Siegfried Idyll, or the End of a Friendship

Thirty years younger than Wagner, Nietzsche spent a full decade in thrall to the composer's spell. However, their relationship must be regarded as something considerably more substantial and consequential than that between an idol and his admirer. Their correspondence and other documents reveal a wide-ranging discussion on topics such as generation difference, musical aesthetics, the great philosophical questions of life and even human weaknesses. And it also constantly returns to the subject of the uncannily beautiful music of the Siegfried Idyll, which describes – in place of words, and in the gaps between them – a sense of life that, although yearned for, never in fact existed. 

Balázs Szálinger is an Attila József Award-winning poet and dramatist. With his time and talent much in demand, he is one of the outstanding authors of his generation.

Conductor and composer Géza Köteles is known for his highly successful “musical adaptations” like FrenchLateNight and Parázsfuvolácska, The Magic Flute for children. As part of the Ring season, the Opera has commissioned these two artists to write a piece about the relationship between Nietzsche and Wagner, which Péter Kálloy Molnár will then produce on the stage.