I was in elementary and junior high school when the legendary first-ever recording of Wagner's Ring Cycle was being set down and released. I did not get interested in opera until junior high and did not have access to the recordings until later, but in the meantime I did find and read this fascinating book, and have read it several times in the meantime.

Culshaw begins by giving some background: the earlier attempts on the part of Decca/London to record and issue a Ring the "easy" way (by going to Bayreuth and taking one down, which they tried in both 1951 and 1955); their ultimately successful attempt to snag Kirsten Flagstad, who had retired from recording, into the Rheingold cast; and the early attempts at creating stereo productions for the phonograph which finally jelled when they got around to recording Das Rheingold.

There are many, many fascinating stories within the main fabric of the tale, and it would take a review much longer than 1,000 words to even mention all of them. For example, although the reasons had to do mostly with the technical quality of the recording, this first-ever Das Rheingold captured the imagination of the opera-buying public in a way that nobody could have imagined or expected, despite the doubts of the competition and the lack of interest on the part of the Wagner cognoscenti. Another story is that of Kirsten Flagstad's tragically deteriorating health which ultimately prevented her from participating in any of the other operas, despite the glimmers of hope that kept flickering and the constantly changing plans Decca/London made to accommodate her. The story of the young unknown tenor who was supposed to be the ideal Siegfried except that he was unwilling to take the time to learn the role is a study in frustration. On the lighter side are the tale of the horse the producers brought into the studio to surprise Nilsson during the recording of Gotterdammerung, and the story of Regine Crespin's kicking James King in the shin during the recording of the Walkure Act I love duet.

Culshaw has a definite way with words and thus has the ability to allow the reader to feel the tension, time pressures and catharses involved in the recording sessions. One example of this is his description of Decca/London's attempt to record an acceptable Rheingold prelude--in the middle of the night yet!--given that the first half of the piece could not be edited because of the way it is written, and so had to be recorded without mistake; the tension here is almost palpable. It is in areas such as this where Culshaw is at his strongest.

Unfortunately, sometimes Culshaw fails to understand the power of his pen and as a result the book also has its weak and even offensive areas, usually centered around the author's own prejudices. For example, he dismisses the 1951 Bayreuth Gotterdammerung, which Decca/London almost issued but did not, as an inferior performance except for the Brunnhilde and the Hagen. However, this performance was finally issued a year or two ago on the Testament label and in the opinion of many immediately jumped to near the top of the list of contenders for best-ever recording of the work. What could Culshaw have been thinking when he wrote his cavalier dismissal of the recording? And if the Gotterdammerung *had* been originally issued rather than the legendary Parsifal from the same year, would Culshaw then have said that the Parsifal was no good? Given a glaring error in judgment such as this one, I have difficulty trusting Culshaw's objectivity in other areas. And even given his bias in favor of the German repertoire as opposed to the Italian, his words to the effect that no *real* conductor has ever shown any interest in Bellini are at best unprofessional if indeed not irresponsible, as Serafin and Berntein provided contemporary evidence to the contrary, while others such as Levine would come along later to prove Culshaw wrong yet again.

Another drawback to the book is that Culshaw can be incredibly condescending. The conclusion to the tale about the man who owned a rare steerhorn and came to Vienna during the Walkure sessions to help Decca/London get the relevant passages on tape is not only condescending but just plain mean. Likewise Culshaw makes the comment that he wouldn't expect anybody who hasn't been exposed to the pressures involved in recording music such as the Ring to understand the necessity of briefly lowering the temperature with the horse episode; such a comment assumes that Culshaw is writing to people who are unsophisticated if not worse.

These drawbacks aside, however, Ring Resounding is really an excellent read, and gives a wonderful idea of the joys and struggles involved in recording an opera. I'm sorry to see that it has gone out of print and hope to see it back soon. I want to edit if it does return, though...

