R. Wagner "The Ring of the Nibelung": content, video, interesting facts, history

R. Wagner "The Nibelung Ring"

Based on the ancient German epos tetralogy Richard Wagner The Nibelung Ring includes 4 operas: The Rhine Gold, The Valkyrie, Siegfried, The Death of the Gods. This is more than 15 hours is not the easiest for the perception of music, which becomes for the listener or torment, or mystical revelation.

Summary "Nibelung rings"Wagner and many interesting facts about this work read on our page.

Nibelung Rings

The Pre-Eve Tetralogy, "The Rhine Gold"

The ugly dwarf Alberich sought in vain the favor of the daughters of the Rhine - they only laughed at him. From them, he learned that the gold of the Rhine, which they protect, you can make a ring that gives unlimited power to its owner, but for this you need to forever renounce love. Unhappy Alberich does this, steals the gold and forges the ring.

The giants Fasolt and Fafner commissioned Wotan to build Valhalla, the heavenly palace for the gods. For his work, Wotan should give them to Freya, the goddess of youth. He does not want to do this, because without it the gods will age. Lohe tells about the stolen gold of the Rhine, the giants are ready to take it instead of Freyja.

Wotan and Loge captivate Alberich with cunning, he gives them all his treasures. Wotan tears off the ring, which the Nibelung curses - it will bring only grief to its owner. The curse begins to work immediately: after receiving all the gold of the Rhine, including the ring, the giants quarrel, and Fafner kills his brother. Despite the fact that the gods rejoice in a new dwelling, there is a sense of impending disaster in the air ...

The first day of tetralogy, "Valkyrie"

Sigmund, the son of Votan from an earthly woman, seeks shelter from the storm in the Hunding's house. There he is met by Siglinda, who is filled with sympathy for an exhausted young man. The returned home owner offers him food and shelter. Sigmund tells his story: once upon a time he lost his entire family - his father, mother and sister. Then he stood up for the girl they were trying to marry by force, and killed both her brothers. Hunding understands that it is about his relatives and causes Zygmund to fight. Sigmund addresses his father, asking him to help him find the magic sword, Notung, with whom he could defeat. Sieglinda tells the beloved where to find that sword - it must be pulled out of the trunk of the tree, which no one else has been able to. Siegmund takes Notung, and Sieglinda reveals to him that which is his sister.

Wotan orders Brunhilde to help Zygmund in a duel, but Frick believes that Sigmund must die - he broke the sacred bonds of marriage and entered into an incestuous relationship with her sister. Wotan goes on about his wife, but Brünnhilde, against the will of his father, comes to the rescue of Zygmund. Angry Wotan breaks Notung, and Hunding kills Sigmund. Brunhilda takes the pregnant Sieginda to safety. Wotan, having found a daughter, as a punishment plunges her into a dream, surrounding her with a fiery ring, which only a fearless hero can go through.

The second day of tetralogy, "Siegfried"

In the forest cave lives Nimelung Mime with his pupil, Siegfried. Mime tries to forge a weapon to send Siegfried to battle with Fafner, his goal is to take possession of the ring. However, all the swords that he did, the young man broke. Under the guise of the Wanderer, Wotan comes to him, saying that Notung, whose fragments are kept by Mime, can be forged only by a fearless hero. Mime understands that we are talking about his pupil. Indeed, Siegfried manages to restore the sword. He wins the battle with Fafner. The dragon's blood gives him the ability to understand the language of birds, which advise from all the riches to take a ring, a magic helmet and follow Brunnhilde. Hearing Mime discuss with Alberich a plan to get rid of him and carve treasure, Siegfried kills a dwarf.

Wotan renounces power over the world, realizing that a fearless hero will come, over whom the Nibelung ring has no power. The fire protecting the sleeping Brunhgilde makes way for Siegfried, he awakens a Valkyrie with a kiss.

