Song and Sign

Abstract

Wagner believed that reducing vocal display and rejecting the convention that the orchestral material remain subordinate to vocal melody would involve listeners more intensively in the drama, and enhance their ability to identify with mythic or “uncanny” dramatic situations. In addition, Wagner’s new ideas about the “symphonic” potential of poetic-musical periods were complemented and challenged by occasional allusions to the simpler designs and textures of the Lied—a polarity that Richard Strauss found no less appealing. After an introductory Wagner/Strauss comparison—the music for night-watchmen in Die Meistersinger and Die Frau ohne Schatten—some relevant episodes in Wagner’s works from Rienzi to Parsifal are discussed, and then set in counterpoint with comparable passages from operas by Strauss. Finally, there is brief consideration of more recent developments in German opera that have sought to retain some aspects of the focus on reflective song that Wagner made his own.