This book came as an insert into the Package of the Ring(Solti). Purchased the set back in 1976, at Westwood/LA'sTower Records. Clerk said,"Wanna see people's heads turn?" And cranked up the concludng portion of the Immola-tion scene for me...on the PA......THAT decided for me notjust which version of the Ringto buy, but just how beautifu-lly and faithfully this recor-ding really IS to Wagner's very precise original direc-tions...I take it out every sooften to remind myself of just how much we opera-lovers oweto the pioneering work doneby Mr. Culshaw and his team ofauditory/sound engineers forEMI/London Recordings.Indeed, I daresay it is due invery large part to their pain-staking work that full-length recordings of Bach, Mozart,Verdi, for that matter, ANYopera, oratorio, or longer-length piece, could have beenrecorded, let alone attempted,at all, or have sold enoughcopies to justify furtherpioneering works.I am in debt, as are we all, to this pioneer in music!

It's an unexpected thing to say about a backstage book (not a genre I'm fond of) but this is an inspiring book about artistic collaboration, and a dream fulfilled.

The recording it celebrates can now be seen to be not without its flaws. For example it's tragic that Hotter's vast voice had gone "woofy" by the time they recorded Walku:re, the last of the cycle to be recorded. Despite the awesome conviction and power of Hotter's vocal acting, he wasn't beautiful, and the transformed Wotan at the end of Act III has to be beautiful. And it's a shame that they replaced Paul Kuen's excellent, musical, Mime with Gerhard Stolze's over-the-top cackling, which has not worn well with time.

But the Culshaw book helps put these flaws (and I can't bring myself really to consider Hotter a flaw, on balance) into perspective against the grandeur of the achievement - which, though complete Ring cycles are now common, remains unchallenged.

Culshaw himself is a fine, clear and sometimes amusing writer and, it seems, a likeably modest and decent man. For example he kindly withholds the name of the tenor, a potential superstar as Siegfried, who nearly killed the project by refusing to study his role. It's now known that that was Ernst Kozub, by the way, and you can consider Culshaw's claims about the magnificence of his voice by listening to his Erik on the Klemperer "Fliegende Holla:nder". He must be kicking himself to this very day. On the other hand, the story of Wolfgang Windgassen's artistic integrity and decency in stepping in and singing to save the recording, even while his agent was still working out the contracts, only adds lustre to the excellence of his performance. And if it were in a movie ("The hell with this; I'm going in to sing") no-one would believe it.

Kirsten Flagstad appears as perhaps the most loveable soprano, or singer of any kind, I have ever heard of, and the story of her death still, when I read it again, brings tears to my eyes. Culshaw's considerably more guarded treatment of Birgit Nilsson, undoubtedly a fine artist, tells a very different story...

It's also inspiring to read about record company management who were not solely motivated by the bottom line. Perhaps nowadays that would see the book classified as science fiction. :)

Good book. The best of it's kind. Recommended. (And they should re-print it.)

Laon

Scholars and critics say that Herr Wagner's talent was in synthesis. The negative critics, e.g., specialists in a field from which they feel Wagner has stolen, tend to discredit Wagner for that. The grail was not, alas, the cup used at the last supper, prior to the opera "Parsifal" anyway. What's more the Grail theme was plagiarized from Mendelssohn. The plot of the Ring was not, alas, the same plot as the German novel "The Nibelungenlied." Wagnerians like myself, rather, see that synthesis as a symptom of Wagner's genius. He was able to take a series of sources, stories, novels, epics, songs, and cement them into a supreme art form, Gesamptkunstwerk, better than the sum of all the parts.

Newman comments intellegently on all aspects of the operas. He includes musical themes--surely a necessity in the work of that expert user of the leitmotif!--and even the psychological dimensions of the music. (Before I saw "Tristan und Isolde," I attended a presentation of a musicologist who nearly broke into tears as to the depth of the music in that opera. His comments reminded me of those of Newman regarding the same piece, which reminds me of Jung, one, whom you might say, was a product of some of the same Germanic trends of the late 19th century. But, enough on that...)

I read each review before I see the opera to which it applies. I read them again periodically. They are magnificent, allow for reasonable criticism. But they also give the devil his due.

I cannot recommend the book more strongly for anyone interested in Wagner, especially if you plan to hear or see the operas. Then leave the volume next to your bed. It's well worth re-reading, learning all dimensions of the music of perhaps the best composer who ever lived.

Is that extreme? Perhaps. Was Wagner's genius extreme? Off the scale.

Read and enjoy it.

