Die Meistersinger and German art
capa0...@aol.com
interesting series of observations that REG made about "Meistersinger"
in the other group, along with my reply.
>REG wrote:
Although, like the cook in Lewis Carroll, I can enjoy beating on
Wagner for the effect, in fact there are four operas of his that I
quite enjoy: Lohengrin, Tristan, Parsifal, and Meistersinger. I went
tonight to the Meistersinger at the MET, and won't try to top or
repeat Dan's review, which still was very much on point, although
Morris got terribly hoarse in his monologue before the quintet, and
Botha sounded a bit tired in the second half of the first act; I also
thought Hong a bit hard to hear at times until Act III, and overall
the cast might all be suffering from early colds. My only
disagreement
with Dan, and I've seen far fewer Meistersingers, is that I think
Polenzani is probably at close to the end of his useful life as David
- the voice is getting heavier and a bit more 'bottom' centered, and
he seemed to be struggling in the second and third acts at moments to
keep it lighter than it might really want to be. In any case, it was
certainly a major, if not a purely first class, evening vocally.
What I wanted to try to address is something else, which is
undoubtedly obvious but strikes me as a little different in emphasis
than what I've thought before - that is, that Meistersinger really is
an embodiment of a certain kind of racial purity that goes beyond the
"Deutschland Uber Alles" of the last scene. In fact, what struck me
in
this production (and I'm a bit ham-strung, since the only two
productions I've ever seen have bee the two MET productions and I
don't have the concentration to watch videos (at least not of opera,
thank you)) is that the whole Nurnberg world is from the beginning
completely homogeneous. I know that there is some scholarly thought,
apparently fairly well-received, that Wagner intended Beckmesser to
represent anti-Semitic elements, and this may be the case, but
despite
his unattractiveness, I think there's no question that he's fairly
well-integrated into the community from the beginning.
In a sense, Meistersinger is the 'ideal' comedy - if you are
familiar
with the work of Northop Frye, who was an philospher, he said, in a
very small and distorted nutshell, that the essence of comedy wasn't
that a work was "funny", but rather that the possibilities for drama
and human loss were dealt with by denial - where there is conflict,
or
the potential for conflict, a comic work deals with the conflict and
the possiblities of pain and loss by denying that the pain and loss
exist, and gives us instead an idealized, painless solution to the
'problem'. So the essence of comedy isn't 'ha ha', but that all
conflicts are resolved in an idealized way in which everyone lives
'happily ever after', reality notwithstanding. If you don't know Frye
and have any interest in this kind of thing - philosophy or art or
what makes different kinds of art what they are, you would have a
treat in reading him, I think.
Anyway, I thought about this because from the beginning there's
almost
a cloying quality to Meistersinger, at least how I see it presented
on
the MET stage, and undoubtedly staging has something to do with it.
I
don't see Sachs as being particularly warm or 'humane', although I
understand that that's how he's usually seen, and although there are
some hints that he has to do some real renouncing of his own interest
in Eva, it's not much of what goes on. Humanity and wisdom really
proceed not from some elitisim, I don't think, but through a certain
kind of hard experience, and there's no opportunity in Wagner's
Nurnberg for that kind of experience for anyone. Everyone lives in a
kind of Utopia already - it many ways it is a walled city - and
everyone knows his or her place, and that place is guaranteed. Aside
from Beckmesser, no one loses, or risks losing, anything....there's
no
real conflict, and that's because the society is so homogeneous and
idealized. In a sense, the love of Eva and Walther is puppy love -
there's never much risk or conflict going on. No one can doubt that
David will, over time, succeed, and the Meisteringers will continue
as
they always have, with no risk of revolution, and only the ocassional
acceptable reform. And I think it's clear in the work that what is
needed for that kind of ideal world isn't that German art triumph
(remember, the warning about German art is that is will survive even
the depradations of conquerors), BUT that there be a kind of
homogeneity and purity in the German world.
Now, I know that most opera, and certainly most 'comic' operas,
doesn't deal with issues like multiculturalism or the fate of
minorities, but I think there's rarely the combination of a social
focus, as there is in Meistersinger, with the kind of world in which
everyone knows and has their place. Elisir may be a comedy on a much
smaller scale, but there's far more at stake, actually, for the
participants, and far more social conflict and class conflict than
ever appears in Meistersinger. The subtext of Meistersinger is
ultimately, in part, that a homogeneous society is the ideal society.
Just to say it once more, I am not saying that the subtext of
Meistersinger is that German art conquers other art, or is superior -
my tiny contribution is to say that I think the text is that German
society must be a homogeneous society.
