Richard Wagner

ble Ring and the Book! Our immediate ancestors were a long-enduring, often long-suffering, generation. Perhaps they liked good value for their money. If so, Ric

joiced to have Tannh?user amongst them, and Tannh?user himself has much to say on finding himself free of the H?rselberg nightmare, and in familiar, homely, human scenes once more. The anger of the nobles in the second, Elisabeth's grief and intercession for her lover, her self-abasement-it is part of the drama to make us feel these things and time is required. The finale of the las

up declaring he has heard the village chime in his dreams, it is as if a breath of cool air, laden with the fragrance of wild flowers, blew into that hot, steaming cavern. Music of unimaginable beauty and freshness sings of the pleasant earth-the green spring, the nightingale. When Venus coaxes him, he responds with one of the world's greatest songs-the hymn to Venus. Her "Geliebter, komm" is another piece of magic. The very essence of sensuality is in it, and never was sin made to seem so lovely. One great theme follows another. "Hin zu den kalten Menschen flieh'" is almost Schubertian in its spontaneity. The music never flags; there are scarcely any of the old formulas-not even, for example, to express Venus's anger; the fund of melody seems inexhaustible. Three main points may be observed. First, the dramatic propriety of every phrase is perfect-the music wanted for each

ards when Tannh?user very guardedly tells Elisabeth of the wonder of his deliverance; and indeed it is expressive of a mood that became more and more characteristic of Wagner as he grew older, as though he got momentary glimpses of some blessed isle of rest where peace and relief from all earthly troubles could be found. A few years later we find him writing to Liszt of his longing for death as an escape; and though his appetite remained good, and he seemed bent on having the best of everything on his table, we can well believe that, overstrung by nature, in constant poor health, and making stupendous demands on his nervous energy

are Tannh?user's impatience and am glad when it is over. As soon as Tannh?user gets up the mighty spirit of Wagner begins to work. With a dramatic abruptness that startles one, a fragment of a Venusberg theme shoots up; then a few chords, and Tannh?user begins praise of the thing he understands by love. His strains are impassioned-too much so for another of the troubadours, Walther, who follows somewhat in Wolfram's manner, but with much more energy. Again there is, as it were, a glimpse of the Venusberg fire in the orchestra, and Tannh?user sings another song, more intense, again, in passion than his

agments of the graceful march-or, rather, processional-to which the minstrels had entered, and these come as a welcome preparation of the ear for the essential part of the scene. Wolfram's first effort, I say, I can hardly tolerate, considered as a piece of composition; yet, shortened, it would be admirably in place. From the moment Tannh?user begins all is perfect. Tannh?user's music grows in intensity, and Wagner is careful not to give us a se

nation is reached in a series of melodies hardly to be matched for pathetic beauty; the orchestra seems to throb with emotion-a device which Wagner often employed extensively in the Ring-the chorus join in, and a wondrous effect is obtained. The ensemble is the last piece of this description Wagn

hich makes one think that he had Schr?der-Devrient in his mind when he wrote the part. That gifted lady used-Berlioz said abused-the device of occasionally speaking, not singing, a few words; and here, where Elisabeth, in despair, says, "Er kehret nicht zurück," Wagner gives her notes that can be either spoken or sung, and certainly are most effective when spoken. The part, by the way, was not "created" by the Schr?der-Devrient, but by Johanna Wagner, the daughter of that brother Albert who had given him his first post in a theatre. I have nothing further to say about the Prayer, nor about the "Star of Eve" song. As night gathers over the autumn scene and Tannh?user enters, the music at once leaps to life. Not that we have not heard some very lovely things, notably a quotation in the orchestra from one of Wolfram's competition songs; the star shines out, and Wolfram, his harp now silent, sits gazing dreamily up in the direction Elisabeth has taken homeward to die. But now we get a renewal of the furious energy of the tournament scene. As Tannh?user declares his intention of returning to Venus, the music crack

at, the fa

to the sweet

disappears like a flame that is blown out. "Elisabeth!" Tannh?user echoes, and the chorus chants solemnly "Der Seele Heil," etc. "Henry, thou art redeemed," cries Wolfram; and then we h

e definiteness is never lost. Through the whirling, dancing-mad accompaniment runs a fibre of strong, clean-cut, sinewy melody. The picture is drawn with firm strokes as well as painted with a full brush. Or perhaps the better analogy would be to describe each sce

ew him declare, never ceased talking; Schumann was a silent man-sometimes in a café a friend might speak to him: Schumann would turn his back to the friend and his face to the wall, and continue to imbibe lager. Wagner would talk for an hour, and, getting no response, go away; he would afterwards declare Schumann an "impossible" man, out of whom not a word could be got; while Schumann would declare he could not tolerate Wagner, "his tongue never stops." Schumann had no dramatic instinct, and no comprehension for opera; in Genoveva-as, in fact, in his so-called dramatic cantatas-he failed utterly: he went straight through the words, setting them to music pur et simple, taking no thought for dramatic propriety. The score of Tannh?user simply puzzled him; he saw in it only the music pur et simple, considered as which it was, of course, very bad. It was not bad in all the ways he thought, however. His