Musical Networks

Wagner's music had been heard in Königsberg and in Riga since the 1830s, with Riga soon to become a Wagner center. Even after Wagner's personal influence in the Baltic world declined, and although—unlike many other German musicians at the time—he did not continue his travels to St. Petersburg and the other centers of the Baltic world, a considerable amount of information on the composer's activities, thoughts, and works can be gleaned from contemporary newspapers and musical periodicals, particularly from the 1850s onward. After taking part in the Dresden Uprising in May 1849, Wagner wrote several texts on the theory of art including Die Kunst und die Revolution, Das Kunstwerk der Zukunft, and Oper und Drama; the sentiments expressed in these books were soon widely quoted in the press, coinciding with a growing interest in Wagner's music.

The purpose of this chapter is to begin a discourse on the initial spread of Wagner's music. Wagner had focused on the composition of music dramas, which—to a certain degree—made his works difficult to export and less suitable for popularization than, for instance, Chopin's piano music. In addition to this, Wagner planned his works to be performed by huge ensembles, thus creating economic and practical hindrances to the spread of productions of his works.

I will address the question of how Wagner's music became better known, the methods by which extracts, separated from the operas, appeared in concert programs, and how Wagner's works were arranged for use in homes and salons. This process of musical distribution was an important factor in the reception of Wagner's work. Reception, after all, was not only a matter of circulating music: it entailed a movement and exchange of people and ideas as well. Here, it was not just through printed sheet music, concerts, music periodicals, and books that Richard Wagner's music became familiar: social interaction also played its part. The reciprocal movement of composers, musicians, singers, and music scholars between Germany and the world of the mare balticum created a network through which musical innovations spread rapidly. This musical network not only influenced the spread of music but also affected the formation of the infrastructure on which music was based.