Making Overtures: John Warner welcomes the recording premiere of Wagner’s Concert Overture in D minor but is disappointed by the lack of a larger vision

Review of Overture (Die Feen), Overture (Das Liebesverbot), Overture (Christopher Columbus), Overture (König Enzio), Concert Overture No. 2 in C major, Concert Overture No. 1 in D minor, Siegfried Idyll, conducted Märkl, Leipzig, 2017 (Naxos, 1 CD).

March 2018, Volume 12, Number 1, 94–6.

Until he began Die Feen in 1833, Wagner’s output consisted mainly of instrumental works, many of which were performed, some of which survive, and none of which was published during his lifetime. Except for the Siegfried Idyll, the music represented in this new release by the MDR Leipzig Radio Symphony Orchestra (actually a collection of studio recordings from 2011–12) all dates from the 1830s, at the beginning of which decade Wagner was still studying music. Only when he renounced instrumental music in the essay Die deutsche Oper (1834) did he focus primarily on operatic efforts, abandoning the Symphony in E major (also released last year by Märkl and the MDR). Their recording of the Concert Overture No. 1 in D minor is quite possibly a recording premiere, making it a welcome addition to the growing discography of Wagner’s non-canonic works.