Page 77 - Weiss, Jernej, ur./ed. 2024. Glasbena kritika – nekoč in danes ▪︎ Music Criticism – Yesterday and Today. Koper/Ljubljana: Založba Univerze na Primorskem in Festival Ljubljana. Studia musicologica Labacensia, 7
P. 77
doi: https://doi.org/10.26493/978-961-293-299-2.77-88
Music of Progress and the Future:
On the Roots of a Fierce Press Feud
in the Second Half of the 19th Century
Helmut Loos
Univerza v Leipzigu
Universität Leipzig
“Zukunftsmusik” was a catchword that appeared in the mid-19th century
and was intended to brand the camp of the “New Germans” in the musi-
cal party dispute until it was positively adapted by them. Richard Wagner
fuelled the controversy with his essay Das Kunstwerk der Zukunft (1850)
and further fanned the flames with an open letter Zukunftsmusik (1861).
As the original dedication of the second main aesthetic writing of the Zu-
rich period (1850) to Friedrich Feuerbach on the basis of his writing on The
Religion of the Future1 demonstratively proves, Wagner, according to his
own testimony (in the preface to the Collected Writings and Poems of 1872),
“surrendered himself without critical consideration to the guidance” of this
“witty writer.”2 This is connected to his decision not to work out a Jesus of
Nazareth but a Siegfried, with which Wagner deviated from the primarily
Christian theme he had pursued until Lohengrin. He thus came into clear
conflict with his supporter and friend Franz Liszt, who had enthusiastical-
ly supported Lohengrin.3 With his move from Weimar to Rome a few years
1 Friedrich Feuerbach, Die Religion der Zukunft (Zurich and Winterthur: Verlag des
literarischen Comptoirs, 1843).
2 Richard Wagner, “Introduction,” in Richard Wagner, Gesammelte Schriften und Di-
chtungen, vol. 3 (Leipzig: Verlag E. W. Fritzsch, 1872), 4.
3 Helmut Loos, “Richard Wagner’s Lohengrin und sein religionssoziologisches Um-
feld,” in Transgression in Music - Międzynarodowa Konferencja 23.–25. listopada/
November 2021, ed. Anna Nowak (Bydgoszcz: Akademia Muzyczna im. Feliksa
Nowowiejskiego, forthcoming).
77
Music of Progress and the Future:
On the Roots of a Fierce Press Feud
in the Second Half of the 19th Century
Helmut Loos
Univerza v Leipzigu
Universität Leipzig
“Zukunftsmusik” was a catchword that appeared in the mid-19th century
and was intended to brand the camp of the “New Germans” in the musi-
cal party dispute until it was positively adapted by them. Richard Wagner
fuelled the controversy with his essay Das Kunstwerk der Zukunft (1850)
and further fanned the flames with an open letter Zukunftsmusik (1861).
As the original dedication of the second main aesthetic writing of the Zu-
rich period (1850) to Friedrich Feuerbach on the basis of his writing on The
Religion of the Future1 demonstratively proves, Wagner, according to his
own testimony (in the preface to the Collected Writings and Poems of 1872),
“surrendered himself without critical consideration to the guidance” of this
“witty writer.”2 This is connected to his decision not to work out a Jesus of
Nazareth but a Siegfried, with which Wagner deviated from the primarily
Christian theme he had pursued until Lohengrin. He thus came into clear
conflict with his supporter and friend Franz Liszt, who had enthusiastical-
ly supported Lohengrin.3 With his move from Weimar to Rome a few years
1 Friedrich Feuerbach, Die Religion der Zukunft (Zurich and Winterthur: Verlag des
literarischen Comptoirs, 1843).
2 Richard Wagner, “Introduction,” in Richard Wagner, Gesammelte Schriften und Di-
chtungen, vol. 3 (Leipzig: Verlag E. W. Fritzsch, 1872), 4.
3 Helmut Loos, “Richard Wagner’s Lohengrin und sein religionssoziologisches Um-
feld,” in Transgression in Music - Międzynarodowa Konferencja 23.–25. listopada/
November 2021, ed. Anna Nowak (Bydgoszcz: Akademia Muzyczna im. Feliksa
Nowowiejskiego, forthcoming).
77
