All language subtitles for Jews-2013

♪

As long as I live and
participate in public affairs,

I will make sure that Wagner
is not played in Israel

and his operas also
will not be performed.

♪

We've hired
the orchestra,

there are people
from all over

who are flying in especially
for this historic event

so plans are going
according to plans

and we're going to have,
I'm sure,

a beautiful event
on the 18th of June.

♪

I saw it coming.

I, I was afraid that
that's gonna happen

and uh, so I wasn't
surprised,

I was disappointed because
we put a lot of work into this.

The head of
the Wagner Association,

he hired our largest hall
here in Tel Aviv University

and when the university
found out

that this is for
the performance of Wagner

and got letters
from survivors then it,

it was cancelled.

You cannot ignore it
that he was declared

an anti-Semite.

♪

For Hitler and his uh,
friends

he really symbolized
the ideal of anti-Jewishness

and anti-Semitism.

Richard Wagner once said,

"The Jew is the shape-shifting
demon

behind mankind's downfall."

And these pictures prove
that he was right.

♪

Richard Wagner:

composer, musical giant,
anti-Semite.

To some, a Wagner Society
in the Jewish state

may seem strange,

but in fact the story
of Jews supporting Wagner

dates back
to Wagner himself.

There were always
Jews around him.

The Jews in Germany were
some of the greatest

admirers and backers
of Wagner.

He was already accused of
being part Jewish himself

because he had
so many Jewish friends.

They used to call him
the Rabbi of Bayreuth.

Copying, coaching,
conducting

and they all did it
for nothing, of course.

♪

Psychologically he needs
Jews around

to feel better,
to feel superior to them.

For us to look back and say
how could German Jews

embrace Wagner,

they embraced Wagner's
great music.

And it was
a theatrical experience

which was better than
3D and "Avatar".

It was more thrilling
than the latest video game.

Do I not buy the video game
because it's made by

an anti-Semitic
manufacturer?

♪

There's something very
appealing to Jews of Wagner.

I mean, what he most
absolutely classic

Jewish fantasy
is "Lohengrin".

♪

What better myth
that I,

without having my name known
or where I came from,

I'm gonna rescue
this country.

That fantasy is the fantasy
of the outsider

coming into the center
in triumph

and that's the fantasy
of "Lohengrin",

appeal to every
aspiring young Jew.

So Wagner understood
the aspiration

that he himself felt
because he himself

felt himself
excluded as an outsider,

as a rebel,

gaining entrance
into the center

by redefining it.

Well, one theory is
that Wagner thought

he himself was Jewish.

First of all,
he wasn't quite sure

who his father was,

and his stepfather
was Ludwig Geyer.

He may have been
his real father.

Geyer is considered
like a German Jewish name.

And Nietzsche
during that famous

walk on the beach
with Wagner

brought up this question
of the Jewish descent

of Ludwig Geyer.

And Wagner confides about
his fear that Geyer

was Jewish.

This would have solidified
in Wagner's emotions

this real fear
he was Jewish.

It was some-,
something evil in himself

he had to expurgate,
destroy, cleanse out.

♪ You shall
never ask me ♪

♪ Where I began
my journey ♪

♪ Nor shall you ever
ask my name ♪

♪ Or that of my people ♪

Do not ask me
my name

and my race.

I don't think you can find
a more dramatic exposition

of the problem as Wagner
may very well have seen it.

Wagner's first Jewish patron
was Giacomo Meyerbeer,

the most successful
opera composer of his day.

Meyerbeer was German,

but he lived and worked
in Paris.

There he wrote gripping
dramatic spectacles

that took the opera world
by storm.

♪

Meyerbeer was doing
what Wagner dreamed of doing.

Meyerbeer was the most
successful opera composer

in Paris.

Then Paris was the center
of the operatic universe,

but that's what Wagner
wanted for himself.

♪

Wagner's early opera,
"Rienzi",

was a deliberate homage
to Meyerbeer's own grand operas.

♪

This young man interests me.

He has both talent
and enthusiasm,

but fortune has not
smiled on him.

He has written me a long
and very touching letter

and it is because of this
that I am asking you

to ensure that he receives
the help

contained in this letter.

Meyerbeer gave Wagner money
and introduced him to members

of the musical establishment.

Meyerbeer saw "Rienzi",

saw a tremendous talent

and Meyerbeer arranged for
the Dresden premier

of "Rienzi" itself.

