Richard Wagner is a German composer who changed the history of music in opera. His work and his scientific works on the aesthetics of music led to the end of the era of romanticism, the establishment of a stable connection between art and life. He made the language of music richer and filled the orchestral composition with new colors.
Childhood and youth
Wilhelm Richard Wagner was born in Leipzig on May 22, 1813, the ninth child in the family. His father died a few months after the birth of his son, and his mother - Johana Rosina - six months after that she again married the artist and actor Ludwig Geiger. Richard loved and respected his stepfather, and strove to be like him. Geiger, in turn, strongly supported the craving of adopted children for art. At the age of 15, Richard, inspired by the works of Shakespeare and Goethe, wrote a great tragedy - "Loibald and Adelaide". The family did not like the tragedy, and he decided to write music for the play, but soon realized that for this he did not have enough musical education. Wagner begins to study harmony and music theory with the cantor of the Church of St. Thomas, where he was once baptized, where he attended a liberal arts school, and where Johann Sebastian Bach served as cantor for 25 years in the 18th century.
A year later, Richard Wagner wrote the first opera "The Whims of Lovers" with a libretto based on the play of the same name by Goethe. Neither word nor music of this work has survived, but the fact that young Wagner began his career as a composer by writing an opera is not accidental. The history of music divides the genre of opera into pre-Wagnerian and post-Wagnerian periods. Wagner introduced a pervasive dramatic composition into this genre, subordinating to it both music and libretto and stage performances.
The beginning of a musical career
In the years 1829-1830, Richard wrote several small works: a piano sonata, a string quartet, but they did not find support from those close to him. The aspiring composer still lacks theoretical knowledge.
In 1831, Richard Wagner continued his education, entering the University of Leipzig.
In 1832 he created a libretto and began writing music for his opera The Wedding. However, she did not finish the work under the influence of criticism from her older sister, who by that time was already a popular actress. Only three fragments of the first act of the opera have come down to us.
In 1833, Richard Wagner received a job as choirmaster at the Würzburg Opera House.
In 1833, Richard's friend, music critic and librettist Heinrich Laube, offered him his libretto for an opera entitled Kosciuszko. Wagner familiarized himself with the text and said that Heinrich misunderstood the principle of reproducing heroic events in a piece of music. From now on, he decides that only he will write the libretto for his operas. Richard Laube's idea is radically altered by replacing the heroic Polish gentlemen with characters from Carlo Gozzi's fairy tale "The Snake Woman". He calls his opera "Fairy". This is the first completed large work of Wagner that has survived to this day. True, its first performance took place after the death of the composer.
Soon after writing the opera The Fairies, the young musician moved to Magdeburg, where he was offered a job as a conductor at the opera house. The following years were difficult for Wagner. He works in various theaters: in Königsberg, in Riga, in Paris, in Dresden, but nowhere he is paid enough not to feel the need. He even has to earn money by rewriting notes, but still cannot pay off his debts. Then, in order to earn even a little more, he went to sing in the choir. However, it quickly became clear that the composer did not have any singing talent, and this part-time job had to be abandoned. All this time he continues to compose. During these years, he wrote and staged the operas "The Forbidden of Love" and "Rienzi, the Last Tribune".
First recognition as a composer
In Paris, in 1840, Wagner wrote the Faust concert overture. The work was conceived as an opera, but, subsequently, the composer decided to arrange it in the form of a small finished work. The overture was well received by critics. P. I. Tchaikovsky, who was generally skeptical of Wagner, gave Faust an extremely high assessment.
In 1841 Wagner wrote the opera The Flying Dutchman. This was his first work, in which his new approach to opera as an integral and complete dramatic work was finally formed, in contrast to the previously accepted construction of opera in the form of independent, often unrelated, musical fragments. Returning from Paris to Germany, he staged "Rienzi" and "The Flying Dutchman" on the stage of the Dresden opera house and finally received recognition. Here he entered the position of the Saxon royal court kapellmeister.
In Dresden, Richard Wagner writes the operas Tannhäuser and Lohengrin, which are based on romantic Germanic tales. The period of prosperous existence in the capital of the Saxon kingdom ends for him in 1849, when a republican uprising took place in Dresden. Wagner took part in it and even got acquainted with Mikhail Bakunin, who was one of the leaders of the public security committee. The uprising was suppressed with numerous casualties. An arrest warrant was issued for Wagner and he had to emigrate to Switzerland.
For the next twelve years he lived in exile. He wrote theoretical works in which he outlined his views on musical aesthetics and on the connection between art and real life, conducted orchestras in Brussels, Paris and London. During these years he became interested in Schopenhauer's philosophy. In the late 1850s, Wagner created the opera Tristan and Isolde, a hymn to love and death, one of his most famous works.
Friendship with Friedrich Nietzsche
In 1862, when Wagner was already amnestied and returned to Germany, the clavier of Tristan and Isolde came to Friedrich Nietzsche. The future famous philosopher was then only 18, he already taught at the Greek philology university and still dreamed of becoming a musician. Wagner's opera shocked him so much that until the end of his life he considered it the most outstanding piece of music. Nietzsche once wrote to his friend: "I am not able to treat this music with cold criticism, all the fibers of my soul, all my nerves tremble, and I have not experienced such a prolonged admiration for a long time." In 1866, at the house of his friends, whose hostess was Wagner's sister, Nietzsche was introduced to the famous composer and was given the opportunity to communicate with him. During the conversation, it turned out that both - the young philologist and the 53-year-old venerable composer - are passionate about Schopenhauer, that both are interested in the history and literature of ancient Greece and that both dream of the revival of the spirit of the German nation and the great reorganization of the world. Nietzsche wrote after this meeting: "Wagner is a genius, in the sense that Schopenhauer understood him."
Three years later, this acquaintance between the genius philosopher and the genius composer continued and grew into friendship. Nietzsche not only admires and is inspired by Wagner, but, under the influence of his innovative views on music and no less innovative works, he himself embarks on the path of sincere, uncompromising and not limited by any norms of expressing his thoughts. According to Stefan Zweig, "An academic philosopher dies in him in one night."
After a few years, this friendship ended. Nietzsche accuses Wagner's work of not meeting the requirements of the beautiful, and he speaks about Nietzsche's books as a sad manifestation of mental illness. However, these years of friendship and close communication have had a huge impact on both.
Women of Richard Wagner
In 1870, Wagner fell in love with Franz Liszt's daughter, Kazima. She was married at that time, but her reciprocal feeling was so strong that she divorced and became the wife of the composer.
Before that, Wagner was already married. The future composer met his first wife, Minna Glider, at the age of 20. Their marriage lasted three decades, but the couple considered it a mutual misunderstanding. Nevertheless, all these years the composer shared his creative ideas with his wife and listened to her opinion.
While married to Minna, Wagner developed a passion for another married woman. Matilda Vezdonk became his muse. The opera "Valkyrie" is dedicated to her, she became a source of inspiration when writing "Tristan and Isolde".
Wagner's love triangle ended in 1870 with a divorce from Minna and a break in relations with Matilda. Soon after, Wagner became inflamed with feelings for Kazim. She lived with the great composer until his death in 1833, and after the departure of Wagner, she headed and made the world famous Bayreuth Music Festival, which is still held annually in the theater, built under the direction of Wagner himself.
