Wagner: The Biography Of A Distraught Musician

Wagner is one of the composers who marked an era, influencing many of the great musical currents. The influence of the famous Wilhelm Richard Wagner and his composition is noticeable both in melody and harmony and in orchestration.

His ideas, his proposals and his way of life had both admirers and critics. He was, in any case, a controversial man. Musically, Wagner’s operas were characterized by the accentuated dilution of tonalities, blurring the line between singing and reciting.

Wagner’s music transports his audience to universes full of heroism and voluptuousness. The strength of his composition conquers the listener, inviting him to empathize with the story that unfolds on stage.

First years

Richard Wagner was born on May 22, 1813, in Leipzig, Germany. He was born in a humble home: his mother, Rosima Patz, was the daughter of a baker; his father, Karl Friedrich Wagner, was a police clerk. A few months after little Richard was born, his father died of a typhus epidemic.

Shortly thereafter, his mother married Ludwig Geyer, who would become his stepfather. Geyer was an actor, singer and painter. For this reason, it is usually pointed out as an influence on the artistic inclinations of the young Wagner. As a result of Geyer’s work in a theater company, the family moved to Dresden.

Wagner began attending the Vizehofkantor Carl Friedrich Schmidt school in Dresden in the year 1817. In the year 1822 he enrolled at the Kreuzschule (school of the cross) in Dresden. Richard studied there until he was 14 years old and, at that school, he took some piano lessons.

Richard Wagner used the name Richard Geyer almost until he was fifteen years old, and changed his surname upon formalizing his entry into the Nicolaischule (Nicolaite school) in Leipzig on January 21, 1828.

the desolation of your youth

The quantity and variety of his first compositions proves that Richard started out as a composer with works of a wide generic diversity. Among them, there was a certain predominance of instrumental parts that followed classical prototypes.

In 1833, when the artist was just twenty years old, he began his professional career, accepting the position of director of the Würzburg choir . His works, at this early stage, were all low-budget and aimed at a provincial audience. As an orchestral director, he finished his first opera: Die Feen ( The Fairies ). However, it would only be released five years after his death.

Three years later, Wagner was married to Minna Planer and, by that time, he had already composed several operas. During this period, Wagner began to develop his ideas of a revolutionary nature. Some claim that Wagner’s ideas somehow influenced Hitler’s Nazi ideas. In fact, currently, his compositions continue to be banned in Israel.

This phase was quite obscure for Wagner;  the marriage to Minna Planer was not helping much and he was going through a series of economic problems. In addition, he had problems with gambling and alcohol addiction. As a result, their economic recovery became even more difficult.

In 1839, the huge amount of debt accumulated by Richard Wagner forced him to flee the country, moving to Paris. The composer would only set foot in Germany again in 1842, but his stay in Paris was a failure and he was unable to release any of his works in the city. He worked assiduously as an arranger for other composers, but without much fame.

Wagner as writer

Wagner was not just an important composer. He also dared to experiment with other artistic forms, such as writing. Between the years 1840 and 1842, some of Wagner’s most important essays were published.

These essays dealt with historical and theoretical issues that had been of great interest to the artist throughout his life. Wagner was also a very prolific journalist, he even published in the German press several reviews of Parisian musical events, and he also wrote some pieces of a documentary nature.

It is worth noting that there are ambiguities in some of his biographical data. This is mainly due to the fact that there are several inconsistencies incorporated by Wagner himself in his autobiography Mein Leben (My Life).

This autobiography ranges from birth to age 51. The text is extremely subjective and your ego manifests. In this way, it is difficult to know exactly what is real in Wagner’s life. This autobiography was written in 1865 at the request of his benefactor, King Louis II of Bavaria.

return to homeland

After the opera Meyerbeer, Wagner became the most recognized composer in Germany. As luck would have it, a few days after the premiere, the royal Kapellmeister (Royal Chamber Director) Francesco Morlacchi passed away. On February 2, 1843, Wagner took over the lifelong post of royal Kapellmeister. This position gave him political prominence, which made him an expert at combining creativity with management.

Wagner’s artistic interests quickly merged with his political activity. The composer conceived the theater as the mirror of a reactionary society. Thus, by performing the transformation of the first, it would change the second. That’s why Wagner found himself involved in subversive politics.

Warner had affinities with German nationalism. The reflection of this thought can be clearly observed both in his mythological characters and in the arguments of his works. An idea that is reiterated in his work is that of the German colonies.

Political changes and the sponsorship of King Louis II of Bavaria

In 1849, the delicate political situation led to a revolution in Dresden. This meant the end of Wagner’s career as a real Kapellmeister. The issuance of an arrest warrant against Wagner caused him to flee to Switzerland, where he remained in exile for eleven years.

During this period, Wagner lived in a very precarious situation. He was excluded from the German musical world and his income was as low as his hopes of being able to represent his works.

In 1864, Wagner was in Mariafeld, near Zurich, on the run from his creditors. King Louis II, his avowed admirer, offered him his hospitality and financial assistance. Thus, “the master” composed Huldigungsmarsch  ( Tribute March ) for his benefactor.

In 1865, he released his famous work Tristan and Isolde in the city of Munich. A year later, his wife Minna died in Dresden, and the composer settled in Geneva. Under the patronage of the King, Wagner worked on his operas without worrying about expenses.

Bayreuth

Years later, Wagner conceived the plan to found the Wagner Society, a theater that would give rise to the famous festival of the same name that still exists today. The cornerstone of the Bayreuth Theater was laid on its 59th birthday. To achieve this achievement, he held a series of concerts across Germany with the aim of raising funds. The work was completed in 1874 thanks to the help of Louis II.

The composer built his Wahnfried house also in Bayreuth. However, just two years after finishing the works, the numbers of the theater revealed huge losses. Wagner did a series of concerts to raise funds to reduce the damage, but shortly thereafter he had heart problems.

death and legacy

Between 1881 and 1882, Wagner had several heart attacks. On February 13, 1883, the celebrated composer died in Venice, Italy. His body was buried in the garden of his Wahnfried house.

Der Ring des Nibelungen ( The Ring of the Nibelungen ) is undoubtedly his most important work. It comprises four operas: Die Walküre ( The Valkyrie ), Das Rheingold ( The Gold of the Rhine ), Götterdämmerung ( The Twilight of the Gods ) and Siegfried . The Ring of the Nibelung, Parsifal, Tristan and Isolde, Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg ( The Master Singers of Nuremberg ), Lohengrin, Tannhäuser  and Der Fliegende Holländer ( The Wandering Dutchman ) are part of the so-called Bayreuth Canon.

The complete cycle was only presented in 1876 and, from that time on, the canon would be represented at the annual festival that is still held in Bayreuth, Germany.

Wagner’s ideas had both supporters and critics. The legacy of the Bavarian Theater, of unprecedented complexity, was made possible by its fervent admirer, King Louis II of Bavaria. This theater is exclusively intended for the representation of his work, thus demonstrating that Wagner’s genius is still alive despite the passage of time.