‘Jewishness in Music’ Revisited: Jews and Judaism in Opera from Meyerbeer to Strauss
In his notorious and viciously anti-Semitic essay, “Das Judentum in der Musik,” (1850-51), Richard Wagner focused his wrath on two prominent German composers: Mendelssohn and Meyerbeer. To Wagner’s dismay, Jewish composers figured prominently in the world of opera during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, and Jewish-themed operas later became something of a sub-genre. In my paper I study the different valences of Judaism in the operas of the period, focusing in particular on the taint of decadence that characterizes the later productions. It is hoped that from this discussion will emerge a fuller understanding of perceptions of Jews and Judaism in one of Europe’s most ‘visible’ cultural forms at a time when a virulent anti-Semitism was emergent in Europe’s political and social discourse.
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