Customer Reviews

Actors and Singers

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This paperback is a collection of some of Richard Wagner's writings, viz:

1)
To the German Army Before Paris (a short, and unimportant poem meant to be set to music by another composer);
2)
A Capitulation (a second-rate burlesque, lampooning the French);
3)
Reminiscences of Auber (where Wagner gives a back-handed compliment to the French by praising an obscure French composer and an even more obscure opera);
4)
Beethoven (which is about Wagner himself and his feelings about music much more than it is about Beethoven);
5)
The Destiny of Opera (here, Wagner re-plows the same ground as in "Opera and Drama");
6)
Actors and Singers (a long article where Wagner critiques the theater stage, not to be confused with the opera stage);
7)
The Rendering of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony (detailing the "improvements" he made in the orchestration; the performance was for the dedication of the foundation stone laying at Bayreuth);
8)
Letters (to an Actor; to an Italian Friend [Arrigo Boito] on the Production of "Lohengrin" at Bologna; to the Burgomaster of Bologna; to Friedrich Nietzsche);
9)
Some minor (short) essays (a Glance at the German Operatic Stage of Today [detailing his criticisms about the German opera houses he visited while scouting for talent for his upcoming Ring performances at his new opera house in Bayreuth] ; on the Name "MusikDrama"; Prologue to a Reading of "Die Götterdämmerung Before a Select Audience in Berlin").
10)
two reports about Bayreuth (where he is starting the construction of his personal opera house)

In 1893, the London Wagner Society published an English translation of the 8 volume set of Wagner's Collected Works. William Ashton Ellis supplied the rather clumsy English translation, perhaps excusable since Wagner's prose was equally clumsy. "Actors and Singers" is a reprint of volume 5 of that set, which covers the years 1870-1873. Note that the title "Actors and Singers" is merely one of the articles contained therein and does not constitute the entirety of the book (it is, however, the longest one, but not the most important one); in fact, it could have any one of a number of titles, including "Beethoven" or "The Destiny of Opera".

Do I recommend this book? Well, it is all written by Richard Wagner, so it is by nature at least a little interesting. Much of the material here is pretty inconsequential. Only "Beethoven" was of great interest to me, and, to a lesser degree, "A Glance at the German Operatic Stage of Today". I do recommend it for that reason alone, but my endorsement is rather lukewarm.