 26-year-old, he had achieved some solid success but also some catastrophic failures, both professionally and personally. And yet, in his luggage, he carried a wealth of experience that he would later put to good use.

While in Riga, exasperated by the light nature of musical theater, he had started writing the libretto for a new work. This would become the monumental opera “Rienzi,” based on a novel by Edward Bulwer-Lytton. This is a historical piece about a 14th-century Roman leader and his populist uprising. During his tenure at the German Theatre, Wagner also developed a new conducting stance, revolutionary for those times. Rather than waving the baton while facing the audience, he faced the orchestra to establish a closer connection with the musicians. Finally, he took careful notes about the architecture of the German theatre; he especially admired the dark auditorium, the simple deck or amphitheater layout, and the deep orchestral pit. These features would all later inspire the construction of his own theater.

But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. The Wagners landed in France in September 1839 after a tortuous journey during which Mina had suffered a miscarriage. This was a tragic event that marked the beginning of another unfortunate period of marital conflict. In Paris, Mina was able to tread the boards now and again, while Richard, the only wooden boards he saw were those of the doors slammed in his face. Apparently, Parisians had little interest in his music. Wagner took a day job completing arrangements for a music publisher while he hustled to get “Rienzi” on stage. An old friend from Leipzig, composer Giacomo Meyerbeer, interceded on Wagner’s behalf with the director of the Paris Opera. Unfortunately, the Parisian establishment was too conservative to accept the work of a young unknown German composer.

Undeterred, Wagner continued to write and compose, completing his next opera, “The Flying Dutchman.” This opera was inspired in part by a legendary ghost ship, as well as Wagner’s own perilous voyage from Riga. Musically, it introduced for the first time one of Wagner’s signature techniques: the leitmotif, a recurring musical theme associated with a specific character or situation. The leitmotif concept has had a major lasting effect on modern and contemporary music, even on film and TV soundtracks. Consider the Imperial March from “Star Wars” or “The Rains of Castamere” from “Game of Thrones,” two ominous accompaniments that sonically acknowledge the presence of series villains.

While Wagner was composing “The Flying Dutchman,” he had the idea to hustle back home. He sent a petition to the King of Saxony, Friedrich Augustus II, asking him to accept “Rienzi” as a production at the Dresden Court Theatre. In June of 1841, the king accepted. More than a year later, on July 7, 1842, Richard and Mina left Paris to prepare for the premiere of “Rienzi.” Considering Wagner’s track record, his relative obscurity, and the fact that the opera was five hours long, well, you can probably guess how it went—and you would be wrong. The opera debuted on October 20, 1842, and audiences absolutely loved it—all five hours.

The year 1843 took off with another rapturous debut: that of “The Flying Dutchman,” a piece in which the composer further pushed the boundaries of operatic convention. These successes granted Wagner a new role as musical director of the Royal Court in Dresden. With newfound financial stability, the young composer could finally repay his many debts—well, kind of. He actually just ended up borrowing more money to pay them, but who are we to judge? You see, he had some other concerns to keep him occupied. This was Europe in the mid-1840s, and another age of political and philosophical debate was brewing. After the post-Napoleonic restoration, a fuse had been lit under the continent, and a spark was gradually burning its way towards 1848, that bomb of a revolutionary year. The detonation was inevitable, and the young, restless Wagner had already picked his side.

While working for the King of Saxony, Wagner continued honing his operatic craft. The next of his operas to premiere was “Tannhäuser” in October of 1845. This work deals with the titular wandering minstrel torn between pagan beliefs and Christianity, between the pleasures of worldly passion and spiritual love. While developing the libretto for this opera, Wagner began studying the mythology of German and Nordic lore, which he found to be a gold mine of inspiration. His favorite writer became medieval poet Wolfram von Eschenbach, whose works are used as a basis for two future operas: “Parsifal” and “Lohengrin.” “Lohengrin” revolves around a mysterious knight who protects young Elsa against a malicious ruler, Count Telramund. Wagner completed it in April 1848, just when revolutionaries across Europe were rising up against their own malicious rulers.

