Re: Trsitan: The First Hundred Years (Zuckerman)

"A.C. Douglas" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message news:<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>...
> "Laon" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> 
> > [snipped - original post is below]
> ---------------------------------------------------------

Dear ACD:

I've hardly had any time at all in two years to contribute any
comments to this site, but I'm within a few weeks of finishing my
first draft of my entire comprehensive study of the "Ring", conceptual
and motival (thanks in large part to Allen Dunning's collaboration
with me), and I do recall reading a quote of Verdi's (no idea where),
in which he said something like: All other operas known to me are to
one degree or another beautiful, etc., but "Tristan" alone fills me
with dread and awe. This is an extremely loose paraphrase, but that
was the general tone of his remark. No idea where or when I read it.
Of course Gutman records Verdi's remark, to Ricordi, at Wagner's
death, that Wagner had made a great mark on the history of opera, and
then reconsidered and wrote instead "Very great", Potentissima, or
something like that.

Anyway, thought you'd be amused to hear also that my "Ring" study of
thirty some years is nearly done. It will be when complete about 850
single spaced pages long, and takes into account not only the entire
text of the "Ring", line by line, but also the entirety of Wagner's
own writings and recorded remarks which are of either direct or
indirect relevance to grasping what he was about in the "Ring", and
also the entirety of Feuerbach's relevant writings. It is also, thanks
to Allen Dunning's comprehensive work with me to figure out each
separate appearance of every single identifiable musical motive within
the poetic text (as found in the orchestral score, in which my
contribution is mimimal, Allen's maximal), I believe the most
comprehensive effort ever undertaken to relate the motifs to the
development of the plot from a conceptual standpoint. This coming
year, opportunity and time permitting (I'm 14k in debt and have to
find work before doom's day), I'm going to devote to PR work on
getting it published, giving talks on it, writing articles based on
it, reducing it to a marketable form, etc. Anyway, just reporting in.


Paul alias Alberich00 
> 
> Many thanks, Laon.  Good of you to take the time.
> 
> It's really bugging me now.  I know I read it somewhere, but now that you've
> confirmed that that encyclopedic work makes no mention of  Verdi owning a
> _Tristan_ score, I wonder how much that other reference, that we both seem to
> have read which does make note of it, can be trusted.  The only saving thing is
> that the Budden is not, strictly speaking, a biography, and therefore may not
> have deemed such mention pertinent (yes, I know that's a stretch)..
> 
> Tantalizing -- and frustrating.
> 
> --
> ACD
> http://acdouglas.com
> ------------------- original post -------------------
> "Laon" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
> news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> > I've looked up each reference to _Tristan_ in Julian Budden's
> > three-volume _The Operas of Verdi_. There's no reference to Verdi
> > having the _Tristan_ score.
> >
> > The idea that Verdi had a _Tristan_ score does ring a faint bell, but
> > I can't remember where I might have read it. Anyway, for what it's
> > worth, you can rule out Budden's _The Operas of Verdi_ as well.
> >
> > Good luck!
> >
> >
> > Laon