Das Rheingold

Das Rheingold is concerned with outlining the leitmotifs (both literary and musical) that appear interwoven throughout the Ring. The motifs laid out in this prelude are all over the rest of the cycle; repeated and transformed via modulations, implosion, time signature changes, etc. All according to the individual situations. Usually lasting under two and a half hours in performance, Das Rheingold can be the most audience-friendly, andis often reccomended as a good way to "get into" the Wagner experience.

From a compositional perspective, this first opera in the Ring cycle draws heavily from the guidelines that Wagner set forth in his then recent book, Opera and Drama. Being that the method outlined in that book was Wagner's own, it was considered quite innovative at the time. However, though Wagner's music composition skills at this time were of outstanding quality, his adherence to the rules he set by that book would cause him problems, particularly when setting the written text of Das Rheingold to music. The rules he set forth in his book dictated he couldn't edit much of the libretto to fit the music, so he often ended up writing music just to suit the text. This resulted in too many long recitative passages during portions of the opera, which were exactly what he wanted to avoid, and which he conceivably could have been avoided had he kept the music first in mind. Luckily, Wagner would draw from the rules of his book less and less as writing for the Ring progressed, mostly expunging the influence around the time he started work on the third act of Siegfried.

Here is a diverging opinion from writer A.C. Douglas (from his marvelous work "Wagner's Ring: A Guide For the Willing But Perplexed"):

"... the quality of the music of Das Rheingold is of a different order from that of the rest of the Ring. It's clearly more elemental, more "square", and absent the soaring, sumptuous, gravity-defying fluidity of the music of the three following music-dramas. Where the commentators are in error is in not recognizing that the difference was not the result of Wagner feeling his way through, nor of his attempting to realize a theoretical ideal to which he'd previously committed himself in print, but rather a purposeful creative act on Wagner's part. As Wagner knew better than anyone, before something can soar it must first have a solid, earthbound foothold from which to push off, and so the complex, new-to-opera musical and declamatory language of Das Rheingold was calculatedly devised to provide that earthbound foothold for the even more complex musical and declamatory language of the rest of the Ring, and in its elemental character provide as well the perfect language with which to limn the elemental, archetypal world-drama of Das Rheingold.

Although Wagner had to some extent used the not exclusive to him device of leitmotif in his operas preceding the Ring, what he now had in mind...was the use of leitmotif on a scale never before attempted, and employing a complex contrapuntal symphonic development never before imagined possible, or even imagined at all; a metamorphosing and interweaving organic development of such subtlety and affective power that "...the thing shall sound in a way that people shall hear what they cannot see," as Wagner put it. In the music for Das Rheingold, Wagner makes easily-grasped and high-relief first use of this extraordinary new handling of leitmotif, thereby laying the foundation, and providing the material, for its more subtle and complex use in the following three Ring music-dramas, as well as preparing and conditioning his audiences for that more subtle and complex use, while at the same time declaring clearly and unmistakably right from Das Rheingold's very first opening measures the radical departure from Italian-form opera that Der Ring des Nibelungen is, and was by necessity compelled to be."

You can read A.C. Douglas' article in its entirety at this great website:

Laying aside for now the debate over Wagner's adherence to the regime laid out in his book, Das Rheingold features some of the finest, most electrifying music ever written. The Act 1 prelude and ensuant Rheinmaiden's song are dazzling, powerful, and gorgeous all at the same time. As the author of "Wagner Without Fear" wrote, few people ever complain about the length of this part of the Ring. The proceeding Valhalla scene is a veritable textbook in applied dynamics, and many of the motifs in that act are quite memorable (i.e. the actual Walhalla motif, the fabulous "beauty/Freia motif" and several others). The parts where Alberich summons the Nibelungen from below is about as Heavy Metal as you'll ever hear, and the character Donner's summoning-of-lightning motif would rock even the most jaded opera goer.

The Rheingold as a symbol has more interpretations than there are aspiring hip hop performers. A Jung-ian interpretive model might assert that the beginning of the opera signifies an individual's first dawning of consciousness, with the gold itself representing the unsullied, childlike part of the psyche, poorly guarded by immanent, fanciful ideas and thus fragile. Along these lines also, the Rheingold could be seen as that part of everyone that sees things (or is capable of seeing things) as a child: tirelessly fascinated and in love with living. The part that accepts and trusts unconditionally; or, what could be considered the light-bearing gold in all of us.

Alberich the Nibelung, base minded and having no patience with even the basic tenets of civilised conduct, attempts to rape the mermaid guardians of the Rheingold. He covets their free spirited, dancing ways, and when he can't grasp them, resorts to stealing the totem that both represents and perpetuates their happiness. Using the pychological model described above, one could say that the sexual frustration that Alberich experienced made it easier for him to renounce love, and spurred him on to steal that part of inward experience that makes things seem light and happy (that same quality that had initially attracted him). Because he couldn't consume the experience, he chose to sully the experience itself, corrupting through his essentially impotent show of covetousness. Out of hate he forges it into something unnatural, something to control the other people of his rabble ilk. Still as base as the rest of the Nibelungen, Alberich now is king of the Nibelheim realm, simply by dint of having impulsively forsaken love itself. The backlash of this sacrifice becomes most obvious when the ring is taken from him, later in the same opera.

Although many listeners will first equate Alberich with what is "bad", the opera ultimately portrays his theft of the rheingold as a felix culpa. The Catholic saint and writer Augustine is responsible for first putting the phrase felix culpa into common use. He reasoned that what is typically considered to be a catastrophically unfortunate event in the Old Testament, the Original Sin (or "Fall of Man") was actually a fortunate occurence, and just as much a purposeful Deux aux Machina as the Creation. He asserted that, without the Original Sin, there would have been no need for a Redeemer. To use his idiom, the gates of heaven would never have been thrust all the way open by Christ, had there not been first a serpent beckoning.

The purposeful engineering of creation and destruction is a major theme in the Ring cycle of operas, and there will be more in depth analysis of this motif as this site develops.

Das Rheingold is also the opera where Wotan's personality, as well as his relationships (read: "what passes for relationships") with his wife, friends, and workers are established and expanded upon.

To Be Continued