♪

On Meyerbeer's recommendation
"Rienzi" was accepted

for production
in Dresden,

Wagner's first
operatic production,

and "The Flying Dutchman"
was accepted in Berlin.

Meyerbeer put him
on the road, as it were.

You have to understand
that for someone

of the personality
of Wagner

the last thing
you want to be is debted,

to have to feel grateful
to someone.

You feel it's your own doing,
you're a self creator,

self created man.

And if that person
is a Jew

then that just intensifies
the whole resentment.

1848.

Democratic revolutions
sweep across Germany.

The idealistic Wagner
joins the fight.

He plots with
revolutionary agitators

and heads to the barricades
for street warfare in Dresden.

♪

But the revolution is crushed
by the king's troops.

Now Wagner is forced
to escape Germany

to avoid arrest
for treason,

an offense punishable
by death.

Homeless and desperate
he turns his steps to Paris.

There he finds his patron,
Meyerbeer,

more successful
than ever.

A friend says that I
must have money here,

like Meyerbeer, or rather
more than Meyerbeer.

Or I must make people
afraid of me.

Well, I have no money
but what I do have

is an enormous desire
to commit acts

of artistic terrorism.

In order to create the myth
of the misunderstood genius

who reaps success
with no one's help

he now had to
erase Meyerbeer,

he had to demonize him.

Now a new answer emerges
in Wagner's mind.

The reason that he,
not Meyerbeer,

is the next great
German composer

is that Meyerbeer
is Jewish

and a Jew can never
write real music.

This is the message
of his essay,

"Judaism in Music",
published in 1850

under a pseudonym,
Freigedank,

Free Thinker.

He creates a whole
ideology

about race
and creativity

showing that in order
to be creative

an individual has to be
rooted in a society

and have a kind of
historic relationship

to landscape and language
and to the social life

of the community.

Jews as outsiders
are denied the basic roots

of creativity.

They are parasites,
they're wandering,

not truly connected.

Therefore their best suit
as artists is imitative,

but they have no
real creativity.

The Jew speaks the language
in whose midst he dwells

from generation
to generation,

but he speaks it always
as an alien.

The important thing is
that he's the first person

to popularize the idea that
what's dangerous about the Jew

is the capacity
to assimilate.

Because the Jews want
to look creative,

they want to look
like everybody else,

and they actually do it
very well

because they're very good
at the imitation

and therefore they're
an invisible poison.

We have to explain
to ourselves

the involuntary repellants
possessed for us

by the nature and
the personality of the Jews.

...feeling of
the greatest revulsion,

repugnance against
the Jewish nature.

In particular the purely
physical aspects...

...creaking, squeaking,
buzzing, snuffle,

yodel, cackle.

His first wife Minna,
could never come to terms

with this anti-Semitism.

I used to be happy
in the knowledge that you

were close to me while
you created

all the beautiful things.

You always made me
so happy,

sang and played almost
every new scene for me.

But since two years ago
when you wanted

to read me that essay
in which you slander

an entire race which
has been fundamentally

helpful to you I could not
force myself to listen.

And ever since that time
you have borne

a grudge against me
and punished me

so severely for it
that you never again

let me hear anything
from your works.

She was very insightful.

I mean, she understood
there was something wrong

and she picked it up.

After that he lost
all this respect for her

as a judge,
as a companion even.

So there was that
emotional break

and new affairs
and all the rest of it.

In "Judaism in Music"
Wagner attacked the Jews

for being wandering nomads.

But he himself
was a wanderer,

a wanted man
with a price on his head.

He would not be able
to return to Germany

for 12 more years.

♪

Wagner's next home
was here in Switzerland

where he was supported
by wealthy friends.

He was now separated
from his wife.

♪

One day an unexpected visitor
knocked on the door.

Carl Tausig.

He was 16 years old
from Warsaw

and already gaining
a reputation

as one of the greatest
piano virtuosos in Europe.

He was also Jewish.

He was a student,
I would say a protégé,

of Franz Liszt.

He had a letter
of recommendation from Liszt.

I send you today
a wonderful fellow,

dearest Richard.

Receive him kindly.

Tausig is to work
your Erard thoroughly

and to play all manner
of things for you.

♪

And the fact that Wagner
was swept off his feet

by the youngster's playing
I guess

wouldn't be any surprise
because he was,

by all accounts,
a wonderful pianist.

♪

More important than that
he took a paternal interest

in the boy.

He just took him
under his wing,

practically adopted him.

