Patrick von Stutenzee's Gay Candy Blog: Richard Wagner's Lohengrin

When I mention Lohengrin, I get three possible reactions: the opera, the chocolate bar, the wedding march. Lohengrin is the Wagner opera where you need a guide and a map to try and make sense of it. Richard Wagner concocted the libretto from poems, Greek mythology, and fake history. The end product has nothing the viewer recognizes as any story they ever heard. At the opera, they then spend hours in limbo or are busy rifling through the program they bought.

Lohengrin: The Opera

Richard Wagner got his idea for parts of the opera and its hero Lohengrin from the epic poem Percival by Wolfram von Eschenbach. It was written before 1220 AD. He then stole the confrontation of the queens from The Song of the Nibelungs which was written down around 1200 AD but had been orally told since about 600 AD. He then added parts of the story of Zeus and Semele from Greek mythology. Out of this hodgepodge he managed to compose the total of the storyline. As a setting, he chose the Duchy of Brabant during a visit of King Henry the Fowler around 900 AD; the 'history' behind that visit is entirely fictional but somehow influenced German history writing into the 20th century.

Richard Wagner conceived the idea for Lohengrin in Paris in 1842; it took him until 1848 to finish libretto and musical score. The opera was first shown in 1850 in Weimar under the direction of Franz Liszt. Formally, Lohengrin is Richard Wagner's first true opera without a clearly distinguishable series of individual musical numbers. He thereby moved away from the traditional sectional works split into arias, recitative, and choral parts as done by Mozart, for example. While this holistic approach welded the work into a single musical entity, it also made later edits more difficult.

Lohengrin: History and Legend

In the end, everything about Lohengrin was pure fiction. The title hero Lohengrin was the son of Percival as King of the Grail Castle and a minor character in Wolfram von Eschenbach's mythical epos Percival. The historical context chosen by Richard Wagner as the setting for the opera was fictional as well. The Duchy of Brabant was part of the kingdom of the Western Franks; King Henry the Fowler led the Eastern Franks, Brabant therefore was way outside his sphere of influence. This fictitious visit did influence German historical perception into the late 20th century, though.

Lohengrin: The Dilemma

The hero Lohengrin is young, beautiful, pure, impetuous, virtuous, and sent by God. In the libretto the positive descriptions of the protagonist keep on piling up. It was little wonder that King Ludwig II of Bavaria got completely hooked. In Lohengrin, he had found the ideal hero. This enthusiasm contributed significantly to the fact that King Ludwig summoned composer Richard Wagner to Munich where he became his lifelong patron.

The famous introduction to the opera exudes bright warmth. Only at the very end of the opera listener learn where this heavenly, spiritual warmth is coming from: Lohengrin is a knight of the Holy Grail, a being of shining light. He heard the cry for help in Elsa's prayers and left the Castle of the Grail to protect her. Once in Brabant, he develops worldly feelings for her in the process.

Elsa falls in love with him, too. She had dreams of him even before his arrival. The motif of Lohengrin first appears in 'Elsa's Dream'. The motif is intended to characterize the protagonist. The bantering, staccato closing phrase is youthful, fresh and proud. Richard Wagner used the term 'animato' for it. The descending syncope shows the enthusiastic and fiery streak in the young man.

This fiery young knight arrives by swan boat in Brabant to save the innocent Elsa from the evil Ortrud. Ortrud accuses Elsa of having killed her brother Gottfried (while Ortrud in fact had turned him into a swan by magic). Lohengrin as part of a secret society has his secrets to keep. He forbids Elsa to ask him his name or where he came from. Ortrud with her pagan witchcraft keeps nagging at Elsa until she asks the question anyhow. Lohengrin boards the next swan leaving for Grail Castle while the female cast dies on stage.

Richard Wagner made use of the tension between the old pagan beliefs and the progressive Christian conversion which had lasted well into the 13th century. It allowed him to show the dilemma between light and glory in heaven and the vale of tears of human existence on earth. He demonstrated the difference between the gains of true faith and the price of losing it; all the while earthly love becomes a mere bystander.

Lohengrin: Did You Know?

Richard Wagner was unable to attend the premier of Lohengrin in Weimar in 1850. He was at the time a wanted terrorist of the German revolution and was in exile in Switzerland. He was very cozy there, living with a rich patron and his adoring wife.

The opera Lohengrin was sung in Italian when first shown in London, Dublin, New York, and New Orleans. Richard Wagner called it his most Italian of operas; the Wagner clan later tried to exclude it from being shown in Bayreuth at all.

Leo Slezak (1873 – 1946) was one of the leading tenors of his day and often sang Lohengrin in leading opera houses. When a technician started moving the swan boat out of reach for him before he had time to get into the boat, he asked the audience: 'Does anyone know when the next swan is due?'

King Ludwig II of Bavaria had his sleeping chamber in Castle Neuschwanstein completely decorated with the arrival of Lohengrin in the swan boat.

In 1911, Norwegian chocolate factory Freia brought the Lohengrin chocolate bar to the market. Initially only sold at the National Theatre, it was put onto the list for the protection of National Cultural Treasures in 2009.