Act 2 Of Richard Wagner's Opera from Bayreuth
The Festival Orchestra
Conductor, Heinz Tietjen
Chorus Master, Friedrich Jung
(By courtesy of Reichs-Rundfunk-Gesellschaft, Berlin).

Prelude: a musical suggestion of the dragon into which the giant Fafner has changed himself to guard the treasure.
The scene shows the dragon's cave in the wood: meeting of Alberich and Wotan (the Wanderer) who warns him against his treacherous brother Mime, and Fafner against the hero who will come and kill him. Wotan goes; Siegfried and Mime appear.
Siegfried listens to the murmurs of the forest; presently he rises and fights and kills the dragon. Having accidentally tasted its blood, he can now understand the voices of the birds; the Wood-Bird warns him against Mime, and he goes into the cave to get the ring.
Alberich and Mime appear discussing the affair; exit Alberich as Siegfried reappears. Mime tries to beguile the hero with soft words, but in vain; Siegfried contemptuously kills him.
Finally the Wood-Bird is heard again, telling Siegfried of the sleeping beauty on the fire-girt rock.