He found a place for
the boy to live

in a small cubby hole,
as he calls it,

near his own home.

♪

Tausig is gradually worming
his way into my heart.

Small bad habits apart
he is really

a very intelligent,
sympathetic,

and good hearted
youngster.

♪

This was a new experience
for Wagner

and it's really amusing
to read it

because he must have thought
the boy

was something exceptional,
but in his behavior

he was just a normal
16 year old.

He sits down to table
every day

stating that he has
no appetite at all

which pleases me
all the less

because the reason is
the cheese and the sweets

he has eaten.

He hates walking,

and yet declares that he
would like to come with me

when I propose
to leave him at home.

After the first half hour
he lags behind

as if he had walked
for four hours.

My childless marriage is
thus, suddenly blessed

with an interesting
phenomenon.

And I take in
in rapid doses

the quintessence
of paternal cares and troubles.

♪

At the same time
it touches and moves me

when this boy shows
such deep, tender feelings.

Such large sympathy that
he captivates me

irresistibly.

♪

Wagner was
a terrible,

terrible pianist.

He never really learned.

Which is one of the reasons
he very often had,

when he could afford it,
a young man nearby,

always at hand who could
play the piano for him.

This is at the cusp,
Wagner's at the cusp,

of the development of
real racial anti-Semitism

which means you're Jewish,
I'm Jewish,

we're all alike,
nothing we can do.

By the same token there was
a long tradition

of exceptional Jews.

Jews, because of
their wealth

or their education who
were accepted

in Christian society.

I don't like your relatives,
but I like you.

Three years later
he's living in Vienna.

♪

He meets Tausig again there,
he's living in Vienna.

By now Tausig had a major
career as a pianist.

He helped Wagner meet
wealthy supporters

and put on concerts
to introduce Wagner's music

to the Viennese public.

♪

In 1863 Wagner embarked
on a tour across Europe

to earn much needed income
as a traveling conductor.

Many of his concerts
were organized by Tausig

and two other
Jewish musicians:

Leopold Damrosch,
and Heinrich Porges.

Such demoniac personalities
cannot be judged

by ordinary standards.

They are egotists
of the first water

and must be so,

or they could never
fulfill their mission.

On his travels Wagner found
that some of

his most loyal audiences
were Jews.

To my amazement I found
almost the entire room

at all events,
the front seats

filled with Jews.

And in fact I owed
such success as I obtained

to the interest excited
in this section

of the population.

Jews were deeply invested
in the music of their time.

They were the leading
sector in most cities

in the population
of audience and of students.

Being a musician didn't
require that you give up

your ways as a Jew.

It was compatible with
remaining very traditionally

Jewish.

So music had a place in
a way that let's say,

imagery, painting,
sculpture never had

as part of Gentile culture
to be assimilated

into the Jewish home.

So that there are Jews
that flocked to Wagner

it's because there were
a lot of Jews in music.

Ideologically you could
conjure up anti-Semitism

out of nowhere but what
decides whether

a person becomes
an obsessive anti-Semite

or an active one depends
on their emotional persona,

the personality.

Usually whether they have
paranoid traits.

Every time something negative
happened

where a Jewish person
was concerned

he would say, "A-ha.

This happened because
he's Jewish."

This happens
even today.

One uses the opportunity
to hate Jews

by circumstantial
evidence.

Wagner's wife, Minna,
had spoken out against

his anti-Semitism.

But they were now
permanently separated.

He had a new lover,
soon to be his second wife,

Cosima, the young daughter
of his friend, Franz Liszt.

♪

His second wife treated him
as a curator

treats a rare object.

Well, she worshipped him,
she utterly worshipped the man.

But she became,
if it's possible,

a greater anti-Semite
than he was.

Despite his Jewish
supporters

Richard and Cosima
were convinced

that he was being
persecuted by the Jews.

Behind every setback
and disappointment

they saw a Jewish plot
to take revenge on him

for his anonymous article
on Judaism in music.

When his opera, "Die
Meistersinger von Nürnberg",

received a scathing review
in Vienna

Wagner had had enough.

He decided to
republish the essay,

this time under
his own name

with some revisions.

The early Wagner
probably doesn't mean

murdering the Jews in 1850,
I'm sure he doesn't,

but in 1869,
later on,

you're seeing
the ambiguities exploited

and it's intimated
maybe a physical death,

or at least the destruction
of the Jews as a community

would be desirable.

