SIEGFRIED Wagner, composer: Richard Wagner's son - composed more operas than his famous father - heard any?

Question

SIEGFRIED Wagner, composer: Richard Wagner's son - composed more operas than his famous father - heard any?

Answer 1

I have heard some of the arias from Der Heidenkö***.



To my knowledge Siegfried Wagner did not write very many more operas than his father (Richard Wagner wrote 14, Siegfried Wagner wrote 18 - Don't quote me on that though), I think you need to question why his father is more famous... maybe he was simply a better composer? Or perhaps because R. Wagner DIDN"T write his own libretto, the actual story and lyrics were better?



Part of Wagner's popularity, at least, was because he really reformed Opera, and popularized German Romantic music, and indeed German music/libretto in General. (But then again Gluck was the first to have this reform, and Wagner really only based his on Gluck's reform; and it was Mozart to popularize a German libretto with Die Zauberflote) Despite this, he really did change the way opera was composed and there was no way that his son could do the same. So S. Wagner, wasn't a good composer, nor was he original, so he never achieved the poularity or fame of his father.





As for your other question -

Vivaldi's father was one of the best and most famous violinists in Venecia at the time. In his lifetime, Vivaldi was as well known as a violinist as a composer.



W. A Mozart's father Leopold, was a court musician and composer, as was W. A. Mozart's sister. (This is well documented, so I am sure you know this!)



There is of course the Strauss family, and Bach. I would definitely agree with the Bach family being the most "prolific" in terms of musicians and composers.





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Suhwah - Never heard of the other Puccini... I'm going to look up some of his works now!

Answer 2

No, never heard a note of any of them.



My take is that two factors come into play.



1. Quantity does not make quality. Not having anything to go by, I don't know what the quality of the music, librettos or story lines were. They might be "junior high-school productions" compared with his father's works



2. If they are on par with the rest of the opera world, he's still got the problem of being out-shined by his father because of the Ring Cycle. Nothing could compare, and anything he tried to do probably came to failure early on because of natural comparisons being drawn between father and son's music.

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I find it interesting that "Der Heidenkö***" wasn't preformed until twenty years after it was written. But why would "Die heilige Linde" have taken seventy-four years to have only the prelude performed? "Das Flüchlein, das Jeder mitbekam" might be a doomed piece, as it was completed by another composer.



"Wahnopfer", as an incomplete work, makes sense that it wasn't performed until sixty-six years later.



Then there are two for which the Siegfried only completed libretti

Answer 3

I haven't heard a note of them either, but a friend of mine was collecting a series of CDs of the overtures which were available on the Marco Polo label. They don't seem to be in circulation currently but the label has a number of recordings of the operas (quite reasonably priced) and the German label CPO has a couple of cheap recordings of excerpts, on for baritone and the other for mezzo. There is even an historic recording from the 1920s, including his Violin Concerto. I found this info by going to my favourite on line record store, www.mdt.co.uk and using their advanced search (enter Wagner, Siegfried, else you will get a '0' return) The search threw up 16 different CDs

Answer 4

I've never heard of him until just now, but do you know about the Worldcat Website?

It is a database of books, recordings, and other materials available through interlibrary loan.

It seems that poor Siegerl is not as neglected as I thought.

I looked up his name, fully expecting to find nothing except Siegfried as the title and Wagner as the composer, but I was surprised.

On the first page alone, I found a biography, a recording of Siegfried Wagner conducting Richard Wagner, a couple of recordings of excerpts, and a complete opera recording.



http://www.worldcat.org/search?qt=worldcat_org_all&q=siegfried+wagner



In reply to your second question, it would be kinda hard to compare Domenico Scarlatti with Alessandro Scarlatti, since DS specialized in keyboard sonatas and AS specialized in church music.



Also, don't forget the elder and younger Johann Strauss.



Of course, there is also the Bach family. Betcha Johann Sebastian Bach's father was a composer.



The Puccini family didn't maintain its stance quite as long as the Bach family, but it came in a close second. Giacomo Puccini had a direct ancestor, also named Giacomo Puccini, who specialized in operas in oratorios. A few of his compositions are currently in print. One of them is an oratorio about the martyrdom of Saint Valentine.



Which reminds me: happy Valentine's Day!