Ernest Newman's book remains the best introduction to Wagner's operas. He is astonishingly good on Wagner's sources, and on the draft processes Wagner went through as he transformed source material into his final forms. Other books deal with different aspects of individual operas in more depth, but this is still one of the books to start with. Everybody interested in Wagner should - well, the first thing to do might be to listen to excerpts from "Die Walku:re", "Tristan" or "Parsifal", say, and be awed by the music - but once you've heard the music, if you're still interested, you should get this book.

Laon

Nobody ever wrote more insighfully, brilliantly and accessibly about the titanic contribution of Richard Wagner to western culture than did E. Newman. This is a classic that should be read by all and anyone interested in what all the fuss is about. It's an old book but it's not dated. Take his translations seriously. Even though there are a lot of anachronisms (thou sayest...etc), they were anachronisms that RW intended when he wrote the poem. May I also recommend the Solti Recording of the Ring; the Furtwangler studio recording of Tristan; the Jochum Meistersinger and (gasp) the Levine Parsifal (the Knappertsbusch is sublime in so many special ways you may have to buy both. May I also recommend the Ring Interactive CD Rom. It is a blast.

The book has many complete examples, so it is easy to read and use. As its name indicates, it does not go into the more advanced features. All in all, it's quite suitable for beginners.

I've now read 4 different books covering XSLT, and it wasn't until I read this one that it finally made sense to me. Nothing is taken for granted in this book; he teaches XSLT from the beginning and enables you to learn it from the ground up. I highly recommend this book for anyone struggling with XSLT that needs some solid, core instruction.

I have (and I will) read lots more books dealing with XSLT transformations for XML content, but there is something about the Dummies series that I find so helpful and/or reassuring. I don't like having my time wasted, but when they're done right Dummies books maintain a tone and scope that tells me just enough about everything I need to know in a topic. I read them and then I go on to O'Reillys (or whatever) with what feels like a pretty solid introductory knowledge. When they're good, I love the Dummies. I've been looking forward to this one for about a year and a half, and it has turned out to be just what I'd have hoped.

This is a wonderful book which shows how a classical field theory like General Relativity can be derived from a quantum field theory. It also points out the extreme difficulty of accomplishing this in the case of gravity and ending up with a consistent, anomaly free theory.

Readers of this book will benefit from familiarity with both quantum field theory and relativity as well as a certain amount of mathematical sophistication. Don't be fooled by the similarity of title to other "Feynman Lectures on..." because this book is based on an upper level graduate physics course and assumes the background of a typical PhD student in physics.

Deep, complex and difficult going but well worth the effort to see the elegance of the connection between General Relativity and QFT.

Feynman gave a series of lectures on gravitation at a graduate seminar at Caltech in 1962. The lectures were recorded and transcribed by Morinigo and Wagner. A very readable introduction on quantum gravity was added by the editor, Brian Hatfield (whose book on quantum field theory and strings, I also recommend.) This is the only book I've seen which develops GR from a quantum field theory point of view. Feynman's lectures show that the GR field equations result from the requirement of gauge invariance under Lorentz transformations for a massless spin-2 field (i.e graviton). This is a more fundamental approach than the usual differential geometric framework and shows what the equivalence principle really means in terms of fundamental symmetries. Highly recommended for a modern field theory viewpoint of GR.

This really is an extraordinary book - it is the most comprehensive, insightful, and consistent study of Wagner's Ring des Niblungen. It offers some musical analysis of the leitmotivs, and is one of the first books to begin a revision of von Wolzogen's grossly erroneous analysis of the leitmotivs; it provides a plethora of highly organized information about the stages of Wagner's sketches and librettos and the original myths/legends/sagas from which he drew; and a scene by scene analysis of Rheingold and Walkure.

This book actually makes sense of Der Ring des Niblungen - no easy task, as anyone familiar with the opera tetralogy is well aware. If you are interested in the tetralogy and want to know more about it, this is THE book. There are, however, two tragedies associated with this book: the first is that the author's untimely death prevented him from finishing the book (though the material printed is itself finished). The whole book should have been about three times the length of the printed material. The second tragedy is that it is OUT OF PRINT - this is absolutely disgraceful...hopefully this title will come in to print again.

Get a hold of a copy of this book if you can.