Whether the downfall
of our culture

can be arrested by
a violent ejection

of the destructive
foreign element,

I am unable to decide,

since that would require
forces

with whose existence
I am unacquainted.

What are you doing
to yourself, you may ask.

He charges into
this nest of,

he creates
these enemies.

He tells these people
you are vile,

you're not German,
you may speak German,

but it's not really German.

You are totally, totally
worthless creatures.

And he was,
at the same time,

raising money from them.

In 1871 Wagner announced that
he was planning to build

a special theater in
the Bavarian-Franconian

town of Bayreuth

to stage his monumental
new work,

"The Ring of
the Nibelung".

He had the financial support
of the King of Bavaria,

Ludwig II who was
a passionate Wagnerian.

Even the Bavarian treasury
couldn't pay

for the whole thing.

It was a very expensive
proposition.

He needed somebody in charge
of trying to raise funds

and he turned to Tausig.

It was Tausig who probably
first got the idea

of the patron certificate,

where you do that all
the time today,

you pay a certain amount
of money up front

and for that you get
a lot of privileges

including, maybe,
free tickets

or something like that.

And the buyers were
those people for whom

culture was
very important.

Culture in 19th century Europe
was the ticket

for recognition and
equality for Jews.

But Tausig's fundraising work
did not last for long.

While he was on
a concert tour in Leipzig

he suddenly fall ill
with typhus fever

and died
a few days later.

He was 29.

♪

To be ready
for death

life's fruit
slowly ripens.

To earn its ripeness early
in the sudden blush of spring,

that was your fate
and your daring.

Now we must grieve both
your fate and your daring.

♪

But Wagner was about to meet
two young Jewish men

who would mean
even more to him.

The year after Tausig's death
Wagner met

the new conductor of
the Royal Opera in Munich.

Hermann Levi.

♪

♪ I came down through the woods
and saw my old house ♪

♪ There sat my lost love,
glancing through the window ♪

He was a very,
very famous man.

One of the great German
conductors of his time.

He had one of those German
apprenticeship careers

where you went up
from smaller towns

to progressively
larger towns

and you ended up
in Munich.

♪

Levi was descended from
a proud Rabbinical family.

The last 14 generations
of Levis were rabbis,

including his father,
Benedict Samuel Levi,

chief rabbi of the town
of Giessen.

Most people who wanted
to get somewhere in the arts,

they converted
if they were Jewish.

Levi didn't
and that was unusual

and he got what,
probably everybody considered

to be fun needling
about that for years.

It's said that he took
these things

with a kind of
pained smile.

♪

How much pain was there,
one can only imagine.

♪

Levi was one of
the best conductors around

and Brahms, to a degree,
needed him.

Not just as a conductor,
but for his knowledge

of the orchestra.

Levi became his sort of
advisor in orchestration.

Levi knew the orchestra
inside out in a way

that maybe even Brahms didn't.

It was almost like
the Hatfields and the McCoys,

or the Montagues
and the Capulets.

You were either a Brahmsian
or a Wagnerian in those days

and there was not
a lot of crossing.

Wagner declared
the symphony to be dead

and that new forms of music,
such as his own operas,

were the future
of music.

Meanwhile the conservatives
believed in the old forms

especially genres like
symphony and string quartet,

and Brahms believed
that those things were

what music were about,

that those things
were eternal.

It was a bitter, bitter
divide for a long time

that seemed mutually
exclusive, though,

of course now Brahms
and Wagner

cohabit concert programs
with no problem.

Like a good Brahmsian
Hermann Levi

always kept his distance
from Wagner.

But then he conducted
Wagner's

"Tristan und Isolde"
in Munich.

Levi became mesmerized
by Wagner's music.

Soon he began to
visit the Wagners

at Wahnfried,
their new villa in Bayreuth.

♪

A few months after
Wagner met Levi

he received a letter from
a young pianist

in Kharkiv, Russia.

♪

I am a Jew.

By telling you that,
I tell you everything.

All those characteristics
noticeable in

the present day Jews,
I too possess.

My condition
largely worsens

since I recognize that
the Jews have to perish.

How should I, however,
not also perish

since I am, myself,
a Jew?

I cannot perish
by baptism.

Only death
is left to me.

I've already tried
to commit suicide,

but I still decided
to write you.

Could I not be
useful to you

with the performance
of a "Nibelungen"?

I believe that I
understand this work,

even if not completely.

I look to you, then,
for help.

For the help
I urgently need.

The letter indicated
that he suffered

from terrible loneliness
and terrible depression

and he was
a Wagner fan.

