That’s Dick Wagner, composer…not Dick Wagner, Pershing County judge. A blog called “Wagner Tripping” has proposed that the German musician be declared the Patron Saint of Burning Man. It seems there are many similarities between TTITD and Wagner’s vision for his performances:
Kinder, macht neues! Neues! Und abermals neues! (Children, make something new! New! And new again!) – Richard Wagner1
He originally envisioned that the premiere performance of the cycle would be held on the banks of a river, and there would only be one cycle – “free, of course” (but three performances each day!) – followed by destruction of the theater, presumably by setting it ablaze, after the end of the cycle. And, then, move on to another work…
…Clearly, Wagner was the original burner, at least in conception
Much of the art is ephemeral and is burned at the end of the week. This is the quintessential Burning Man experience: lots of art; lots of fire…
…Wagner, who was obsessed with the cleansing and renewing nature of fire, would have been absolutely enchanted with the burner community. These were the droids he was looking for!
There sure do seem to be some similarities here. Burning Man founder Larry Harvey is very well read, calling himself an “auto-didact” (which means, self-taught). He lectures around the world on the arts, it is certainly not inconceivable that he would have an awareness of Wagner.
According to the author, the similarities go even further. Wagner envisioned his festival as being free to the people, but as time passed, commercial realities took over.
Wagner first conceived of his festival before he had written any of the music dramas, in 1849. Over twenty years later, he was still nursing his dream when he began the Bayreuth project. He had given up the hope of setting the site on a river—I am sure reluctantly—as impractical, however, according to biographer Barry Millington:
All this would be paid for through a world-wide fund-raising program, with Wagner societies throughout the world springing up to help make this a reality, and a lot of free labor. And, of course, with Wagner’s patron, King Ludwig II, chipping in the lion’s share (though it came in the form of a loan.)
He was, in fact, deeply disappointed in Bayreuth, in a number of ways. Certainly foremost is that the people he wanted to see it—young people, university students and choral societies—couldn’t afford it.5 Instead, the rich turned out, and he hated the rich.6 He wrote to his supporter Friedrich Schön, “Since we have had no choice in the matter, these performances, as before, will have to be reserved for paying audiences,”7 but he then went on to ask Friedrich to rally his supporters to set up a foundation to “make it possible for people without means of their own to attend the performances.”8 This was done, and it still exists today. It’s something, but very, very far from his dream.9
Perhaps we will see some great operatic performances of Wagner’s works at Burning Man in years to come. This year’s visit by a Blackhawk helicopter had me humming “Ride of the Valkyries”…