This book was to have been the first of a two-volume set, but sadly Deryck Cooke passed away before his monumental exposition could be fully realized. It is a great tragedy that this work was left unfinished, but we should at least be thankful for what we have. Rather than take a theological, political or sociological position and try to make the Ring fit, as many authors did, Cooke chose instead to focus on the actual construction of the libretto and orchestral score. Although there is insightful analysis on all 4 operas, this volume is devoted mostly to the realization of Das Rheingold and Die Walkure. The author presents a very convincing thesis that far from being a disjointed, poorly conceived work, Rheingold, by comparison to the extremely disparate and incoherent nature of the source material, is in fact a very compact and concentrated story. When one looks at the Nibelungenlied, the Eddic poems, and the various pieces of Norse mythology, Cooke unequivocally demonstrates that Wagner had enough material to compose a stage work requiring much longer than 4 evenings to perform. The process of refining, editing, compressing, and modifying (within reason) to adapt the writings for the stage is explained in thorough and exhaustive detail. Somehow Cooke accomplished this without the narrative dragging on or becoming too difficult, a masterly effort in exposition. He then goes on to explain how the leitmotives were conceived and transformed from one character and/or event to another. The depth of analysis is worthy of the subject matter. Anyone who reads this book should have a much greater appreciation of Das Rheingold than before.

This work offers many rewards to the serious Wagner enthusiast and also to the casual music lover, and cannot be too strongly recommended. Let us hope it comes back into circulation.

This book is Wagner's seminal essay where he fully explains his principles and opinions regarding opera and music. If you like his operas, this is the one book that is a must have on your reading shelf.

In 1893, the London Wagner Society published an English translation of Wagner's 8 volume collected works. This is volume 2 of that series. It contains the full text of "Oper und Drama", translated as "Opera and Drama". Our old friend, William Ashton Ellis, did the stilted but essential English translations.

Much of what Wagner wrote has nothing to do with music, and quite a large portion is pretty forgettable. However, this book is important, and goes a long way toward helping you understand his music.

Well, to sum it up I simply have to say: Wagner wrote it, so you should read it

This book is an investigation of the relationship between Wagner's art and his intellect. Bryan Magee, who has been both an academic philosopher and a music critic, is uniquely qualified to describe this relationship. The book is based on Magee's careful analysis of both Wagner's music and Wagner's voluminous writings, including his autobiographical works, letters, and polemical writings on art theory. Magee is also an expert on 19th century German philosophy.

Magee presents Wagner as both a great creative artist and a substantial self-conscious intellectual. Magee shows that Wagner made a conscious effort to shape his art to match philosophical/ideological concerns. Wagner's philosophical/idoelogical preoccupations did vary over the course of his life and this resulted in differences in content and forms of his operas. Magee is careful to demonstrate consistent themes (dare I say leitmotifs) throughout this artistic career. These include disgust with contemporary society, strong belief in the importance of love, and a conviction that Wagner's art could have a transforming effect on contemporary life.

Magee shows well that Wagner was initially a political radical and German nationalist with strong anarchist leanings. Under the distant influence of Hegel and the more immediate influence of Feuerbach, Wagner rejected contemporary society, conventional religion and mores, and believed strongly in the redemptive power of love, particularly sexual passion. Along with the idea that he could create an integrated music drama with equal roles for poetry, dramatic expression, and music, these ideas strongly color his early successful operas and writings about artistic theory. Wagner began the Ring cycle with these ideas in mind and intended that the Ring cycle would be an essentially revolutionary document, an incitment to the destruction of contemporary society.

Midway through the lengthy gestation of the Ring cycle, Wagner underwent a conversion experience after he encountered the work of Schopenhauer. Magee treats Wagner's experience with Schopenhauer sensitively. He shows that Wagner's embrace of Schopenhauer was based on very careful reading and analysis of Schopenhauer's work. Magee shows also that Wagner's enthusiasm for Schopenhauer resulted from the fact that Wagner's considerable intellect was already moving towards conclusions reached by Schopenhauer. Wagner's later work is shown to be a combination of Schopenhauerian ideas translated brilliantly into powerful music and opera.