Now you'd think this
would be exactly

the kind of letter Wagner
wouldn't reply to.

Richard sends him
a very friendly reply.

As soon as Rubenstein
received Wagner's reply

he traveled from Russia
to this house in Switzerland

where the Wagners
were staying.

♪

In the evening
Herr Joseph Rubinstein

suddenly arrives
from Kharkiv,

a curious spectacle
and experience.

Richard is infinitely kind
to the young man

and advises him
to take things easy,

offers him access
to Bayreuth.

And the visit turned out
to last ten years.

For most of
the next ten years

Rubinstein lived with
the Wagner family

as part of
the household.

Wagner put him to work
as a musical copyist

and arranger.

♪

Rubinstein, I mean,

Wagner recognized from the start
this was a crazy chap

and I think he took him in
like he would a stray dog

to begin with.

♪

Then he found he was
very useful,

he was entertaining,
an admirable pianist.

♪

Wagner more and more
loved to lecture,

he loved to lecture
his guests.

And he always had Rubinstein
there to play

whatever was needed
to exhibit.

If Wagner wanted to show
a portion of

what he had composed
in the last ten days

or two weeks there was
Rubinstein to play for him.

And also it's someone
you can look down on

when he's out of the room.

Or even when he's
in the room,

come to think of it,
even better.

After one of the final
piano rehearsals

Wagner tries to thank
Joseph Rubinstein

for the work he has done.

He starts off
very amiably and then

says something along
the lines of,

"If we never really
drew closer on a human level,

the fault is not mine,
but yours.

You are a member
of a foreign race

with which we have
no sympathy.

Jewish".

By the end he gets
quite worked up

so that his planned
speech of thanks

turns into an expression
of anger and ill feeling.

♪

Something underneath
caused them

to get along
with each other

despite some flare-ups,
despite his religion,

despite Wagner's
short temper.

Wagner had
his own problems

and he must have known
that his man really suffered.

I think he probably,
without ever expressing it,

saw something of himself
in this man.

♪

As the opening of
the Bayreuth Festival

drew closer,

Wagner was surrounded
by Jewish helpers.

Joseph Rubinstein was
the accompanist

for piano rehearsals.

Hermann Levi took time off
from his duties in Munich

to work with
the Bayreuth orchestra.

Heinrich Porges kept
an official record

of all Wagner's stage directions
to his cast.

The soprano,
Lilli Lehmann,

coached the women's
choruses

and premiered several
different roles

in "The Ring Cycle".

♪

He did very, very good things
for these people.

They got recognition,
they got to deal

with a genius.

I mean, if anybody knows
about Hermann Levi now

or Joseph Rubinstein now
it's thanks to Wagner

and the Wagnerian connection.

It's complicated,

but you can't take
these Jewish friends

and say, "Look,
this is the alibi.

He wasn't anti-Semitic,
he's got Jewish friends."

I mean, this is absurd.

You have to look at
the quality of the friendships

and so on.

He needs Tausig
for piano reductions,

he needs Porges
and the others

for screen help,

Rubinstein
for helping out.

I am too old
to fool myself

about anything anymore
and I am telling you

that what is going to happen
in Bayreuth next year

will produce a radical change
in our artistic world.

Levi was getting
closer to Wagner

and Brahms knew it.

And they had a visit
and that meeting ended badly

and Brahms left
without saying goodbye.

And they met after that,
but it was never quite the same

and Levi was, in fact,
pulling away from Brahms,

being a champion
of Brahms, really,

to being Wagner's acolyte
and conductor.

And part of the cult
in a way, I think.

♪

♪ Now I shall see her
no more ♪

♪

Levi had now lost
his closest friend

because of his support
for Wagner.

But he also knew
that the Wagnerians

would never
completely accept him

because he was a Jew.

He did his best to
fit in at Wahnfried.

He even began to echo
Wagner's ideas

about the Jews.

Friend Levi speaks of
a great movement

against the Jews
in all spheres of life.

In Munich there are
attempts to remove them

from the town council.

He hopes that in twenty years
they will be extricated

root and branch
and the audience for "The Ring"

will be another kind
of public.

Certainly one of the moments
when things began

to go sour between
Brahms and Levi

is when Levi wrote Brahms,
I think,

a really remarkable letter
about Wagner

and about Wagner's,
even at the time,

infamous article
"Judaism in Music".

Levi wrote "I've never
been able to join in

with the general howling
about Wagner's foolishness

and questionable character.

