This recording of Heinrich August Marschner's "Der Vampyr" was made in Cologne at the WDR Funkhaus, Klaus-von-Bismarck-Saal, in August 1999.
Notable Performances
The 15-year-old Richard Wagner was among the audience at the 1828 premiere of Marschner's opera "Der Vampyr" in Leipzig.
Critical Reception
Music historian Georg Knepler noted that Marschner's "Der Vampyr" was the first time in German music a monster was portrayed as a positive hero, contributing to "general confusion."
Historical Context
Marschner's "Der Vampyr" emerged during the era of Dark Romanticism, which cast its shadow on opera with themes of inherited curses, dark guilt, and bloody props.
Critical Reception
Hans Pfitzner, a generation after Wagner, rehabilitated the "German genre" of horror opera, praising Marschner's "Der Vampyr" as a "pearl of German opera music."
Cultural Impact
The devilish Lord Ruthven from Marschner's "Der Vampyr" was a clear influence on Richard Wagner's first opera text, which he conceived as a "darkest nocturne."
