‘Hitler’s Composer’: Why an Israeli is Rethinking Wagner’s Music and Legacy

By ⋅ March 19, 2013 ⋅ Post a comment

German Composer Wilhelm Richard Wagner (Credit: BBC Radio 3)

German Composer Wilhelm Richard Wagner (Credit: BBC Radio 3)


German composer Richard Wagner died six years before Hitler was born, but his music featured at almost every Nazi rally.

Wagner himself published an essay in 1850 claiming that Jewish composers were inferior to German ones.

And so, his music has been more or less banned in Israel since 1938.

But an Israeli musicologist say it may be time to rethink Richard Wagner.

Irad Atir is a doctoral student at Bar-Ilan University near Tel Aviv and studied each of Wagner’s ten major operas.

He says “the question is about how we can see Wagner’s ideology in his operas. And I found that in his operas we can see Wagner saw the Jews not in one way.”

Watch the “Ride of the Valkyries” from Wagner’s “Ring Cycle” at the Met.

Discussion

One comment for “‘Hitler’s Composer’: Why an Israeli is Rethinking Wagner’s Music and Legacy”

  • Guest

    At a low point in Wagner’s life, he
    penned a foolish essay while seething with transparent envy for
    Mendelssohn and his seemingly effortless talent and success. His
    rant was emotional and childish—and Wagner was always both. He
    also castigated the French with equal ferocity. However, Wagner had
    a romantic relationship with a French Jew, so one must really wonder
    how deeply his hatreds ran. Wagner was a jerk and likely the sort
    you would tell to shut up at a dinner party. He did not participate
    in the holocaust and staked his life against everything fascism stood
    for (he was a 48′er, after all), so let us not confuse the issues.
    In the end, Wagner found himself standing on the shoulders of
    Mendelssohn, and he knew it. That alone is sufficient justice..

    Thank you, Ms. Cheslow, for exploring
    this topic.