Perhaps other stagings, and other interpretations, can bring
something
else to this work, which is obviously quite complex and 'means
things'
on too many levels to really simplify, but when people talk of Wagner
and his influence on the baleful side of German in the last century,
it seems to me that Meistersinger really presented a Utopia that was
inherently a dystopia....in a sense (and not the sense that Wilde
would have liked), it is a very 'bad' work. (Wilde said there was
good
or bad art, and it didn't have anything to do with the 'moral' of the
art, but how it was constructed). That doesn't make me enjoy the
music less or want to see it less, but to me it adds at least a
slight
dimension to what I think of as the influence of Wagner on German
nationalism, and ultimately its inspiration for a much more
horrendous
development in the next century.
=================================
I have always felt that the 'glorious German art' business at the end
of Meistersinger is really a plea for Germans to unite around the one
good thing, apart from their language, that unites them -- their art &
music.
Wagner and Bismarck were born only two years apart (1813 and 1815
respectively), and as young men, each in his way must have felt that
the fragmented Germany of the Napoleonic and post Napoleonic eras
could be a tremendous force in the political and cultural history of
the world -- as indeed it proved to be in the 20th century -- if ever
its contentious peoples could unite.
By mid century, or a little after, Bismarck had made great strides
with the political re-unification of Germany, but the country was
still badly split in other ways - particularly religion. Bismarck
spent the next thirty years or so fighting his famous Kulturkampf with
the Catholic minority, sensing that the large Catholic minority,
centered in Bavaria, would always undermine the budding reich's
stability. I think Meistersinger was Wagner's attempt to get the
protestants and Catholics of his own day to look beyond their
religious beliefs and pull together -- for the greater good of Germany
and German art.
Note that Meistersinger is set in Nuremburg, in very Catholic
Bavaria, in the middle of the 16th century, a generation or so after
the Lutheran storm tore apart the theology and the fabric of Germany.
In the 1520's the Peasants' War had swept through Thuringia, Bavaria,
and Swabia and thousands had been slaughtered over their disagreements
about how to pray to and honor a merciful God. Bloodshed had
continued on a lesser scale long afterwards, culminating eventually in
the seemingly unending Thirty Years War of the 17th century, which was
largely a religious war.
But what do we have in Meistersinger? Walther is a Thuringian, almost
certainly a protestant. (Catholicism had been all but banned in
Thuringia in 1520, when most of the priests had been driven out; the
Peasants War had decimated most of the rest.) Viewed in this light
one can see a very subtle Romeo and Juliet-like subtext to
Meistersinger -- two young people from different and clashing worlds
more or less indifferent to the rituals of their respective churches,
but united by love and music.
Seen in this light Sachs' eulogizing of German art should not be seen
so much as a chauvinistic trumpeting of German cultural supremacy, nor
as an impolite challenge to the people of other countries, but as a
rallying cry to the people of his own city, of his own country. What
can we not do as a people, the irreligious Wagner asks in words and
music, if we all pull together and rejoice in what unites us, rather
than bicker about what divides us?
The dark side of this coin is that Wagner used anti-semitism, another
cultural element that tended to pull Catholics and protestants
together, albeit at the expense of an innocent third party, in much
the same way.
Pat
thierry
> Note that Meistersinger is set in Nuremburg, in very Catholic
> Bavaria, in the middle of the 16th century, a generation or so after
> the Lutheran storm tore apart the theology and the fabric of Germany.
> In the 1520's the Peasants' War had swept through Thuringia, Bavaria,
> and Swabia and thousands had been slaughtered over their disagreements
> about how to pray to and honor a merciful God.
True, but at that time Nuremberg was not in Bavaria. Nuremberg is in
Franconia, and Franconia became part of Bavaria as late as in 1806.
Nuremberg was, and still is, a protestant city. The afflux of
protestants in 1806 led Bavaria to declare the egality of the
religions, and until today the Catholic holidays haven' been holidays
in Nuremberg, among other cities.
The Meistersinger are set 100%ly in a protestant frame.
th.
jszos...@comcast.net
---------
Thierry: You mean...they don't celebrate Christmas in Nuremburg? I'm
pretty sure that's considered a VERY Catholic Holyday as well as
holiday. As well as Easter...I believe.
Jon E. Szostak, Sr.
thierry
Christmas and Easter are celebrated both by Catholics and Protestants,
but
Epiphany (Jan 6th), Corpus Domini, Assumption (August 15th), All
Saints' Day (Nov 1st) ... are only Catholic and thus are workdays in
NurembErg (not Nuremburg), while they are holidays in Munich or
Augsburg.
th.
capa0...@aol.com
Very interesting. I have always understood Bavaria to be 70-80%
Catholic, and obviously did not know that Nuremberg was an exception
to that. After reading your message I found an online Catholic
reference claiming 220,000 Catholics in Nuremberg, a city of about
half a million, so obviously the Catholics are not in the majority
there.
