Rienzi

Rienzi, der Letzte der Tribunen (Rienzi, the Last of the Tribunes) is an early opera by Richard Wagner in five acts, with the libretto written by the composer after Bulwer-Lytton's novel of the same name. (The title is commonly shortened to Rienzi.) Written in 1840, it was first performed in Dresden on 20 October 1842.

Related Topics:
Opera - Richard Wagner - Libretto - Bulwer-Lytton's - 1840 - Dresden - 20 October - 1842

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The first performance was well received despite running over six hours (including intermissions). Later, Wagner experimented both with giving the opera over two evenings and making cuts for performance in a single evening.

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Rienzi is Wagner's third opera, and is mostly written in a French Grand Opera style, inspired by Meyerbeer and Halévy, which seems conventional in comparison with what Wagner later wrote. For this reason, and because of the opera's sheer length, Rienzi is rarely performed today. Wagner later saw the work as an embarassment, but it remained one of his most successful until his death.

Related Topics:
Grand Opera - Meyerbeer

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The opera concerns the life of Cola di Rienzi, a medieval Italian populist figure who succeeds in outwitting and then defeating the nobles and their followers and in raising the power of the people. Magnanimous at first, he is forced by events to crush the nobles' rebellion against the people's power, but popular opinion changes and even the Church, which has earlier urged him to assert himself, turns against him. In the end the populace burns the Capitol, in which Rienzi and a few adherents have made a last stand.

Related Topics:
Cola di Rienzi - Medieval - Italian

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During the 1920s, the future Nazi dictator, Adolf Hitler, witnessed a performance of Rienzi in his home town of Linz in Austria. According to the documentary film, The Architecture of Doom (First Run Features, 1995, directed by Peter Cohen), he confided to a childhood friend, who had seen the opera with him, that "This was where it all began", meaning his plans for Germany and its people, implying that he saw himself very much in Rienzi's shoes as being the head of not just his country, but a vast empire like that of the Romans and the ancient Greeks. It is ironic, indeed, that, just as Rienzi saw his dreams of power collapse amidst burning buildings as the people he ruled revolted against him, Hitler saw his Third Reich collapse in Berlin at the end of April 1945, only Rienzi ended up being murdered, whereas Hitler took his own life. However, Hitler himself had, only the year before, been nearly killed in the conspiracy of July 20, 1944.

Related Topics:
Nazi - Adolf Hitler - Linz - Austria - Peter Cohen - Germany - Third Reich - Berlin - 1945 - July 20 - 1944

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