Richard Wagner - Die Meistersinger - Prelude (BPO / Furtwangler / 1942)

Richard Wagner - Die Meistersinger / The Mastersingers - Prelude
Berliner Philharmoniker / Berlin Philharmonic
Conducted by Wilhelm Furtwängler
Recorded at the AEG Factory in February 1942
--------------
The music making is unmistakeable, but the historical context cannot be ignored.
This concert was performed in the presence of Nazis, just weeks before the openings of Belzec, Sobibor, and Treblinka II - and the close-up images of members of the audience, being corrupted by great music, turns the stomach.
Furtwängler looks like he wishes he was anywhere on earth but there. His performance of Beethoven's 9th under similar conditions a month later is now in the history books, as is the look on his face and his general demeanour - a mixture of terror, utter repulsion, and intense discomfort, when Goebbels leans in for a handshake. It may be the most profound performance of Beethoven ever recorded - but clearly Furtwangler's pulpable desperation to convey Beethoven's message of friendship, peace, and brotherhood fell on deaf ears.
This clip isn't so often seen.
Picture and audio quality is predictably not pristine, but having said that, I've been able to make some significant improvements to the soundtrack... no less, dealing with the opening bar, which was badly damaged in commercial release and can now be properly heard, for the first time, I believe.

[@buffuzo4201]

Zum jeden sein.

[@Ryan-on5on]

Watching this and other Furtwängler concerts of the Third Reich era, I can't help to wonder if hearing this wondrous music temporarily brought a degree of humility and shame to those in the audience who had enough common sense to recognize the hypocrisy of feigning an interest in the higher aesthetics of civilization while being knowing accomplices to a campaign of human extermination only surpassed in body count by Genghis Khan's infamous sacking of Eurasia during the 13th century. Man certainly is a most peculiar and vexing organism!

[@glagolitic]

I like to think so. After all, it's a common misconception that during the war, all Germans were Nazis. Not all Germans were Nazis. Not even all Nazis were Nazis - some did what they had to do, joined the party, saluted, and kept up appearances in public because they needed to survive, but quietly despised the regime.
But, sadly, I wonder how much impact music would have on those who genuinely believed that the Nazis were doing the right thing. In the same year, Furtwangler viscerally beat Goebbels and co around the head with Beethoven's 9th. The whole performance felt like a 70 minute long blood-curdling scream of anger and defiance aimed right in the Nazi's faces, with all the subtlety and nuance of a hand grenade shoved down each and every audience member's throat. And they loved every second of it. It confirmed their supremacism, it justified it, it validated it. They closed their eyes and saw THEMSELVES as the magic power reuniting all men as brothers... They thought it was talking about THEM. Never underestimate the ability of someone who is that deluded and that brainwashed to hear even the strongest, most eloquent criticism as glowing praise...

[@Charliecomet82]

"Enjoy the war, peace will be terrible!"😁