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A memorable day…

4/10/2017

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Listening to the rousing overture to Wagner’s opera Rienzi on Radio 3 today, took me straight back to a Saturday in the early summer of 1973. I had gone to visit my girlfriend in Reading where she attended the university, and she, knowing my growing regard for Wagner’s music, had got tickets for a local amateur production of the opera.
 
Wagner composed Rienzi during his ‘Paris’ period, an unhappy time when he was trying to make his mark by writing music with popular appeal. He subsequently disowned it, and Rienzi is rarely performed these days and never at Bayreuth, but it has some excellent and memorable ‘tunes’, and a splendid climax when the Roman Capitol building collapses around the hero.
 
It was a glorious day, and we took advantage of the weather to go to Henley and enjoy a cream tea overlooking the river. We knew that the opera was going to be long, and one of my girlfriend’s flatmates cooked a fish pie to be eaten before the performance in order to keep us going.
 
The whole Rienzi experience was most entertaining and thoroughly enjoyable, but at midnight I was sick as dog. I always wondered afterwards which of the sensory excesses it was that was responsible  – the cream tea, the fish pie or Wagner. I suspect the fish pie although many would blame Wagner, and that is a pity, because in Rienzi, Wagner succeeded in creating real entertainment. 

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  • Home
  • Books
    • Henry's Trials >
      • Extract from Henry's Trials
    • Smethurst's Luck >
      • Extract from Smethurst's Luck
    • Murder in the Red Barn >
      • Extract from Murder in the Red Barn
    • Reverend Duke and the Amesbury Oliver
  • Talks
    • Talk on Henry's Trials
    • Talk on Smethurst's Luck
    • Talk on Isambard Kingdom Brunel
    • Talk on the Murder in the Red Barn
    • BBC
  • Publications
    • The Amesbury Union Workhouse
    • The Separate System
  • Peter Maggs
  • Shop
  • Blog
  • Family History
    • Mirli
    • BM Creeper >
      • The Significance of Stonehenge
      • Educating Ealing I: How Lady Byron Did It
      • Educating Ealing II: Church of England Primary in the 1920s
      • All Because of Crystal Palace
      • Innocent in Ealing - Extract
      • Miss McDonald