Wagner frequented the Dresden court while writing these new operas, but he preferred to mingle with revolutionary activists who shared his progressive ideals, his desire for a constitutional government, or even his yearning for a united Germany. Most notable among them was Augustus Schleich, the editor of the radical newspaper “Volksblätter,” and Mikhail Bakunin, the founder of collectivist anarchism. Initially, Saxony was not involved in the revolutionary wildfire of 1848, but after more than a year of quiet dissent, in May of 1849, Dresden revolted against its king. The Saxon people took to the streets, pressing the king to institute social and electoral reforms. Wagner was on their side; he wrote articles against the aristocracy and in favor of a republican constitution, and he personally distributed revolutionary manifestos to the Saxon troops.

Eventually, he got involved with some of the more serious action, and on May 7, 1849, Richard Wagner volunteered to spy on troop movements from the top of a church tower in Dresden. Soon, he spotted incoming troops. The problem was that they spotted him too, and they opened fire. Luckily for the future of music history, those unnamed soldiers were bad shots, and Wagner escaped in one piece. But his name had already been compromised by his rebellious articles. When the uprising eventually failed, Saxon authorities issued an arrest warrant on May 16. But the composer was on a streak of good luck. The warrants bore a very vague description of Wagner: 37 to 38 years old, of medium height, with brown hair and eyeglasses. They might as well have written “a guy somewhere in Europe.” The incompetence of Saxon police allowed Wagner to escape Dresden and relocate to Zurich, Switzerland. With the help of his friend, composer Franz Liszt, Wagner spent the next 12 years in exile from Germany.

Running low on morale and even lower on funds, a group of friends thankfully arranged for him to receive a regular pension to give him some stability—except he sabotaged himself by having an affair with one of the wives of said friends. So much for gratitude. During the first years in Switzerland, the Wagners were again unhappy. Mina slipped into depression while Richard suffered from composer’s block. If there is such a thing, he did write some essays, though. The first one, “The Artwork of the Future,” was a visionary work in which he described opera as a total work of art that combined music, song, dance, poetry, visual arts, and stagecraft. The follow-up, published in 1850, was his infamous “Judaism in Music” essay. In this work, he expressed publicly for the first time his anti-Semitic views, which he held in private throughout his life, even extending his racial disdain to other nations. His thesis was that Jews had no connection to the lofty German national spirit and, as such, were capable of producing only shallow and artificial music. According to Wagner, Jewish composers were only seeking popularity and financial success, incapable of conceiving genuine art. The Jewish artist could only speak in imitation of others; he could not really speak, write, or create art on his own.

It can be argued that Wagner did have many Jewish friends and that anti-Semitic views were quite common in Europe at the time. However, taking the time to write and publish such views really took the arbitrary hatred of a whole portion of mankind to another level. And yet, Wagner’s musical genius cannot be denied, nor can his drive for innovation in the musical medium. While he was working on his first pamphlets, the composer had also started working on his best-known masterpiece: the four-opera cycle “The Ring of the Nibelung,” or simply “The Ring.” This cycle includes “Das Rheingold,” “Die Walküre,” “Siegfried,” and “Götterdämmerung.” The plot is inspired by Nordic mythology and revolves around a magic ring that can bestow the power to rule the world. The god Wotan steals the ring from its maker, the Nibelung dwarf Alberich. He then hands it over to giants Fafner and Fasolt as payment for them building Valhalla, Wotan’s mortal grandson. The hero Siegfried slays Fafner to retrieve the ring, only to be killed by Alberich’s son. The Valkyrie Brunnhilde, secret lover of Siegfried, returns the ring to the Rhine maidens, rightful owners of the gold from which the ring had been forged. She then commits suicide on Siegfried’s funeral pyre before the gods and Valhalla are all destroyed in “Götterdämmerung.”

If you want any more details on the story, you are welcome to attend the full 15-hour performance. According to Carol Berger, professor of music at Stanford University, “The Ring” is an allegory for Wagner’s political beliefs inspired by his revolutionary experience. Siegfried’s quest represents a struggle to wrest power from the hands of capitalists, that’s the goldsmithing dwarves, as well as the aristocracy. In his lifetime, though, Wagner did not expound on the meaning of the cycle but rather on his musical vision. In an 1851 publication, “A Communication to My Friends,” Wagner described his work as dramas rather than operas. They would be performed at a specially designed festival over the course of four consecutive days, allowing audiences to enjoy the cycle in its entirety.

The composition of the Ring cycle absorbed most of Wagner’s energies during much of the 1850s. By June of 1857, the composer had written and composed the first two dramas and the first two acts of “Siegfried” before setting them aside for another project: “Tristan und Isolde.” Now, before we continue with today’s very long video, I’d like to thank Squarespace for making it possible.

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