Siegfried: Death, Awe, and Terror

The problem about Siegfried is that it is a little too accessible. The forging of the great sword, Notung, the confrontation with the dragon, Fafner, leading to his awakening of Brünnhilde - it all seems so action packed that it is easy to neglect the darker, more philosophical side of the Ring, which seems for the moment to recede into the background. Yet, it is there, and there most prominently in the scene when Siegfried discovers the meaning of Angst - of blinding and overwhelming terror.

Let's have a look at the score. The passage leading to Brünnhilde's awakening to the words Heil dir Sonne! (hail to thee sun) starts with the following chord full of foreboding in the winds:



Here are the wind parts up close:

The music dies off to a pp before rising again to a forte, which again fades away to reveal the eerie harp part. The harps lead into a terrifying high chromatic violin passage marked tremolando:

The opening chord repeats, leading once more to the eerie harps yielding to the same high chromatic violin tremolandi:



Suddenly there is a flourish of strings starting piano, building up slowly to a passionate climax first forte then double forte:



The third time the foreboding opening chord is repeated it leads to Brünnhilde awakening to the words Heil dir Sonne, leading again to the repetition of the same high chromatic violin tremolandi:





These high chromatic violin tremolandi are the most critical part of this entire passage. In a fine performance they sound utterly terrifying, yet mysterious, celestial and toweringly sublime. Siegfried is seeing a woman for the first time, and is dumb struck with awe and terror at the site of this divinely beautiful Angel of Death. A great performance forces you to experience Siegfried's paralysing Angst, as expressed in the creepy high chromatic notes. For his Angst is that very fear before Death itself.

Arthur Rackham - Brunhilde Awakens

Here is Wilhelm Furtwängler at La Scala Milan in 1949:



The eerie terror of this passage is infinitely critical in that they recur - or more precisely are recapitulated - in Götterdämmerung. The recapitutation (and I mean that in the fullest symphonic sense) occurs in Siegfried's dying moments. Prior to that, when Siegfried is made to forget Brünnhilde, he also forgets the meaning Angst. When the memories of his awakening of Brünnhilde rush back to the dying Siegfried, so to does the meaning of Angst, which rushes to overwhelm him in bewildering awe and terror as Death suffocates him.