Magee is an excellent writer with a warm, conversational style. As intellectual history this book is first-rate and it is highly accessible. A bonus of this book is that it is an excellent introduction to 19th intellectuals like Schopenhauer and Feuerbach whose work is largely unknown here. As an aside, Magee makes it clear that important ideas usually associated with Freud originally derive from Schopenhauer and Feuerbach. Magee provides also a very good chapter on Nietzsche's relationship with Wagner and an appendix on Wagner's anti-semitism. The former contains what I think is Magee's only misstep. He attributes Nietzsche's descent into insanity as being partly due to Nietzsche's realization that he would never be the creative artist that Wagner became. This is unlikely. Better explanations are that Nietzsche suffered from dementia due to tertiary syphlis or simply developed severe and probably idiopathic depression. The section on Wagner's anti-semitism is clear, unsparing but also vigorously attacks those who judge Wagner solely on this basis. Magee puts Wagner's anti-semitism in context and rebuts claims that his operas exemplify anti-semitism.

The author, Bryan Magee, modestly states in his preface that: "There is never any suggestion that I am giving a full explanation of [Wagner's] works by what I say in these pages: I am merely drawing attention to some of the ideas that went into them." While it is true that is book is focused on Wagner's philosophy (both in the broad and narrower senses of the word) and how this philosophy influenced and affected his works, he also succinctly and brilliantly covers Wagner's biography and personality. If you have never read a book on Wagner, this would be a marvelous place to start.

Magee's basic argument is that to really understand and appreciate Wagner's mature operas you need to understand Schopenhauerian philosophy and Wagner's metaphysical beliefs. He then proceeds to explain Wagner's ideas in a prose style that is straight-forward, extraordinarily lucid and brimming with profound insights. But while the heart of the book is the exposition of Wagner's philosophical beliefs and the affect on his music, there is so much more. As the book jacket blurb says accurately, the book is "at once a biography of the composer, an exploration of the creative process, an account of 19th century opera and an investigation of the intellectual and technical aspects of music". It is really a wonderful addition to Wagner literature.

Magee, it should be noted, is also the author of "Aspects of Wagner", which is a marvelous collection of five short pieces examining, yes, different aspects of Wagner. One of the pieces in that book is about Wagner's anti-Semitism, primarily placing Wagner's views in historical context. In Tristan's Chord, he compliments that earlier essay with an appendix which explores Wagner's anti-Semitism and its ramifications more fully than his earlier piece. It is a balanced and well-supported argument on this most controversial and inflammatory topic.

Before picking up this book, I had Wagner pegged as a proto-Nazi. This was not based on any investigation, I just absorbed it somehow, and took it for granted. Imagine my surprise, then, to learn that Wagner was a hotheaded anarchist revolutionary as a young man, who stood shoulder to shoulder with Bakunin as a leader of the 1848 uprising in Dresden! This part of Magee's book is just the prelude to his real topic, Wagner's later turn to the philosophy of Schopenhauer, but I enjoyed it tremendously. Like many before and since, Wagner became disillusioned as he reached middle age. Whereas he had developed an elaborate philosophical and aesthetic theory about revolutionizing human relations, based on Fuerbach among others, he read Schopenhauer and had an epiphany. One of the most fascinating aspects of this is that he was only partially through composing "The Ring" -- the libretto was complete, but not the music. He stopped in the middle of "Siegfried," wrote "Tristan und Isolde" in a Schopenhauerian frenzy, went on to write "The Mastersingers," and only then returned to finish the music for "Siegfried" and then "Gotterdammerung." So the story of the "The Ring" reflects an anarchist revolutionary vision, far from any proto-Nazi sentiments! "Parsifal," often taken for a Christian work, is not Christian per se, but rather Schopenhauerian -- Wagner used Christian mythic imagery just as he used "pagan" mythic imagery in The Ring.

If you have only the received view of Wagner, prepare for a journey of discovery. Magee's writing is smooth and easy, and the nearly 400 pages read as if only half that. My only minor complaint is that Magee proclaims at regular intervals that Wagner is one of history's greatest geniuses, alongside Shakespeare and Mozart. I have only heard a small sample of Wagner's music, and I am as of yet far from convinced of that, but for the first time I'm ready to give Wagner a fair hearing!

If you are currently collecting or playing Magic cards, I suggest buying this book if you dont have it NOW! It is filled w/ information, fully illustrated cards, interesting facts, playing tips, etc. Also, buy the Magic Encyclopedia Volume 1.

