Wagner descendant slams 'anti-Semitic' music at Berlin Wall event

Of course Jewish greats and German greats wrote in German, may their works endure. There is no intention in my post to vilify the innocent, not to abolish any language, just a sarcastic comment to show how insane it is to censor, id est, since some German-speakers committed acts of anti-Semitism, we should not destroy anything having to do with Germany. The Wagners are being "more Catholic than the Pope!"

"It`s kind of amusing to hear people who so vehemently (and correctly ) denounce the Nazis for burning literature because it was written by Jews refusing to play music because it was written by Wagner." Amusing to you it may be, but there is a slight difference in your purported equation of the two phenomena: the Jews whose literature was burned didn't make racial hatred their chief passtime in life.

...lets walk.

AND WAGNER'S MUSIC IS WRETCHED, HITLER LOVED IT, ENOUGH OF AN ENDORSEMENT NEVER TO PLAY THE DRIVEL AGAIN.

Richard Wagner lived from 1813 to 1883. It is absurd that he foresaw anti-semitism as a part of his great vision when he composed the music to Lohengrin. More than 50 years passed before Hitler became Chancellor of Germany. However I do admit that a mixture of Schoenberg and Wagner is somewhat out of the ordinary, especially when rock is mixed in with a fallng Berlin wall.

The Prelude to Lohengrin usually refers to the 10 minute long first act, which may be the most heavenly music ever written. The 4 minute prelude to Act 3 is loud and powerful, and some could object to it's inclusion. Daniel Barenboim is a true man of peace, and I would fully trust his reasoning. Listen to the middle movement of Haydn's cello concerto played by his deceased wife, Jacqueline Du Pre with him conducting. The most healing music one can experience!

Wagner was, as fashionable at the time, anti-semitic, although the conducter who made him great was naturally Jewish! If we should not play Wagner, what about all the other virulently anti-semite like Chopin, Tchaikovski, etc?

It's kind of amusing to hear people who so vehemently (and correctly ) denounce the Nazis for burning literature because it was written by Jews refusing to play music because it was written by Wagner.

Unfortunately for your idea, too many Jewish "greats" in culture and science spoke and wrote in the German language. Take your hate out on people, not on languages. David

Hitler's anti-Semitic speeches were in German. German is an anti-Semitic language and should never be heard or uttered again.

Wagner was not a nice man but he created some of the most sublime music of his time. Anyone who can dismiss the prelude to Lohengrin as "warmongering music" is living in a different musical universe. But then the Wagner descendants always were a bit strange.

Barenboim often plays Wagner, but I believe this is a VERY inappropriate choice for such a public event. The 9th of november is a day of sorrow for Germany's Jews and it is sad to see this conductor choose to play the music of one of the most famous anti-Semitic composers, who was even Hitler's favorite composer, on the anniversary of the "Pogrom Night". Barenmboim already shocked many in Israel by being the first conductor who played Wagner there. I can't understand his motivation for doing that back then, and for doing this now.

It is unfortunate but true that many great works are written by bad people. We would be short sighted to dismiss the works because of people who wrote them. We should allow the works to stand on their own.

A scary thought!

Leonard Bernstein had it right when he performed the Beethoven Ninth at the time the wall came down. That one was appropriate, or indeed any of thousands of works of German and Austrian composers which better fit the occasion than Wagner, whose work directly inspired Hitler's insane objectives and whose house in Bayreuth he made into a shrine to Nazism, laying the groundwork for the deaths of millions and the division of not only Germany, but of Europe as a whole. Unfortunately Barenboim can't climb down off his personal soapbox, be it Germany, Israel, the Palestinians, etc. And the Lohengrin prelude?? Mediocre Wagner at best!

Not Wagner's fault he became a favorite composer of Hitler. It is still beautiful. Music and poetry lives on after the flawed people who produced them are buried. Who cares that Franz Liszt was a lech, Chopin was a wimp, Lewis Carroll was a pedophile, Kipling was a jingoist we could go on and on dissing dirt on the dead but it doesn't diminish the art they left behind.

The question is not if Wagner's music is war-mongering and whether Wagner was anti-semitic, but that Hitler and his regime are so closely identified with it. Nor is the point of Wagner's music played or not played in Israel relevant. Anti-Semitism and Israel are two separate issues. The point is that the 9th of November is also the date of the "Reich-Kristall-Nacht", the night of the broken glass 1938 of infamous memeory. On such an aoccasion and on such a date, playing Wagner would be a sign of insensitivity if not lack of takt.

"Wagner said the choice of his great-grandfather's "warmongering" music was inappropriate to mark November 9, 1989, which was remarkable for the peaceful course of events." - DPA Too true. On occasion I can enjoy Dick Wagners taste in excess. But I cannot see how it could be associated with celebrating the fall of the Berlin Wall. Few were more responsible for the delusions of grandeur and racial superiority which led Germany to it's destruction. And without that destruction there would have been no Berlin Wall.

The great grandson should stay home if he doesn't like the choice of music. If Barenboim was able to play Wagner in 2001 in Israel, he could very well play it at the wall. In 2001 he politely asked objectors to leave if they did not want to hear Wagner. In 2000, holocaust survivor Mendi Rodan had conducted the Israeli Rishon Letzion Orchestra in some Wagner too. In 1981, Zubin Mehta was about to conduct the Israel Philharmonic in some Wagner when he was interrupted by an objector. There is nothing wrong with playing Wagner at the wall festivities.

we know who and what wagner the composer was. nevertheless, israeli musicians tell me all the time that his contributions to music are so significant we must look beyond the man and accept his art. israelis want to play wagner - and there is some type of taboo on it here as well. i look at it this way, if the nazis working for volkswagen saw jews enjoying their cars in israel, they'd roll over in their graves. let us reclaim german gifts to the world - and recognize that even bad people can create good things. why should we suffer without those good things? i see no reason for it.

....sometimes even if they have been torn down a long time ago...:)