Wagner: Elsa's Procession to the Cathedral for double bass quartet (arr. David Heyes)

About the Arrangement

Wagner’s opera Lohengrin was completed in 1848 and was premiered in Weimar two years later under the direction of Franz Liszt, a close friend and supporter of the composer. Elsa’s Procession to the Cathedral comes at the end of Act II as the heroine is about to be married to an unnamed knight, who is Lohengrin, a Knight of the Holy Grail.

The music is slow and solemn, majestic and regal, and over the years has been arranged for many different instrumental ensembles. It transcribes beautifully for double bass quartet and each player shares the melodic material, making effective use of the solo and orchestral registers of the instrument. The rich harmonies are well suited to the advanced double bass quartet with the emphasis on the sonorous and singing qualities of the instrument, particularly in its upper register.

Elsa’s Procession to the Cathedral was arranged for violoncello quartet in the 1880s by Friedrich Grützmacher (1832-1903) and was published by Breitkopf & Härtel in 1882 as part of their chamber music collection. This new arrangement for double bass quartet by David Heyes is based on Grützmacher’s transcription.

About the Composer

Richard Wagner (1813 – 1883) was a German composer, theater director, essayist, and conductor, best known for his operas—although his mature works are often referred to as music dramas. Unlike most composers, Wagner wrote both the libretti and the music for all of his stage works. He first achieved recognition with works in the Romantic tradition of Carl Maria von Weber and Giacomo Meyerbeer, but revolutionized the genre through his concept of the Gesamtkunstwerk ("total work of art"), which sought to unite poetic, musical, visual, and dramatic elements. In this approach, the drama unfolds as a continuously sung narrative, with the music evolving organically from the text rather than alternating between arias and recitatives. Wagner outlined these ideas in a series of essays published between 1849 and 1852, most fully realising them in the first half of his four-opera cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen (The Ring of the Nibelung).

Wagner's compositions, particularly in his later period, have complex textures, rich harmonies and orchestration, and elaborate leitmotifs—musical phrases associated with individual characters, places, ideas, or plot elements. His advances in musical language, such as extreme chromaticism and quickly shifting tonal centres, greatly influenced the development of classical music; his Tristan und Isolde is regarded as an important precursor to modern music. Later in life, he softened his ideological stance against traditional operatic forms (e.g., arias, ensembles and choruses), reintroducing them into his last few stage works, including Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg (The Mastersingers of Nuremberg) and Parsifal.

To fully realize his artistic vision, Wagner had his own opera house built to his specifications: the Bayreuth Festspielhaus, which featured many innovations designed to immerse the audience in the drama. It hosted the premieres of The Ring and Parsifal, and remains entirely devoted to staging his mature works at the annual Bayreuth Festival. After Wagner’s death his wife Cosima assumed leadership; it has since remained under the management of their descendants.

Wagner's unorthodox operas, provocative essays, and contentious personal conduct engendered considerable controversy during his lifetime, and continue to do so. Declared a "genius" by some and a "disease" by others, his views on religion, politics, and society remain debated—most notably the extent to which his antisemitism finds expression in his stage and prose works. Despite this, his operas and music remain central to the repertoire of major opera houses and concert halls worldwide. His ideas can be traced across many art forms throughout the 20th century; his influence extended beyond composition into conducting, philosophy, literature, the visual arts, and theater. 

Source: Wikipedia