You'll remember that
I, myself,

defended the Jewish brochure
insofar as I believe it

to come from serious
artistic conviction."

♪

The Jews feel sense,
in a guilty way,

that Wagner has got some,
a germ of truth

which is why he's so
wounding to them, I think.

You know, if it was
completely bogus,

they didn't feel that
bit of insecurity

they wouldn't be
affected.

But they know
he's got something.

That they're outsiders.

That they're German
is not naturally

the proper high German
of the artist

and you get this
self doubt coming up

as a result.

The Wagners knew that
Jews like Levi

were the most devoted
helpers they could find

because they had
the most to prove.

If you come we shall be able
to talk about your people.

Do you think that you
and Rubinstein could serve

as typical examples
of the species?

I do not think so.

♪

The opening of
the Bayreuth Festival in 1876

was a major
international event.

From nearly every part
of the world

audiences streamed
up to the theater

on Bayreuth's Green Hill
to see the world premier

of Wagner's "Ring Cycle".

Few people in the audience
were as struck

by what they saw
as Angelo Neumann,

a young Jewish tenor
turned opera impresario.

I was incapable of
speaking to a soul,

so deeply sunk was I in all
I had seen and heard.

Angelo said,
"I got an idea.

What do you say I tour this
all around Europe?"

And Wagner says,
"Great, do it.

I support you,
I'll sign the contracts."

And that's exactly what
Angelo Neumann did,

he brought it to Italy,
to different parts of Germany,

to Paris, to London.

I think he, more than Bayreuth,
made "The Ring Cycle" famous

all over Europe because
he was bringing it

to all these other
European capitols.

He is Angelo Neumann,
a man of Jewish extraction

and strangely energetic
and extremely devoted to me

in a way which,
oddly enough,

I find now
only among the Jews.

♪

Since anti-Semitism
was so commonplace

it's very hard for us
to understand

that the Jewish audience paid
as little attention as possible

to his anti-Semitism.

We look back always
at Jewish history

through the lens
of the Holocaust,

as if everything led up
to Auschwitz

and that's a distortion.

People were flabbergasted

by what happened in 1933.

There were still flabbergasted
when the anti Jewish laws

were passed in the '30s.

They were still flabbergasted
when Kristallnacht happened.

They were still flabbergasted
when they were taken to camps.

Now they were not
stupid people.

And they thought,
"This can't be true.

We've lived in this place
for hundreds of years.

We speak the language.

We are an integral part
of this community.

So, yeah, there are a lot
of people who don't like us."

Do we think that
Barack Obama

and that African Americans
in the United States

should consider their life
in American unstable

because of the ubiquity
of racism?

There's racism every corner
where we live.

Does that make this
an unstable place?

♪

Now, to some of them
Wagner's anti-Semitism

was a cause of distress,

especially as
the century wore on.

Because there began
to be real tensions

between Jews and non-Jews
that had

real political significance.

You find the birth of
political anti-Semitism.

And then Jews began
to have qualms about,

you know, there's
something about this

which is not right.

What produces political
anti-Semitism

is the reaction to 1871,

the final full emancipation
of the Jews as citizens

in the United German Empire.

It's not a cultural
anti-Semitism,

it's a racial anti-Semitism
where you were being tarred

because of who you are,
because of your very existence.

The leaders of
the new movement

all corresponded with Wagner
and considered him

an inspiration.

I read a very good speech by
the preacher, Stoecker,

about the Jews.

Richard is in favor of
expelling them entirely.

We laugh to think that
it really seems as if

his article on the Jews
marked the beginning

of this struggle.

As Wagner became closer
with the anti-Semites

his Jewish friends were
becoming a liability.

There's a lot of German
anti-Semite didn't think

that Wagner was anti-Semitic,
they thought he was Jewish

because he had so many
Jewish friends,

there were cartoons in
the paper about him.

The newspapers used to write
articles to that effect.

Richard wishes all Jews
would drop off of him like warts

for which there is
no known remedy.

In 1878 Wagner had signed
a contact

with King Ludwig II
stating that his new work,

"Parsifal", would be
performed at Bayreuth

with the orchestra and chorus
of the Munich Royal Opera.

Using the king's
opera company

was the only way Wagner
could afford to hold

another Bayreuth Festival.

This meant that Hermann Levi,
the king's court conductor,

was the natural choice
to conduct "Parsifal".

It would be an overwhelming
hardship to me

if "Parsifal",
this all Christian work,

should be directed by
a Jewish conductor.

