United States or Iraq ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Wagner is sometimes credited with having originated this method for the portrayal of celestial music. Mr. Louis C. Elson says: "Wagner, alone, of all the great masters, does not use the harp for celestial tone coloring, but violins and wood-winds, in prolonged notes in the highest positions.
Over a waving accompaniment of clarinets, the other wood-winds strike up a more lyric and hopeful strain, and a soliloquy from the 'cello ends the slow introduction, the materials of which are taken from the two principal subjects of the overture, which is built on the classic sonata formula.
The foyer was like an ant-hill in commotion; people running forwards and backwards, trying vainly to bribe an entrance, until the noise was like hornets buzzing; while from behind came the sound of the orchestra tuning, faint raspings of the cellos, and the wails of the wood-winds, and above them the cry of a trumpet muffled.
With what precision the bows of the violins moved up and down together; how accurately the wood-winds came in with their gentler notes; how regularly the brazen keys of the trumpets rose and fell, and the long, shining tubes of the trombone slid out and in.
After this introductory period the work runs through tenderly contemplative musing to the end, in which, again, the only strings are the four violins, though here they are accompanied by the brass and wood-winds and tympani, the cymbals being gently tapped with drumsticks. The introduction to the third act of the opera is more lyrical, but not so fine. Gleason is again his own librettist.
Drawn to her height she stood, the helmet tipped back on her red-blonde hair, the white robes trailing about her, the spear uplifted. As she sang her throat swelled, her voice came like a torrent: above the wood-winds and strings, the brass and the basses, the single voice soared higher and higher, deeper and richer, full of passion and pure. "Heil dir, Sonne! Heil dir, Licht!
All the fiddles strummed With tuning up; the wood-winds made a ring Of reedy bubbling noises, and the sting Of sharp, red brass pierced every eardrum; patting From muffled tympani made a dark slatting
Word Of The Day