Curtain, Gong, Steam Th e publisher gratefully acknowledges the generous support of the Dragan Plamenac Endowment of the American Musicological Society, funded in part by the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. Th e publisher and the University of California Press Foundation also gratefully acknowledge the generous support of the Constance and William Withey Endowment Fund in History and Music. Curtain, Gong, Steam Wagnerian Technologies of Nineteenth-Century Opera Gundula Kreuzer UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESS University of California Press, one of the most distinguished university presses in the United States, enriches lives around the world by advancing scholarship in the humanities, social sciences, and natural sciences. Its activities are supported by the UC Press Foundation and by philanthropic contributions from individuals and institutions. For more information, visit www.ucpress.edu. University of California Press Oakland, California © 2018 by Th e Regents of the University of California Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Kreuzer, Gundula Katharina, 1975– author. Title: Curtain, gong, steam : Wagnerian technologies of nineteenth-century opera / Gundula Kreuzer. Description: Oakland, California : University of California Press, [2018] | Includes bibliographical references and index. | Identifi ers: lccn 2017052549 (print) | lccn 2017056145 (ebook) | isbn 9780520966550 (ebook) | isbn 9780520279681 (cloth : alk. paper) Subjects: LCSH: Wagner, Richard, 1813-1883—Aesthetics. | Opera and technology—History—19th century. | Opera—Production and direction—History—19th century. | Opera—Stage-setting and scenery—History—19th century. | Opera and technology—History— 20th century. | Opera—Production and direction—History—20th century. | Opera—Stage-setting and scenery—History—20th century. Classifi cation: lcc ml1700 (ebook) | lcc ml1700+ (print) | ddc 792.509/034—dc23 lc record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017052549 Manufactured in the United States of America / Printed in China 26 25 24 23 22 21 20 19 18 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 To Barbara Kreuzer and the wise love she represents contents List of Illustrations ix Preface and Acknowledgments xi Abbreviations xvi Note on Presentation xix Introduction: Opera, Staging, Technologies 1 1. Wagner’s Venusberg 27 2. Curtain 54 3. Gong 109 4. Steam 162 Epilogue: Wagnerian Failure 215 Notes 239 Works Cited 291 Index 335 illustrations 1.1. “ ‘Atlas’ in Music,” in Puck. Humoristisch-Satyrische Wochenschrift (1877) 43 1.2. Venus’s all-purpose pink drapery lures Tannhäuser in Wolfgang Wagner’s production of Tannhäuser, act 1, scene 2 (Bayreuth, 1985) 44 1.3. Venus charms through layers of rose-colored bodily extensions in Nikolaus Lehnhoff ’s staging of Tannhäuser, act 1, scene 2 (Festspielhaus Baden- Baden, 2008) 45 1.4. Th e Venusberg rendered as an inverted theatrical curtain in Werner Herzog’s production of Tannhäuser, act 1, scene 2 (Teatro San Carlo, Naples, 1998) 46 2.1. Th e Wagner curtain: draft of its mechanical construction by Walter Huneke 92 2.2. Th e Wagner curtain in 1897, framing the Bayreuth stage for Parsifal’s Grail temple in Wagner’s premiere production of 1882 93 3.1. Gong strikes at the beginning of Domenico Corri’s “dramatic opera” Th e Travellers, or Music’s Fascination (London, Th eatre Royal, Drury Lane, 1806) 118 3.2. Tam-tam used in Paris for François-Joseph Gossec’s Marche lugubre (1790) as part of the funeral cortège for Mirabeau on April 4, 1791 119 3.3. Use of a gong to induce catalepsy in Jean-Martin Charcot’s neurological clinic at the Salpêtrière Hospital, Paris, during the 1870s and 1880s, as rendered in Paul Regnard’s Sorcellerie, magnétisme, morphinisme, délire des grandeurs (1887) 141 ix