Well,
Last week was Richard Wagner's 200th birthday. . . . So, though I don't get around to all the various parts of the board as much as I should, I thought I should post a little note about this.
Wagner, the man, was a jackass. Evil, unfaithful, jealous, bitter, and anti-Semitic. I don't really have much time for him, as a human being. He is not even my favourite composer. BUT. . . he did create some sublime moments, in the history of music.
Last week, I saw Stephen Fry being interviewed on Craig Ferguson's late-night programme. I love Mr. Fry, and all his words and works, and I pretty much agree with him, about Wagner. He said, on that occasion: "My Mother was Jewish, and I DETEST all the awful things Wagner said, and wrote - to the point of being sick. BUT -
something happened with him, that his MUSIC subsists in an entirely different realm. . . "
And so it often is, with great, creative geniuses. Often, they are horrible people, in their own personal lives. But sometimes, even such awful people are led to express (almost involuntarily) - works of great beauty which seem to spring from other, better, places and sources. (If one believes in what Carl Jung had to say, about the collective unconscious, I suppose this is not so difficult to believe.)
At any rate, here is Wagner's best moment, the "Liebestod", from
Tristan und Isolde, performed by Birgit Nilsson.
"A" XOXOXOXOXO
P.S. If you can get your boyfriend (or girlfriend) to sexual climax at the climax of the "Liebestod" (as I did once): let me tell you - there is NO FEELING LIKE IT ;-)))
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_mOA8pZ_I4M
And I am SOOO glad I had the chance to meet him, here. (One day, I am gonna show up in Ireland, and give him a giant hug.)