The third day of tetralogy, "The Death of the Gods"

The Norns weave a thread of fate, but it breaks, foreshadowing the death of the gods. Siegfried leaves the ring of the Nibelung Brünnhilde and leaves for new feats. On his way there is the Gibibung Castle, where Gunter, Guthruna and their stepbrother Hagen live. Gunter is looking for a spouse, and Hagen tells him about Brünnhilde. Siegfried meets Gutrun and is scorched by a potion, under the spell of which he falls in love with a girl and is ready to bring Gunter Brünnhilde, if only he would give him his sister as his wife. Siegfried puts on a magic helmet, under which he assumes the appearance of Gunter, passes through the fire and takes Brunnhilde away with the ring.

In the house of Gunter is preparing for two weddings. Brunhilda claims to be Siegfried's wife, but he does not remember anything that happened until yesterday. Hagen wants to get a ring to return it to Alberich. He inclines Brünnhilde to vengeance, she reveals Siegfried's secret - you can only defeat him by attacking from the back. Hagen takes advantage of this and kills Siegfried while hunting. Arriving at the Gibibung castle, he demands a ring from Gunter, and when he refuses, he kills him. Brunhilda enters the funeral pyre of her spouse. She knows that the flame will clear the ring from the curse, and it will return to the daughters of the Rhine. The waters of the river wash away the burned fire, taking with it the ring. Behind him in depth rushes Hagen.

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Interesting Facts

• P.I. Chaikovsky He called the Ring of the Nibelung "the hardest music ever written."
• In 2006, in the Scottish Cardiff for the Nibelung Rings touring performances of the Mariinsky Theater, all tickets were sold in 4 hours.
• The presence of not only male characters, but also the female heroic image, Brunhilda, gives directors the opportunity to interpret the events of the opera from a feminist point of view. Thus, in the performances of the Danish Royal Opera, Nothung, stuck in a tree, pulls out Ziglind, and Brunhilda does not die in the final fire, but gives birth to a child from Siegfried.
• The Nibelung Ring was also a musical discovery: in it Wagner fully demonstrated its system of leitmotifs. The basis of the melodic characteristics of each character, an important object or event of the cycle is a unique musical phrase. All the leitmotifs as the plot develops are intertwined with each other, and in the finale of The Twilight of the Gods they compose a multi-faceted musical picture.
• Another well-known author of the story of the ring, R. Tolkien, although he recognized that in the distant fundamental principle of his “The Lord of the Rings” and the “Nibelung Ring” lies one myth, generally denied the connection between his epic and Wagner's cycle. The only similarity of the two works he saw was that "both rings were round".

• Despite the complexity of the production, all 4 operas of the cycle are included in the hundred of the most performed operas in the world and are played from the stage every year more than 220 times. “Gold of the Rhine” is performed one and a half times more often than the “Death of the Gods”.
• Wagner's operas require a serious restructuring of the vocal apparatus and sound science, different from that used in the Italian vocal school. The history knows very few examples when the singer at the same time would have in her repertoire parties from tetralogy and Italian classics. One of these vocalists was Maria Callas. In the late 1940s, she performed the parties Brunnhilde (“Valkyrie”) and Elvira (Belkanty’s “Puritans” by V. Bellini) in the Venetian theater “La Fenice” with a break of only a few days.
• Deborah Voigt refused in her time from the party of Brunhilda only because she understood that if she did it well, the theaters would stop offering her other roles. This is one of the most difficult parts for soprano, there are only a few performers in the world who can sing it, and opera houses invite them primarily to the production of The Nibelung Rings, almost without considering them as candidates for a different repertoire.

Known Nibelung Ring Numbers

"Flight of the Valkyries" - "Valkyrie" (listen)

The history of the creation and productions of "Nibelung Rings"

In preparation for the creation "Lohengrina"Richard Wagner studied a lot of medieval literature, including the legends of the Nibelungen. Relying on various sources, he put together his own picture of ancient Germanic, Icelandic, Scandinavian mythology. Work on the tetralogy began with its finale - first, in 1848, Wagner wrote the libretto for Siegfried Death, which later became the Doom of the Gods. Then the story of the young Siegfried (1851) was created, five months later - the first prosaic sketch of the "Gold of the Rhine" and the Valkyries that followed. In order to adhere to the main storyline, Wagner in 1848 wrote the concept of the entire tetralogy, entitled The Myth of the Nibelungs. He will put the final point in the score of the "Death of the Gods" in almost 26 years, having written on it: "I will not say anything more !!".