King Ludwig makes it clear
without my royal orchestra

or conductor, and conductor
comes with the orchestra,

there is no way I can see
that we can get "Parisfal".

Wagner is miffed.

He doesn't want Levi
to conduct "Parsifal".

He makes it
so impossible he,

he torments
the man.

He says in a conversation
with Levi

that he, as a Jew,
has merely to learn to die.

This Levi well understands.

And when he tells
Hermann Levi,

"As a Jew all you
have to do is die,"

well, of course Wagner says
"I mean it metaphorically.

You have to destroy
the Jewishness in yourself."

But when you say that
to someone, I mean,

it's a crushing statement even
if you mean it metaphorically.

It's intended to hurt
and then Wagner graciously,

in a German way, will pick
up the humiliated Levi

from his knees
and restore him.

Whether he wants to
actually die, well,

of course he doesn't,

I don't think Wagner wants
to actually kill anyone.

But then again
it was 1881,

he reads of
the Russian pogroms.

An article about
anti Jewish demonstrations

makes him remark, "That is
the only way it can be done,

by throwing these fellows out
and giving them a thrashing."

That's very physical.

And there's that joke.

Wagner reads about the theater
fire in Vienna

where some Jews were killed.

This was an operetta theater
in Vienna.

A fire broke out and hundreds
of people were burned to death

and trampled to death.

The fact that 416 Israelites
died in the fire

does not increase Richard's
concern over the disaster.

We, for example, do not talk
of our feelings

about those Jews
in the theater

in front of Rubinstein.

Four hundred unbaptized
and probably five hundred

baptized ones.

He makes a drastic joke
to the effect

that all Jews
should be burned

at a performance of
"Nathan the Wise".

This is the closest they've come
to the incineration

of human beings
in their fantasy of hate.

If it happened,
if only it could be.

It's a matter of the,
the wishes, the dirty wishes.

♪

♪ Over all the hilltops
is calm ♪

♪ In all the treetops,
you can feel ♪

♪ hardly a breath of air ♪

♪

♪ The little birds fall silent
in the woods ♪

♪

♪ Just wait... ♪

♪ ...soon,
you'll also be at rest ♪

♪

Wagner had confidence
in Levi's conducting,

but the fact remained
he was a Jew.

Richard and Cosima agreed
that Levi

would have to get baptized
before he could conduct

the opera,
Wagner's most Christian work.

Time and again they tried
to persuade him to convert,

but Levi knew that baptism
would break the heart

of his beloved father,
the rabbi.

What would become of me
if I were to approach "Parsifal"

from a level higher
than that of the arts?

I do not know.

For the time being I struggled
not to let any such power

get a hold of me.

In 1881 Wagner received
an anonymous letter demanding

that he keep his work pure
and not allow a Jew

to conduct it.

The letter also hinted
that Levi and Cosima

might be having an affair.

Wagner set it all up,
he even looks at his watch

on the steps of Wahnfried
and says,

"You're late, Levi,
for this meal."

And then he sits him down
and says,

"Someone has given me
this letter

accusing you of an affair.

I, of course,
don't believe it."

It of cour-, I mean,
destroys the man.

Puts him into a state
of breakdown.

I sat down at the table
deeply upset and outraged,

but could not utter
a single word.

In answer to the master's
question why I was so quiet

I responded,
"I don't understand why

you didn't just tear
the letter into pieces.

Why did you give it
to me to read?"

You know, the sun rose
and set on Richard Wagner

as far as Cosima
was concerned.

He was her whole life,
I mean,

there was no possibility
and he knew that.

My opinion is that
he thought to show Levi

"Look at the trouble
you're causing.

You see what's happening?

People are willing to say
all kind of things

because you're Jewish.

And, you know, if you just
go through a ceremony,

a simple little ceremony
uh,

we won't have that
anymore."

Levi had finally
reached his limit.

After they finished eating
he packed his bags

and left Bayreuth
without saying goodbye.

The next day
he wrote to Wagner

resigning the post
of "Parsifal" conductor.

Wagner writes him
and says,

"Look, we've got work
to do here,

come on back."

And Levi writes
him back and says,

"I'm sorry.

Thanks, but no thanks.

I think you need
to get somebody else."

He said, "I'm over,
finished with Wagner."

And, of course, Wagner
has to come round

because without Levi

there's no
Munich Orchestra,

there's no Munich Chorus.

There's no "Parsifal".

