How does Siegfried Wagner compare to Richard Wagner?

[karelm]

Though Richard Wagner is about as sung as it gets, I was very curious about his more unsung son, Siegfried, since as a composer, he lived well into the 20th century - long enough to have heard developments such as Mahler, then the Second Viennese school, etc. 

Is there any similarity in style between the two?  I would imagine since Richard was such a dominent personality that it would be hard for the son to shake the influence.  Does his music have any of the characteristics of Richard, the gravitas, the lush harmonies, etc.?  Does it form a bridge between Richard and post Mahler at all or is it really just second rate? 

[Alan Howe]

I'd compare him more to a composer like Humperdinck. I have quite a lot of Siegfried's music (pretty well all orchestral), but can't say I find it all that distinctive. However, I'd certainly appreciate a steer towards, say, one opera that would be an absolute must-buy. Is anybody more in the know than me?

[saxtromba]

He's actually considerably more conservative musically than his father.  He wrote a pleasant violin concerto, for example, which wouldn't have been out of place decades earlier.  While I enjoy what I've heard of his music (which isn't a whole heck of a lot), I've always felt that he composed because it was expected of him rather than because he was driven to do so.

[karelm]

I read on wiki that it took him a long time to "find his voice" at first starting a career as an architect then as an adult deciding to pursue music.  It might be presumptuous of me to infer reluctance to his part towards composition from this given he had the upbringing for it.  It seems like many of Richards descendants are still alive but none are in music.  The closest seems to be music administration which is probably more like managing an estate I would imagine.

[Mark Thomas]

I have eight of his operas in my collection. They are almost always pleasant, sometimes dramatic but never memorable listens. There's never much momentum, everything happens (if it happens at all) in his own good time. Stylistically there seem to be few links to his father, although the vocal lines are sometimes declamatory in the Wagnerian manner. I suspect that he was influenced by verismo and in that respect and in his operas' general sound world I always bracket him with Eugen D'Albert, although his writing lacks the latter's dark streak. I can't recommend a must-buy opera, Alan, because I honestly can't distinguish one from another.

The work of his which I play most isn't an opera at all but the relatively early symphonic poem Sehnsucht, which has a certain rhapsodic strength, is melodically more distinguished than most of his music and which exhibits a passion almost wholly lacking from the rest of his oeuvre.

[TerraEpon]

I seem to remember a lot of his music sounding similar to Richard Strauss, but much less engaging. Though there was one piece I really enjoyed when it was played on the radio, I forget what though.

[karelm]

So interesting that Richard Wagner, whose music is imbued with passion, seems to have less in common with his son than he does with Richard Strauss.  It would seem that Siegfried had a lot to live up to with limited interest in pursuing that direction where others were more than ready to take up the cause of the father.  Of course, this is not that unusual historically, but very fascinating.

It seems like if I want to pursue the musical legacy of Richard Wagner, I should pursue Bruckner and Richard Strauss (his stylistic heirs) rather than his children.

[Alan Howe]

The stylistic heirs of Wagner are to be found in all manner of composers that followed (not simply Strauss): try, for example, the operas of Chausson (Le Roi Arthus), d'Indy (Fervaal), Delius (Koanga), Pfitzner (Der arme Heinrich) and many others. Siegfried Wagner was not in their league as a creative artist and ploughed a rather narrow (and often much more gentle) late-Romantic furrow.

[JimL]

The French of the late-19th/early 20th Century were notorious Wagnerophiles, to the extent of rioting over continued composition of absolute music.  "We want opera!" was the call to arms of protesting students who eventually lost a suit over their disruption of orchestral concerts.

[Steve B]

Mark, I agree with you about "Sehnsucht"; I think it is more passionate because it is dedicated to his lover Clement Harris, who had died many years before in a war(this is well documented now, so please no claims of "that cannot be possibly so"!:)ie that they were lovers). However, the Symphony has its moments and there are very memorable themes in his operatic overtures; i am not very keen on the vocal sections of the operas either. I actually think when he is good he is very good, particuarly melodically; we have had threads on Siegried W before and I have always pointed out that there is a stream of almost endless memorable melody in "Sehnsucht", which means "longing"; or the Welsh word "hiraeth" would approximatively describe it; it is, to me, a classic:). I would recommend the excellent, wellrecorded 5 disc CPO set of his orchestral works and opera overtures

Clement Harris's music is also well worth exploring, some is available as Marco polo downloads.
Thanks Steve

[Alan Howe]

Just a gentle reminder: let's not turn this into a thread solely about Siegfried, but keep to the issue of how his music compares with his father's.

