Curtain, Gong, Steam. Gundula Kreuzer

      

      Curtain, Gong, Steam

      The publisher gratefully acknowledges the generous support of the Dragan Plamenac Endowment of the American Musicological Society, funded in part by the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.

      The publisher and the University of California Press Foundation also gratefully acknowledge the generous support of the Constance and William Withey Endowment Fund in History and Music.

      Curtain, Gong, Steam

       Wagnerian Technologies of Nineteenth-Century Opera

      _____

      Gundula Kreuzer

      UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESS

      University of California Press, one of the most distinguished university presses in the United States, enriches lives around the world by advancing scholarship in the humanities, social sciences, and natural sciences. Its activities are supported by the UC Press Foundation and by philanthropic contributions from individuals and institutions. For more information, visit www.ucpress.edu.

      University of California Press

      Oakland, California

      © 2018 by The Regents of the University of California

      Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

      Names: Kreuzer, Gundula Katharina, 1975– author.

      Title: Curtain, gong, steam : Wagnerian technologies of nineteenth-century opera / Gundula Kreuzer.

      Description: Oakland, California : University of California Press, [2018] | Includes bibliographical references and index. |

      Identifiers: LCCN 2017052549 (print) | LCCN 2017056145 (ebook) | ISBN 9780520966550 (ebook) | ISBN 9780520279681 (cloth : alk. paper)

      Subjects: LCSH: Wagner, Richard, 1813-1883—Aesthetics. | Opera and technology—History—19th century. | Opera—Production and direction—History—19th century. | Opera—Stage-setting and scenery—History—19th century. | Opera and technology—History—20th century. | Opera—Production and direction—History—20th century. | Opera—Stage-setting and scenery—History—20th century.

      Classification: LCC ML1700 (ebook) | LCC ML1700+ (print) | DDC 792.509/034—dc23

      LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017052549

      Manufactured in the United States of America / Printed in China

      26 25 24 23 22 21 20 19 18

      10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

       To Barbara Kreuzer

       and the wise love she represents

      Contents

       List of Illustrations

       Preface and Acknowledgments

       Abbreviations

       Note on Presentation

       Introduction: Opera, Staging, Technologies

      1. Wagner’s Venusberg

      2. Curtain

      3. Gong

      4. Steam

       Epilogue: Wagnerian Failure

       Notes

       Works Cited

       Index

Illustrations

      1.1. “ ‘Atlas’ in Music,” in Puck. Humoristisch-Satyrische Wochenschrift (1877)

      1.2. Venus’s all-purpose pink drapery lures Tannhäuser in Wolfgang Wagner’s production of Tannhäuser, act 1, scene 2 (Bayreuth, 1985)

      1.3. Venus charms through layers of rose-colored bodily extensions in Nikolaus Lehnhoff’s staging of Tannhäuser, act 1, scene 2 (Festspielhaus Baden-Baden, 2008)

      1.4. The Venusberg rendered as an inverted theatrical curtain in Werner Herzog’s production of Tannhäuser, act 1, scene 2 (Teatro San Carlo, Naples, 1998)

      2.1. The Wagner curtain: draft of its mechanical construction by Walter Huneke

      2.2. The Wagner curtain in 1897, framing the Bayreuth stage for Parsifal’s Grail temple in Wagner’s premiere production of 1882

      3.1. Gong strikes at the beginning of Domenico Corri’s “dramatic opera” The Travellers, or Music’s Fascination (London, Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, 1806)

      3.2. Tam-tam used in Paris for François-Joseph Gossec’s Marche lugubre (1790) as part of the funeral cortège for Mirabeau on April 4, 1791

      3.3. Use of a gong to induce catalepsy in Jean-Martin Charcot’s neurological clinic at the Salpêtrière Hospital, Paris, during the 1870s and 1880s, as rendered in Paul Regnard’s Sorcellerie, magnétisme, morphinisme, délire des grandeurs (1887)

      4.1. Interleaved stage manager’s score for productions of Das Rheingold at the Munich Court Theater showing Wotan’s descent into Nibelheim via sulfurous fumes

      4.2. Bayreuth’s steaming dragon, as re-created for Angelo Neumann’s 1881 production of the Ring cycle in Berlin’s Victoria-Theater

      4.3. A later satirical view of Siegfried’s dragon, likely referring to Angelo Neumann’s production as presented in London in 1882

      4.4. “Steam Concert,” in [Jean-Jacques] Grandville, Un autre monde (1844)

      4.5. “Steam Orchestra for Handling Wagner’s Scores,” in Kikeriki (1876)

      4.6. Karl Klič, “The Bayreuth Music Steam Engine,” in Humoristische Blätter (1876)

      4.7. Theo Raven’s production score for Das Rheingold documenting the 1914 Bayreuth staging and how it differed from earlier productions

      4.8. The steaming hydroelectric dam in Patrice Chéreau’s centennial production of Das Rheingold, scene 1 (Bayreuth, 1976)

      4.9. Mime’s industrial (and proto-steampunk) smithy in Patrice Chéreau’s 1976 Bayreuth production of Siegfried, act 1

      4.10. Vera Nemirova’s cosmically misty unit set for the Ring (Opernhaus Frankfurt, 2010–12)

      4.11. “Steam Swan,” in Berliner Wespen (1882)

      E.1. Robot Myon arrives in front of a red velvet curtain in the Gob Squad production of My Square Lady (Komische Oper Berlin, 2015)

      E.2. The “machine” in operation: models of Carl Fillion’s unit set for the Ring in Robert Lepage’s