Great book of pictures of Mirage, Visions, 5th Edition, Weatherlight & Portal. Helps alot with viewing the cards for collecting.

Richard Garfield is the creator of Magic The Gathering card game. This book gives the reader an in-depth look into the game and shows the beautiful illustration that each card contains. This is a must have for all players and collectors of the card game.

This penetrating essay on Wagner's works is deceptively brief. Magee's analysis is brilliant and right on target. He manages to say in a few well chosen words what other books ramble on about for pages. This book is well written, authoritative, and masterful. I can't recommend it highly enough.

The kind of book you buy several of to give away to friends. Short, to-the-point, lucid, wide-ranging. The author has a readable style and, well, knows what he's talking about. Good job.

Despite the fact that this book was first published in 1969, it is so well written in such reasonable language that it still stands as one of the most cogent introductions to the genius of Richard Wagner. The bookstore shelves are full of volumes on the man many consider one of the most important composers ever. But many of those books are biased by quirks of each writer who preach either a love-him-or-hate-him agenda. Magee goes to the source, addressing the writings of the composer during his musical hiatus between Lohengrin and the Ring of the Niebelungen, a period (1848 - 1851) when Wagner withdrew into the works of the great German philosophers and gradually formed his world view of Opera as Drama, or, a religous happening - quite a different stance from the 'Opera as Entertainment' that was the popular consensus of the time. Magee offers translations of Wagner's words that clarify the messages that so often are lost in the verbiage that Wagner labored as he responded to the importance of mythology as a universal language, to Shakespeare as the perfect man of words, to the music of Beethoven as the writer of music that ALMOST didn't need poetry ( even though he granted that Beethoven's 9th Symphony which includes poetry was the gold standard of his time and indeed opened all the Bayreuth Festivals with that Beethoven work before presenting his own operas), and to the writings of Karl Marx, et al. Magee's essays include notes on the claims of AntiSemitism, on the influence of Wagner on the other artists of his time and after his time, and even on performance standards of his works. All this, in a book just over 100 pages in length! An invaluable tool for those who want to better understand why Wagner's music continues today to cause such profound emotional responses. Beautifully written and informative.

This is a well-written and hard to put down history of the Bayreuth Festival. Thanks are due to Mr. Spotts for sifting through many works in German that are hard to find. However, there are a couple of curious statements that make me wonder about the veracity of the book as a whole. In his discussion of the 1951 reopening, he refers to Karajan as an up and coming young conductor from Aachen. Well, in 1942 Karajan left Aachen to assume directorship of the Berlin State Opera, and by 1951 his associations with the Vienna Philharmonic and the Philharmonia Orchestra had made him an internationally known recording artist. Hardly a young upstart from the sticks!

In the same chapter, he refers to a society that was organized around Hans Pfitzner to protest the radicalism of Wieland Wagner's productions. However, Pfitzner died in 1949, presumably without seeing the first of Wieland's stagings in 1951. No explanation is given for this statement.

In general, this is a book written by a well-informed and insightful fan, but perhaps one without a strong musical background.

I consider this book to be very informative, on a topic that may not interest everyone, but anyone who is interested in Wagner and his music should read this book. The links the author makes between the Bayreuth festival and Hitler help explain why Wagner's music was considered central to the National Socialist ideology. Another book which I have read and which I highly recommend for people who do not know much on Wagner but would like to know more is "Wagner without Fear" by William Berger. It mentions the Bayreuth festival, but also summarizes all of Wagner's operas (except "Rienzi"), something which is not found in "Bayreuth: A History of the Wagner Festival."

I will never forget the excitement of seeing this book on the shelf. Admittedly, the heavy emphasis on outstanding photography made me hesitant. But, having been to the Festival a couple of times (and having cut through many a book related to Wagner), I had to go with it. I was not disappointed. Indeed, I would be hard pressed to suggest a better written book on the festival, its relationship to Nazi Germany, the conflict of schools of interpretation, Wagnerism, or ... Wagner! This book sails and you are sorry when the trip is over. It also provides a serious, well-organized discussion of the development of Wagner's music and the characters who desired the association of the Wagner household. The musician, performer, historian, critic, biographer, and disciple will all be entertained.