Wagner had, from early on, a deep engagement with the Grail mythology, particularly in its French and German variations. (I) His final selection from it for Parsifal was a result of decades of sorting it all through. (II) So I think a true understanding of Wagner’s last testament is not possible without some exploration of this material. My own has no doubt been scattershot by scholarly standards. But it’s always there, part of the latency of this haunting, disturbing work, and my intuitive sense of whether or not it’s being summoned is my visceral, pre-analytic performance test.
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NEXT TIME: I will post the third installment of my “Before the First Lesson” series, concerning the many contemporary cultural and environmental factors that influence developing young singers in advance of training. On Friday, March 23.
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Footnotes
| ↑I | The British versions—the ones we think of as Arthurian, wherein Perceval’s adventures are alternated with those of Lancelot, Gallahad, and the rest of the Round Table gang—are of equal importance, but not to Wagner’s opera. |
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| ↑II | A superb recent recounting and analysis of the Grail materials, with an excellent chapter on Wagner’s treatment, is Richard Barber’s The Holy Grail: Imagination and Belief, Harvard, 2004. |