Another thing that helped convince me that "Meistersinger" was posed
in a Catholic setting is the name of the church -- the
Kathareninkirche (St Catherine's Church). In the US one occasionally
runs across a Lutheran church named for a male disciple or evangelist
(St John, St Peter, St Paul), but in my experience Lutheran churches
here are almost never named for female (or obscure male) saints.
Catholic churches, of course, are commonly named for saints that non-
believers have never even heard of. At least in the US.
Finally, I swear that I have read that in the Thirty Years War
Gustavus Adolphus, the protestant king from the north, "took"
Nuremberg -- rather than "defended" it or "saved" it, as one would
expect might have been the case had it been a protestant city at that
time.
But clearly you are much closer to the situation, and better informed
about it than I, so I defer to your superior learning.
Thanks for straightening me out.
Pat
thierry
> ==============
> Very interesting. I have always understood Bavaria to be 70-80%
> Catholic, and obviously did not know that Nuremberg was an exception
> to that. After reading your message I found an online Catholic
> reference claiming 220,000 Catholics in Nuremberg, a city of about
> half a million, so obviously the Catholics are not in the majority
> there.
No prob here. At the time when 'cujus regio, ejus religio' was
proclaimed (at the Augsburg Peace Treaty a bit more than 450 years
ago), Bavaria was Catholic. And what is called 'Old
Bavaria' (Altbayern) now, roughly the South-East of the country, is in
majority Catholic.
In 1806 however, as a reward for being on Napoleon's side, Bavaria
become a kingdom and was increased with Franconia (roughly from
Nuremberg up North), Bavarian Swabia (West of Augsburg), some free
cities (Augsburg), etc ...
Many of these districts were Protestant, thus the balance between the
confessions was shifted, which led to (forgot the date, but it was
around 1820) the declaration of the equality of the confessions, that
is Bavaria was officially an exception to "cujus regio, ejus religio".
Which didn't change the predominance of the Catholics in public life.
But allowed to call ministers and public servants from (Protestant)
Prussia, among them Mongelas, who organised the Bavarian State (and
got quickly famous for their arrogance, which is one of the reasons
Bavarians today don't like the 'Preiss' and also the reason of the
despective nickname of 'Nordlichter' - polar lights- for people from
the North who think they know everything).
You've always noticed that Bavaria is full of contrasts.
The image of Bavaria which is /was made popular represents actually a
small part of the country: Upper Bavaria (half of Old Bavaria): the
Alps, the lakes, the castles, the churchs, the cows, the lederhosen
etc etc ....
Even in Germany this is the common picture of Bavaria.
People from Franconia, however, are not so happy with this, for they
don't fit into the picture.
This to explain that your idea was not weird, but derived from the
'official' view of Bavaria.
> Another thing that helped convince me that "Meistersinger" was posed
> in a Catholic setting is the name of the church -- the
> Kathareninkirche (St Catherine's Church). In the US one occasionally
> runs across a Lutheran church named for a male disciple or evangelist
> (St John, St Peter, St Paul), but in my experience Lutheran churches
> here are almost never named for female (or obscure male) saints.
> Catholic churches, of course, are commonly named for saints that non-
> believers have never even heard of. At least in the US.
The reason for this is simple.
In Europe, the Protestant churches are often former Catholic churches
( when a town or a country 'passed' to Protestantism, they didn't tear
the Catholic churches down to build new ones, they just updated them).
Thus they kept their name - with a slight alteration. In your example
the church would have been called before tthe Reformation 'Kirche Skt
Katharina', after the Refomation, its official name became
'Katharinenkirche', because Lutherans have no saints.
People already called their churches commonly this way (think of the
Stephansdom in Vienna), but this is not the official name of them,
while this name was officialised for Protestant churches.
A speciality of Augsburg are the double churches: one Catholic church
is joined to a (smaller) Protestant one. Thus you have, for example,
the C-church Kirche Sankt Ulrich und Afra, and sticken to it the P-
church Ulrichskirche.
In the US however, the churches were built after the Reformation, thus
there was no older name to consider.
>
> Finally, I swear that I have read that in the Thirty Years War
> Gustavus Adolphus, the protestant king from the north, "took"
> Nuremberg -- rather than "defended" it or "saved" it, as one would
> expect might have been the case had it been a protestant city at that
> time.
Nuremberg was at that time a wealthy city. I guess Gustav Adolf and
Wallenstein besieged it more for economical than for confessional
reasons. They destroyed most of the outskirts but didn't enter the
city itself.
At the end of the Thirty Years War, after the Peace of Westphalia in
1648, a Peace congress was held in Nuremberg in 1649-1650.
BTW, as in Bavaria the equality of religions was proclaimed, the
Catholics, which were a tolerated minority in Nuremberg before, got
full civic rights (which enabled of course the 'monacocentralistic'
Bavaria - with its imported Protestant Prussian politicians- to send
Catholic civil servants there to control the town better... again a
Bavarian contradiction)
> Thanks for straightening me out.