According to the original plan of Wagner, Siegfried was to become the central character of the tetralogy - a fearless hero who goes against the society worshiping strength and gold, declaring his world order based on love. Over time, Wagner understood all the hopeless utopianism of this idea - Siegfried died, like the European Revolutions of the Nations revolution, and Wotan, representing the old world order relentlessly striving for self-destruction, took his place. The figure of Votan became the main one in this drama. His sins, born of lack of love and lust for power, and his tragic insight that he was powerless to prevent the destruction of the world, transformed the optimistic heroic drama into a sad elegy of decline.

"At first there was water" - so Wagner opened his mythology. Music came to the composer during an afternoon nap on September 5, 1853. “I began to dive into a state similar to trance, and suddenly I felt that I was in rapidly flowing water, which began to turn into major chords,” Wagner recalled. Work on the "Golden Rhine", "Valkyrie" and "Siegfried" (until the end of the second act) continued until 1857. After which it was interrupted - the composer switched to "Tristan and Isolde"and" Nuremberg Mastersingers ". But in 1869 he again returned to The Ring, adding Siegfried and The Death of the Gods. The composer decided that the operas should be performed for four days in a row. But the admirer and philanthropist of Wagner King Ludwig of Bavaria insisted on two premieres fully finished operas in the Munich Hoftheatre, where the “Gold of the Rhine” was first sounded on September 22, 1869, and “Valkyrie” - on June 26, 1870. Wagner didn’t go on any transactions, especially since Ludwig allocated money for the construction of the theater in Bayreuth - specially and exclusively for the composer. It’s impossible to overestimate the head of Bavaria. Wagner never hoped to ever see the cycle on stage - the requirements for the production were too high (starting with the fact that you had to put 4 huge operas at once), the orchestra and the singers. The unique hall was erected in just 4 of the year, and on August 13, 1876, opened with the full “Nibelung Ring.” In 1882, the Ring was shown in London, and in 1883, just a few months after Wagner’s death, in Venice, the city where the composer was no more.

Since 1894, Russian theaters began performing separate operas of the cycle. The entire "Ring of the Nibelung" was delivered at the Mariinsky Theater in 1907. Since 2003, tetralogy has been part of the theater’s repertoire today.

"Ring of the Nibelung" in the movies

The music of the tetralogy, especially the famous “Flight of the Valkyries,” is highly demanded by cinema. Among the famous films in which it sounds:

• "Minions", 2015
• "Nymphomaniac: Part 2", 2013
• "Night at the Museum - 2", 2009
• "Keepers", 2009
• Quantum of Solace, 2008
• "The Blues Brothers", 1980
• "Apocalypse Today", 1979
• "8 ½", 1963

The nibelung rings of the past years can be seen on DVD:

• Performances of the Metropolitan Opera, 2011, director R. Lepage. In the main parties: B. Terfel (Wotan), D. Hunter Morris (Siegfried), D. Voigt (Brünnhilde)
• Performances of the Gran Theater di Liceo, 2004, directed by G. Kupfer. In the main parties: F. Struckman, D. Treleaven, D. Polaski
• Performances of the Bayreuth festival, 1993, director G. Kupfer. In the main parties: D. Tomlinson, Z. Eruzal, A. Evans
• Performances of the Metropolitan Opera, 1990, director B. Large. In the main parties: D. Morris, Z. Eruzal, H. Berens

The four operas of the cycle form a single whole, but, at the same time, they are very different in mood and genre - here there are lyrics, and romance, and heroics, and tragedy. They embodied all stages of life, creativity and beliefs. Richard Wagner. "Nibelung ring"- not only epic, but in many respects, the philosophical and biographical canvas of one of the greatest creators in the history of music.