Wagner, Richard. (1813–1883)
Used 1875 Conductor's Baton
Wooden conductor's baton, apparently used by the composer to conduct in Berlin, 1875, inscribed in brown ink: "Sonnabend 24 April, 1875. Aufführung der Bruchstücken der Götterdämmerung in Berlin. R. Wagner's Taktstock." The stick measuring 37.4 cm long and approx. 1 cm in diameter. From a Wagner collection in the United Kingdom.On the date described on the baton, Wagner was in Berlin to conduct two fund-raising concerts for his Festspielhaus, whose construction at Bayreuth was already well under way, and these concerts included excerpts for Siegfried and Brünnhilde from Götterdämmerung. Because the writing on the baton has been smudged, it is difficult to confirm the handwriting, but it has been proposed that it may that of Karl Eckert (1820 - 1879), director of the Royal Opera since 1869. Wagner and Eckert had met previously when the composer had visited Vienna, where Eckert was from 1853 - 1860 conductor at the Court Opera. On the occasion of Wagner's Berlin concerts, Eckert was likely in charge of the local arrangements for singers and orchestra and may have been given the baton after Wagner's performance. Cosima's diary of April 24 records "great enthusiasm by Berlin thermometers, though the performance was not good and R. greatly exhausted and in consequence out of humor."
Wagner himself sometimes used the term "Bruchstücken" to refer to the female roles being cast for Bayreuth. Literally meaning "breast pieces" in the armorial sense as worn by the Valkyries, the use of the term as written on the present baton refers to the female ('breast') roles in the Ring, namely those excerpts ('pieces') from them which Wagner was using for concert purposes. (6001)
Ephemera Opera