From the Schubertiade Festival to the Museum Rietberg Zurich: A
journey from Wagner's Lieder to the Villa Wesendonck
The Schubertiade Festival is held annually in Schwarzenberg, a small
town in the Bregenzerwald, Austria. The new Angelika-Kauffmann-Hall
has an appealing acoustic, seats about 550, and is ideal for Liederabend
and Chamber Music Recitals. The Alpine mountains hover over the Bregenzerwald.
When we compare this to our Australian Ranges we are overawed by the
sheer magnificence of the Austrian Alps. Just in case we are blind
to this beauty, the Schubertiade Festival performers feast the ear
with musical performances of an incredibly high standard.
Bayreuth Festival audiences have already heard Violeta Urmana, the
Lithuanian mezzo-soprano, in complete roles including Kundry and Sieglinde.
The Schubertiade Festival audience had the opportunity to hear her
in an intimate venue for themselves on 1 September 2003. The program
opened with Schubert's rarity "Cronnan", D 282 a setting
of the James Macpherson (Ossian) poem translated into German. She
followed this with Wagner's Lieder nach Gedichten von Mathilde
Wesendonck. Her profound musical understanding, the range of colours
and tones in her voice combined with a masterly projection resulted
in music lovers' delight. Wagnerian rapture!
A selection from Hugo Wolf's "Spanish Song Book"[Spanisches
Liederbuch] acted as a contrast before the next creative result
of Wagner's stay beside the Villa Wesendonck. Jan Philip Schulze,
the pianist and accompanist, played the Tristan und Isolde Vorspiel
in an arrangement by Ernest Schilling. A piano arrangement is no substitute
for the full orchestra; however, Schilling's arrangement draws the
listener fully into the drama. Violeta Urmana topped the evening singing
Isolde's "Liebestod". She is widening the scope of her mezzo
soprano voice into full soprano. The performance was both a conquest
of the role and the audience. Wagner lovers hear live performances
of this stature too infrequently.
Zurich is a few hours drive over the Alps into Switzerland. The Villa
Wesendonck is now called the Museum Rietberg Zurich. It was here that
Wagner composed the five poems written by Mathilde Wesendonck and
grappled creatively with Tristan und Isolde.
The Villa is an absolute knockout - classic architecture
set in an extraordinary landscape with a view across to the lake,
what we call today "prime real estate". The life affirming
energies of the place resonate nearly 150 years later. Wagner's relationship
with Mathilde: we speculate but its intensity inflamed the creative
muse. When we move through the beautifully proportioned rooms with
stunning windows we can stop, listen to a museum handset. We notice
that Wagner's Women (all three) - his first wife, Minna, Mathilde
and Cosima- congregated here and are an essential part of his
creative history.
The museum publishes Richard Wagner's Buddha- Project "Die Sieger"
("The Victors"), a lecture given for the 100th Anniversary
of Wagner's death. It is fitting that the founding art donor of the
Museum Reitberg Eduard von der Haydt collected Buddhas. The Museum's
display of Buddhas is very choice. The rest of the non-European sculpture
and art collection includes some exceptional pieces. There's even
the Art of Oceania for Australian visitors.
Thomas Mann, the Nobel Prize for Literature winner, had a love-hate
relationship to Wagner's work. The house in which he lived is now
an archives/ museum within the University of Zurich. Down the road
a house plaque announces "Richard Wagner lived here", another
clue on the composer's exile trail. Zurich was a significant stopping
place for Wagner.
Colin Baskerville, 27 October 2003
This Page was last updated on:
10-Mar-2004
© Wagner Society in NSW Inc 2004 |