Siegfried Wagner, An allem ist Hütchen schuld! (1917)

Not only did Dick Wagner name his son Siegfried, but he named his daughters Isolde and Eva, the latter being the name of his Meistersinger heroine.  LET YOUR CHILDREN HAVE THEIR OWN EXISTENCES, DUDE.  THEY ARE NOT YOUR FASHION ACCESSORIES.  Yeesh.

"Everything is Little-Hat's Fault!"  That's a fun title.  What is this about, exactly?  Well, we have a couple, Frieder and Katherlies'chen, but she's just a servant, and family and society interfere.  How can they get married?  Well, they have to go on quests, and this all may seem very confusing and hard to follow until you realize that the plot is more or less just a light framework so Wagner can cram in as many Brothers Grimm faerie tales as he possibly can.  Trying to fix them all into an overarching plot is a futile endeavor.  At any rate, the couple eventually triumphs; a lot of their troubles throughout the opera are caused by Hütchen, a mischievous, invisible spirit, whom we the audience see playing tricks even if the characters can't (but he also exchanges the poison that Katherlies'chen is planning on taking with honey, so he's not all bad).  In the end Katherlies'chen captures but then releases him.

Once I realized what this was all about, I really liked it a lot.  The premise is cool, and dang, man, the music too is pretty darned fantastic--strong romantic stuff that doesn't particularly recall his dad but that works on its own merits.  Would it just be me being contrarian if I suggested that he might actually be better than Wagner père?  Probably, especially since I've seen so little of his work.  But he's a totes legit composer; that much is not in doubt.

This production is a kind of ugly, overly busy modern-day affair, with a metatextual thing (or, since the opera itself is kind of metatextual, should I call it "patatextual?") where a guy meant to be the composer himself on-stage (he's arranging texts in the beginning while Hütchen messes with the pages--that's kind of clever).  I didn't love it, but it was adequate, and I really liked Alexander Lueg in the mute title role--the kid's got moxie!  Also, for the whole performance, I would have sworn he was a she; I hope that does not cause offense.

But yeah; Wagner's great, and definitely deserves more attention.  Respect must be paid!