>
You're welcome ... as you've noticed, Bavarian history could have been
written by Lewis Carroll, thus not knowing it perfectly is rather a
sign for peace of mind ;-)
Best,
th.
Hans Christian Hoff
> But what do we have in Meistersinger? Walther is a Thuringian, almost
> certainly a protestant.
No, he is a Franconian (Pogner says to Kothner's question about
Walther's credentials that he is "von Stolzing Walther aus Frankenland"
- Franconia lies partly in Bayern and partly in Baden-Württemberg;
Nuremberg is part of Franconia.
Regards
Hans
jszos...@comcast.net
Thierry: I understand...sorry for the misspelling.
Jon-
ljo
ljo
"Hans Christian Hoff" <hch...@broadpark.no> wrote in message
news:45f007a1$1...@news.broadpark.no...
Hans Christian Hoff
For me any performance of die Meistersinger is a great event ! My
expectations, based on the video of the same production from 2004
(Morris/Heppner/Mattila/Pape/Allen/Polenzani), were however probably a
bit too exalted, as I was a wee bit disappointed when I left. This may
be due to my being handicapped by the cold that I caught in the
abdominable weather (15 F and winds gusting down Broadway)and eardrums
flipping as a result of a steep descent in a badly adjusted pressurized
cabin. My judgment must be seen in the light of this !
A contributing reason for my disappointment was may be that Kurt Moll
was substituted as the Nightwatchman by John Relyea; he had it seems
cancelled all his engagements at the Met, and I believe he is about to
retire from the stage. May be the finest bass of some considerable time.
Relyea was however very fine (isn't it strange that this tiny cameo part
gets so much attention, both from artists and public ?)
I found Nikitin vocally fine, but not sensational, and he was also an
indifferent actor. Ketelsen proved himself an accomplished one, but was
too much the clown. Botha's Walther was vocally one of the finest I have
heard, and it is a great pity that he cuts such an impossible figure on
stage (The thought struck me that his Walther had been forced to give up
his career as a knight because no horse would any longer carry him!)
Hong was almost in the same league vocally, and acted plausibly.
Polenzani was a joy. Sadly I got the impression that Morris is either in
decline vocally or had a bad day (may be because of the weather !); he
started out with a bleating sound that I have never heard from him
earlier, and he got obviously taxed underway. I was at the end afraid
that he would not be up to "Verachtet mir die Meister nicht", but he
managed it quite well. He was however only a shadow of the imposing
figure on the video, but I like his portrait of Sachs, though. The
production was the same solidly traditional one; I like them that way!
Regards
Hans
Daniel Kessler
thing about the evening was the David of Matthew Pollenzani...and I already
heard him in that role..ditto James Morris...
Well, if that is the best thing about the evening...I'm not going to bother
although I do like the work very much.
Daniel Kessler
perhaps I am too spoiled in this regards....I recall my first trip to Bayreuth
(1959) with Rudolf Shock and Elisabeth Gruemmer in the cast may have runied me
in that regard....now that is "glamor." Botha just looks too funny to my
jaundiced eyes to be believed. Although the Met is only a short 15 minute taxi
ride away from Manhattan's Upper East Side...I'm sitting this one out!
Richard Loeb
news:45F151C2...@pop.cybernex.net...
> and forgive me...but I want a glamor tenor for Walther...
>
> perhaps I am too spoiled in this regards....I recall my first trip to
> Bayreuth
> (1959) with Rudolf Shock and Elisabeth Gruemmer in the cast may have
> runied me
> in that regard....now that is "glamor." Botha just looks too funny to my
> jaundiced eyes to be believed. Although the Met is only a short 15 minute
> taxi
> ride away from Manhattan's Upper East Side...I'm sitting this one out!
>
she was truthfully not exactly an oil painting, was she???? Richard
>
ljo
"Richard Loeb" <loe...@comcast.net> wrote
> You think Grummer was "Glamorous"???? I am a great fan of her vocalism but
> she was truthfully not exactly an oil painting, was she???? Richard
>
Nor was she a three-hundred pound tub of lard. Proportion, Richard,
proportion . .
ljo
Daniel Kessler
though she may have been a "hausfrau" to be!
Richard Loeb
> well, you may have a point! She (Gruemmer) was wonderful in the role,
> even
> though she may have been a "hausfrau" to be!
>
>> but
>> she was truthfully not exactly an oil painting, was she???? Richard
>>
>> >
>
impulsive girlishness that was so endearing - her international career began
late but even her later recordings have that girlish tone - a very special
artist. Richard
Daniel Kessler
girlishness that was so endearing" and it fit the character of Evchen to a tee,
at least the way I judge the role...