(From Bournemouth)
No. XI of the Summer Season
THE BOURNEMOUTH MUNICIPAL AUGMENTED ORCHESTRA
Conducted by Sir DAN GODFREY (Soloist, ALBERT VOORZANGER)
Tannhauser was completed in 1842, when Wagner was 29. Already in this opera, as even before it in The Flying Dutchman, Wagner is beginning to feel his way towards the use of leading motives, but the work is still opera in the sense that it consists largely of separate numbers. Wagner made his own libretto for the work, using two of the oldest and most interesting legends in the German folk lore. One was the old story of the song contest in the Wartburg, a hall which may still be visited today, where the Minnesingers strove for no smaller prize than the hand of the Land-grave's niece, Princess Elisabeth.
The other legend dates back to the very early days of Christianity, when it was matter of common belief that the old heathen gods and goddesses had taken refuge in remote parts of the world, to which mortals still sometimes found their way. According to the German legend, Venus, with all her attendant nymphs and witchery, had hidden herself amongst the remote mountains of the Horselberg, where she held her court in unfading youth and beauty.