So Wagner sits down
and writes him a letter,

rather than
a telegram.

"You do not need to lose
any of your faith.

Perhaps some great change
is about to take place

in your life,
but at all events

you are my "Parsifal"
conductor."

Reading Wagner's letter
Levi was finally reassured

that Wagner would no longer
try to have him baptized.

He returned to Bayreuth
and continued his work

with Wagner.

Levi did conduct
the world premier of "Parsifal"

and nearly all the performances
at that year's

Bayreuth Festival.

He continued to conduct
"Parsifal" at Bayreuth

for the next 12 years.

He was never baptized.

So Hermann Levi is
a little bit of an odd case.

I think more has
been made of it than demands

because he did understand
on some level

the conflict between
genius

and this sort of,
in a way,

humiliation that
he had to suffer.

Listen, every Jew
that dealt with Wagner

knew about his essay.

They knew the man
was anti-Semitic.

He knew
they were Jewish.

But the important thing
to all of them was artistry.

He, it's no weakness
on the part of Levi.

He was completely taken in
by Wagner's music

which I can understand,
so am I.

He was a Wagnerite.

He uh, he gave up
a lot of friends.

There's nothing weak
about Levi.

The year after
the "Parsifal" premier

Wagner died in Venice.

♪

"God grant you the strength
to withstand this heavy test.

Certainly consolation
is impossible.

Please remember that
a Richard Wagner does not die,

only his mortal coil
is stripped off."

♪

With Wagner gone
Joseph Rubinstein's

inner demons soon made life
unbearable.

One year later he returned
to Lucerne, Switzerland

where he had first
met Wagner.

There, Joseph Rubinstein
shot himself to death.

♪

He was a man who felt
he couldn't go on living

once Wagner was dead.

What that was about,
I don't know.

It was about genius,
I suspect.

He couldn't imagine that
this genius could die.

I think Wagner felt
that Rubinstein was

an extremely valuable commodity
for his social occasions.

Shame, isn't it?

Because it was so deep
on the other side.

♪

Wagner passed away
some six years

before Hitler was born
in 1889.

So it wasn't that he
planned any influence

on a person
he never knew, of course.

Hitler said "Wagner
is something divine.

His music
is my religion."

In 1923 he went to visit
Wagner's grave

and visited it many times
after and Hitler said,

"When I was there
for the first time on his grave

I understood what is
my vocation,

what is my mission."

Okay, this is not anything
that you can think lightly.

He understood there
what was his mission.

♪

When we came to the ghettos
and concentration camps,

hell is the garden of Eden
compared

to what we endured there.

Blows, humiliation and death.

Whenever they spoke to us,
they called us "dirty Jew,"

"Jew full of lice."

Who did this?
Anti-Semites.

The hero of the anti-Semites
was Wagner.

Wagner wrote it very clearly
in his books.

That is essentially why
we don't want (Wagner's music).

♪

Sooner or later
it must happen.

To not play Wagner by
an orchestral musician

is like a pianist
not playing Chopin.

It's just, should be
part and parcel

of their education.

♪

Whether you like his music
or his personality

Wagner was
a very important composer.

♪

You cannot live
as a professional musician,

you cannot play a trombone
or a horn

or a violin for that matter
without playing Wagner's music.

I grew up in Israel,
of course,

we had one record
of "Tannhäuser" at home,

but that was about it.

And I was introduced in way
of shock therapy

when I went to become
Daniel Barenboim's

assistant in Berlin.

And my first task there was
to prepare "Parsifal"

of all works and I was
so taken by the music

and I was so,
I've really cha-,

it has changed my life
as a musician.

And since then I've been
conducing as much Wagner

as I could.

In the coming years,
regretfully,

we will not have
any more survivors and,

and then another generation
will listen to Wagner.

Wagner will become
a legitimate composer

as any other composer.

It will take time,
but I don't think this is

an everlasting curse
or everlasting boycott.

Will there be
ever a time?

I don't know.

I would think that the nation
that respects itself

should keep some symbols
sacred.

Even if "sacred"
is a strong word,

should keep and respect
some symbols.

Every nation does that.

Why, why not us?

You ask me whether I am
still a Wagnerian.

After years of study
and reflection I feel

I might really
call myself that.

I don't know whether
my change of view

compared to what I thought
as a young man

means a lack of principles,
a weakness or a crime,

or development
and progress.

But it's as little use
discussing Wagner

as it is discussing
religion.

To each his own.

♪