Here's one excellent review of the orchestral music on cpo, which should give a decent idea how the comparison plays out:
http://www.musicweb-international.com/classrev/2008/june08/Swagner_9996552.htm

And here's a review of Die heilige Linde that also contains some useful points of comparison between son and father:
http://www.musicweb-international.com/classrev/2003/nov03/SWagner_Heilige.htm

[Steve B]

 Alan, I was trying to draw attention to the music of Siegried Wagner for its OWN merits, though I agree the title is indeed how he compares to his father; but why SHOULD he always be compared to his father, anymore than any other composer is compared to any other?; aren't these the types of comparisons we are fighting against on this site?! Eg. the received canonic opinion that eg Reinecke,  is watered down Mendelssohn and Schumann(a remark often used by the Penguin and Gramophone Guides to Recorded Music in th last few years) and usually applied to most mid-Romantic composers. I agree there are stylistic similaritities between , particuarly MID RW and SW, eg the sweeping,lush melodies of SW at his best mirror similarly lush melodies and orchestration in the RW of "Lohengrin" and "Tannhauser", but I can at least tell SW is a late Romantic who is, overall, NOT RW, even if I can't always distinguish between him and other)non-related!) late Romantics!

I do not see if we are allowing 20th century, non tonal, Romantic era style downloads(which is FINE by me!:)), you can imply this is a tangent!I am rather hurt too, of course, because it is obvious, from my posting(which took lots of psyching up to make), that "Sehnsucht", being in memory of his same-sex lover Clement Harris, is significant to me personally, as a gay man, and, apart from that, certainly INFORMS the music, which is passionate and full of yearning in the same way as Tchaikovsky's "Romeo and Juliet"; so this is not actually going BEYOND the music: it is, like in all programmatic content works, an intrinsic PART of it.

Steve

[allison]

Finally someone says it, the endless comparisons between composers mentioned on here serve no purpose whatsoever to me.
If I can't listen to a piece of music for itself, and in order to determine what its composer is saying about him or herself that I can resonate with, then I don't listen. No composer from the "greatest" to the "worst" has composed in a vacuum, so all have some influence from somewhere.
The moments of similarity do not automatically mean that everyone but the first composer to write that sound is somehow inferior.
I suppose it is impressive to some when a wannabe musicologist can pick up on something and describe it by measure number and key signature and the color of ink it was written in but NOT TO ME.
I am a music lover, not a musicologist and that's all I want to be, and I will decide what I like on my own. I happen to like Siegfried better than Richard, and if I knew for sure why, I wouldn't spout it.

[Alan Howe]

To answer these points:
1. It's very simple really: we were asked in this thread about how son Siegfried compares with father Richard, so it's the task of the moderator to keep the thread on track. If members wish to discuss Siegfried alone, then they are perfectly at liberty to start another thread*...
2. This is quite obviously not a comparison like any other because it involves father and son; therefore it is vital to explore the musical connections between them.

My own personal view of Siegfried is that he wrote some fine music, but that his operas are pretty unmemorable - unlike those of his father who was a genius. I certainly wouldn't put him in the same category as composers like Reinecke whose music is much more memorable. But that's just my opinion. And so back to the topic, please...

*My apologies. There is an existing thread on Siegfried which I have resurrected here:
http://www.unsungcomposers.com/forum/index.php/topic,556.msg38629.html#new

[Alan Howe]

And, having listened properly to Siegfried's Sehnsucht, I'd say the idiom was early Richard, i.e. Lohengrin/Tannhäuser. Interesting - because the son was obviously much more conservative in relation to his time than his father. But I do agree, Sehnsucht is a very nice piece, well worth investigating on its own terms.