Wagner: Siegfried Idyll I Gábor Takács-Nagy and the Verbier Festival Orchestra
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 8 ก.พ. 2025
- Richard Wagner at his best with a musical declaration of love that was long prohibited
from being published. Wagner’s wife, Cosima, viewed the Siegfried Idyll (WWV 103) in E major of 1870 to be too personal and not meant for the broader public. Nowadays, it is one of Richard Wagner’s most famous orchestral pieces. The Verbier Festival Orchestra played it under the direction of Gábor Takács-Nagy in this recording made in 2008 during the Verbier Festival in the Swiss Alps.
Richard Wagner had already been in a relationship with Cosima Bülow, née Liszt, for six years, and they already had three children, including their son Siegfried, also known as “Fidi.” They got married with a small circle of guests in 1870.
In the same year, Wagner composed the Siegfried Idyll orchestral piece, a symphonic poem he gifted his wife for her 33rd birthday to pay tribute to the birth of their son. In the dedication on the score, Wagner called it “Triebschen Idyll with Fidi's birdsong and the orange sunrise, as symphonic birthday greeting. Presented to his Cosima by her Richard.”
The Wagners had a country house in Triebschen, near Lucerne. The wallpaper shone orange like a sunrise, and Wagner had heard birdsong in the early morning when his son Siegfried was born. The feelings of this day are reflected in the illustrative music of his symphonic poem. It is the only piece by Wagner of this sort, in which non-musical elements are described using musical means - like how the woodwinds imitate birds chirping.
Siegfried is the dragonslayer, the hero from the Nibelungenlied who fights with the dragon for a treasure and reigns victorious. Richard Wagner put the saga to music in the third part of his opera cycle “Der Ring des Nibelungen.” He adopted a few of the musical leitmotifs from the cycle in his “Siegfried Idyll,” combining them with the lullaby “Schlaf, Kindlein, schlaf.”
The orchestral piece impresses with its idyllically tender, romanticized tones. Wagner’s father-in-law, Franz Liszt, a master of symphonic poems praised the piece with exuberant words: “In this thousand-petaled flower, what fragrance, color, enchantment, glory, allure, sweet piousness and delightful art!”
The Siegfried Idyll was originally performed among close family members for Cosima’s birthday on Christmas in 1870. Members of the Tonhalle Orchester Zürich, whom Wagner had booked, surprised her with the serenade on the stairs of their country house. The piece is considered the most personal among Richard Wagner’s works. Since it was so intimate and meant for her personally, Cosima did not wish to publish “Siegfried Idyll” for a long time. Only in 1878 did the composition appear as a printed score.
The Hungarian conductor and violinist Gábor Takács-Nagy turned to chamber music while still a student. With the Takács Quartet (1975-1992), he has worked with such stars as Lord Menuhin, Sir Georg Solti, Isaac Stern, Mstislav Rostropovitch, Paul Tortelier, Gidon Kremer, and András Schiff. In 2002, Gábor Takács-Nagy turned to conducting. In 2007, he became director of the Verbier Festival Chamber Orchestra (VFKO), which performs annually at the Verbier Festival and has toured extensively throughout Europe and Asia.
The Verbier Festival is one of the world’s most prestigious classical music events. The quality of participating artists is coupled with the originality of the programs. The festival is held from late July to early August in the mountain resort of Verbier, Switzerland.
© 2008 EuroArts Music International / Idéale Audience
Watch more concerts in your personal concert hall:
• LISTEN AND WATCH - you...
and find more symphonies here:
• SYMPHONIES
Subscribe to DW Classical Music:
/ dwclassicalmusic
#richardwagner #Siegfried #symphonicmusic
優しさに満ち溢れたこの曲が好きです。
Bravo 👏🏻 bravo 👏🏻 Thank you
Nice, forward-propelled performance. Perfect size of orchestra for this piece and it's good to have the strings arranged in proper 19th century layout (divided violins, cellos left, violas right). Excellent woodwind work, except for some botched flute entrances. I do wish at 13:56 that the violin-cello duetting had been more equally balanced.
Thanks for sharing your observations with us and our community!
ГАБОР ,- ОЧЕНЬ ИНТЕРЕСНО!
Sublime Bravo
We're glad you liked it! Make sure to follow us for the latest uploads.
Just awsome.
Extraordinario!!!!!!! 👍
Wagner inventó la música para cine mucho antes de que alguien soñara con inventar el cine ❤❤❤
pd.: ¡Dispárenle a quien quiera que haya tosido justo en la parte más linda del final! 🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬
Viejisimo¿ por qué?🙄