Wagner and Verdi

[Dave2002]

We know that Wagner and Verdi were contemporaries, but did they know/like/dislike each other's work. Would either have heard any music written by the other, or would they have known the music by examining the scores, or by some other means?

The Prelude to Act 1 of Die Walküre has a brief flash of music which is reminiscent of the storm music towards the end of Rigoletto. Which came first? Actually Rigoletto came first, in 1851 with performances in Venice, while Die Walküre was somewhat later - 1856 and onwards. However, the first ideas for Die Walküre were written in 1851.

Coincidence?

Of course both composers could have taken inspiration from earlier musicians, such as Beethoven (6th Symphony), or maybe others that I can't place right now.

[umslopogaas]

According to Julian Budden in the Master Musicians book on Verdi, Wagner "could hardly bear to hear Verdi's name spoken" (page 26). However, Verdi, while not very enthusiastic to begin with - he thought Lohengrin the best of the earlier works - became more and more so as the years past and came to think the second act of Tristan und Isolde "one of the sublimest creations of the human spirit" (page 153).

[Serial_Apologist]

According to Julian Budden in the Master Musicians book on Verdi, Wagner "could hardly bear to hear Verdi's name spoken" (page 26). However, Verdi, while not very enthusiastic to begin with - he thought Lohengrin the best of the earlier works - became more and more so as the years past and came to think the second act of Tristan und Isolde "one of the sublimest creations of the human spirit" (page 153).

I'm prepared to believe that, although it really is quite astonishing, when one comes to think about it, how many and diverse are the range of composers of totally different aesthetic backgrounds who came to admire "Tristan" - from Debussy to Zemlinsky to Schoenberg to, of all people, now we learn, Verdi!

[Richard Tarleton]

Cosima's Diaries -

24 November 1871 - 'Letters from Boito and Richter...' (Boito admired Wagner's operas and translated Rienzi and Tristan into Italian).

2 November 1875 - 'In the evening Verdi's Requiem, about which it would certainly be best to say nothing'.

23 April 1882 - 'R has remembered a Verdi theme which he heard sung yesterday on the Grand Canal as a duet; he sings it to me, laughing at the way this outburst of rage was bellowed out yesterday; he made a note of its broken rhythm - "And that one is asked to call a natural line!" - there is nothing like it in Rossini.'

[Pianorak]

Cosima's Diaries -

February 12, 1871: In the evening Richter brings the conversation around to Gounod, and that sets us off on a dreadful musical tour, Faust, Le Prophete, Les Huguenots, Bellini, Donizetti, Rossini, Verdi, one after another, I feel physically sick. I pick up and seek refuge in a volume of Goethe. But nothing helps, I suffer and suffer. It is too much for R. as well, and he begs Richter to stop after the latter sought to prove to him that Verdi was no worse than Donizetti.

December 2, 1871: Report from Italy, Verdi at a performance of Lohengrin, applauded by the public on that account, but he stayed at the back of his box so as not to distract from the solemnity of the performance.

Barry Millington: The Wagner Compendium
. . . In this context one might recall that Wagner's great rival Giuseppe Verdi confessed to an interviewer that he stood “in wonder and terror” before Tristan. (David C. Large, p.382)

[Richard Barrett]

Verdi in a late interview: "The work which always arouses my greatest admiration is Tristan. This gigantic structure fills me time and time again with astonishment and awe, and I still cannot quite comprehend that it was conceived and written by a human being. I consider the second act, in its wealth of musical invention, its tenderness and sensuality of musical expression and inspired orchestration, to be one of the finest creations that has ever issued from a human mind."

I think he was a more generous spirit than Wagner, to say the least.

[Conchis]

Verdi in a late interview: "The work which always arouses my greatest admiration is Tristan. This gigantic structure fills me time and time again with astonishment and awe, and I still cannot quite comprehend that it was conceived and written by a human being. I consider the second act, in its wealth of musical invention, its tenderness and sensuality of musical expression and inspired orchestration, to be one of the finest creations that has ever issued from a human mind."

I think he was a more generous spirit than Wagner, to say the least.

The two men never met.

In his lifetime, Wagner never even acknowledged Verdi's existence. When discussing Italian opera, he would make slighting reference to 'Donizetti & Co.', leaving aside the one Italian operatic composer - Bellini - whose he genuinely admired and was influenced by.