The Struggle for Orchestral Control: Power, Dialogue, and the Role of the Orchestra in Wagner's Ring

Abstract

This article examines the degree to which characters in Wagner's Ring might be heard to control the orchestra for specific rhetorical purposes. Using Edward Cone's work as a starting point, I adopt a "fully diegetic" perspective in which music is understood as a physical presence in the Ring, a continuous tissue of sound that can be altered, shaped, and re-created according to a given character's conscious or unconscious intentions. An analysis of Die Walkure, act III, sc. 3, clarifies the approach.