Speranza
"Parsifal: dramma mistico in tre atti" contains a number of special effects, such as the suspension
of the Spear in the second act and the scenes of transformation between the
forest and the temple in the outer acts.
For the latter in the first production
of Parsifal, the composer decided that a backdrop on rollers, the
Wandeldekoration, should move across the stage, producing the illusion that the
figures on stage were moving. Apparently such devices were in use in Paris in
the 1830s, where Wagner might have encountered one during his stay there from
1839 to 1842. The stage technician who was commissioned to produce the various
effects and illusions was, as in 1876, Karl Brandt. Unfortunately, Brandt died a
few months before the start of the festival, and the stage effects became the
responsibility of his son Fritz.
Act I Transformation Music (ogg format,
mono, duration 4.5 minutes)
This effect, engineered by Brandt,
and found hugely effective by most who saw it, was not a wholly original
invention. The Baroque theatre had used moving bands of painted cloth, often in
a continuous loop, for fire and water effects, as did later pantomime and
popular theatres. The earliest large-scale panorama mobile to appear in an opera
house was probably that used at Covent Garden in 1826 for Weber's Oberon and it
is more than likely that Wagner would have known about it. Karl Brandt's teacher
Ignatz Dorn used the technique in 1836 to portray a hot-air balloon trip from
Turkey to Darmstadt, while Brandt himself put it to use in 1863, also at the
Darmstadt Theatre, for Aimé Maillart's comic opera Lara.
[Patrick Carnegy,
Wagner and the Art of the Theatre, Yale 2006, page 111.]
The
Wandeldekoration covered an area of more than 2500 square metres, weighed some
700 kilograms and cost 17,694 marks. The scenes were painted by the Brückner
brothers following the set designs by Paul von Joukowsky. During rehearsals, it
was discovered that the transformation music of the first and third acts did not
last long enough to allow the Wandeldekoration to be fully revealed. This
presented something of a problem and little time remained to find a
solution.
Only on one point had we
to make a tiresome compromise, on this occasion: by a still inexplicable
misreckoning, the highly-gifted man to whom I owe the whole stage-mounting of
Parsifal, as formerly of the Nibelung pieces -- and who was torn from us by
sudden death before the full completion of his work -- had calculated the speed
of the so-called Wandeldekoration (moving scenery) in the first and third acts
at more than twice as fast as was dictated in the interest of the dramatic
action. In this interest I had never meant the passing of a changing scene to
act as a decorative effect, however artistically carried out; but, at the hand
of the accompanying music, we were to be led quite imperceptibly, as if in
dream, along the 'pathless' adits to the Gralsberg; whose legendary
inaccessibility to the non-elect was thus, withal, to be brought within the
bounds of dramatic portrayal.
When we discovered the mistake, it was too
late to so alter the unusually complicated mechanism as to reduce the scenes to
half their length; for this time I had to decide not only on repeating the
orchestral interlude [Act I] in full, but also upon introducing tedious
retardations in its tempo; the painful effect was felt by us all, yet the
mounting itself was so admirably executed that the entranced spectator was
compelled to shut one eye to criticism. For the third act, however -- though the
moving scene had been carried out by the artists in an almost more delightful
and quite a different manner from the first -- we all agreed that the danger of
an ill effect must be obviated by complete omission ...
[Richard Wagner,
Das Bühnenweihfestspiel in Bayreuth 1882, tr. Ashton Ellis as Parsifal at
Bayreuth 1882.]
How Humperdinck Saved the Day
he above
account is not, of course, the entire story.
You now expect me to
compose by the metre!", the Master exclaimed, horrified. Well, there was no
other way round it, [Fritz] Brandt replied, the machine couldn't be operated any
quicker, and the sets couldn't be altered -- it would cost a kings' ransom, and
in any case, there wasn't enough time. Wagner was beside himself and kept on
swearing that he would have nothing more to with the rehearsals and
performances, and stormed out in high dudgeon.
Prelude to Parsifal
arranged for piano duet by Engelbert Humperdinck - played by Yaara Tal and
Andreas Groethuysen (ogg format, stereo, duration 11.5
minutes)
Dismayed, we watched him go. What was to be done? It
was simply not possible to risk the whole production, with all its attendant
difficulties, merely because of a stupid miscalculation. And it wasn't as bad as
all that, Levi thought; just as cuts can be made, so it was possible to repeat
the odd phrase. I thought the matter over. To expect the already overburdened
Master to undertake such a thoroughgoing revision at the eleventh hour was out
of the question. I preferred to try my own solution. I ran home, quickly
sketched out a few transitional bars, orchestrated them and incorporated them
into the original score. Then, filled with anxious expectancy, I took the
original to the Master. He look through the leaves, nodding affably, then said,
'Well, why not? It should work! Be off with you to the Chancellery and copy out
the parts, so that we can get on.' No sooner said than done. The sets and music
were now in glorious accord and no one in the audience had the least suspicion
at any of the performances that the score had been patched together by a back
street cobbler plying his modest trade. Of course, the sets were altered in time
for the following year's performances; the interpolated passage, dignified by
Levi with the conscientious note 'H. ipse fecit', was removed and the original
music reinstated.
[Engelbert Humperdinck, first published in Die Zeit,
1907, tr. Stewart Spencer.]
Saturday, February 23, 2013
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