Recommended for Grades 6-12
In this resource, you’ll:
- Learn the opera’s background and synopsis
- Meet the opera’s composer
Parsifal
by Richard Wagner
Parsifal
by Richard Wagner
A quick overview of Wagner’s 1882 opera about a knight’s quest for the Holy Grail.
Background
Parsifal is a music drama in three acts by the German composer Richard Wagner and his last composition. Wagner’s own libretto for the work is freely based on the 13th-century Middle High German chivalric romance Parzival of the Minnesänger by Wolfram von Eschenbach and the Old French chivalric romance Perceval ou le Conte du Graal by the 12th-century trouvère Chrétien de Troyes, recounting different accounts of the story of the Arthurian knight Parzival (Percival) and his spiritual quest for the Holy Grail.
Wagner conceived the work in April 1857, but did not finish it until 25 years later. In composing it, he took advantage of the particular acoustics of his newly built Bayreuth Festspielhaus. Parsifal was first produced at the second Bayreuth Festival in 1882. The Bayreuth Festival maintained a monopoly on Parsifal productions until 1903, when the opera was performed at the Metropolitan Opera in New York.
Wagner described Parsifal not as an opera, but as Ein Bühnenweihfestspiel (a sacred festival stage play).
Wagner read von Eschenbach’s poem Parzival in 1845. Wagner did not resume work on Parsifal for eight years, during which time he completed Tristan und Isolde and began Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg. In 1865, he took up Parsifal again and made a prose draft of the work; this contains a fairly brief outline of the plot and a considerable amount of detailed commentary on the characters and themes of the drama. But once again, the work was dropped and set aside for another eleven and a half years. During this time most of Wagner’s creative energy was devoted to the Ring cycle, which was finally completed in 1874 and given its first full performance at Bayreuth in August 1876. Only when this gargantuan task had been accomplished did Wagner find the time to concentrate on Parsifal. By 1877, he had completed a second and more extensive prose draft of the work, and the same year he had transformed this into a verse libretto (or “poem,” as Wagner liked to call his libretti).
The full score was the final stage in the compositional process. Wagner composed Parsifal one act at a time, completing each act before beginning the next act; Wagner completed the score in early 1882.
For the first twenty years of its existence, the only staged performances of Parsifal took place in the Bayreuth Festspielhaus, the venue for which Wagner conceived the work. Wagner had two reasons for wanting to keep Parsifal exclusively for the Bayreuth stage. First, he wanted to prevent it from degenerating into “mere amusement” for an opera-going public. Only at Bayreuth could his last work be presented in the way envisaged by him—a tradition maintained by his wife, Cosima, long after his death. Second, he thought that the opera would provide an income for his family after his death if Bayreuth had the monopoly on its performance.
The Bayreuth authorities allowed unstaged performances to take place in various countries after Wagner’s death but they maintained an embargo on stage performances outside Bayreuth. In 1903, after receiving a court ruling that performances in the United States could not be prevented by Bayreuth, the New York Metropolitan Opera staged the complete opera, using many Bayreuth-trained singers. Cosima Wagner barred anyone involved in the New York production from working at Bayreuth in future performances.
At Bayreuth performances audiences do not applaud at the end of the first act. This tradition is the result of a misunderstanding arising from Wagner’s desire at the premiere to maintain the serious mood of the opera. After much applause following the first and second acts, Wagner spoke to the audience and said that the cast would take no curtain calls until the end of the performance. This confused the audience, who remained silent at the end of the opera until Wagner addressed them again, saying that he did not mean that they could not applaud. At subsequent performances some believed that Wagner had wanted no applause until the very end, and there was silence after the first two acts. Eventually, it became a Bayreuth tradition that no applause would be heard after the first act, but this was certainly not Wagner’s idea. In fact, during the first Bayreuth performances, Wagner himself cried “Bravo!” as the flowermaidens made their exit in the second act, only to be hissed by other members of the audience.
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Synopsis
Act I
In a forest near the seat of the Grail and its knights, Gurnemanz, an elder knight of the Grail, wakes his young squires and leads them in morning prayer (“He! Ho! Waldhüter ihr”). Their king, Amfortas, has been stabbed by the Holy Spear, once bequeathed to him into his guardianship, and the wound will not heal.
Kundry arrives in a frenzy, with soothing balsam from Arabia. The squires eye Kundry with mistrust and question her. They believe Kundry to be an evil pagan witch. Gurnemanz restrains them and defends her. He relates history of Amfortas and the spear; it was stolen from him by the failed knight Klingsor.
Gurnemanz’s squires ask how it is that he knew Klingsor. Gurnemanz tells them that Klingsor was once a respected knight, but, unable to cleanse himself of sin, castrated himself in an effort to attain purity, but instead became an evil monstrosity.
Parsifal enters, carrying a swan which he has killed. Shocked, Gurnemanz speaks sternly to the lad, saying that this land is a holy place, not to be defiled by murder. Remorsefully the young man breaks his bow in agitation and casts it aside. Kundry tells him that she has seen that his mother has died. Parsifal, who cannot remember much of his past, is crestfallen.
Gurnemanz wonders if Parsifal might be the predicted “pure fool”; he invites Parsifal to witness the Ceremony of the Uncovering of the Grail, which renews the knights’ immortality.
The voice of the retired king Titurel resounds from a vaulted crypt in the background, demanding that his son Amfortas uncover the Grail and serve his kingly office (“Mein Sohn Amfortas, bist du am Amt?”). Only through the immortality-conferring power of the sacred chalice and the Saviour’s blood contained therein may Titurel himself, now aged and very feeble, live on. Amfortas is overcome with shame and suffering (“Wehvolles Erbe, dem ich verfallen”). He, the chosen guardian of the holiest of relics, has succumbed to sin and lost the Holy Spear, suffering an ever-bleeding wound in the process; uncovering the Grail causes him great pain. The young man appears to suffer with him, clutching convulsively at his heart. The knights and Titurel urge Amfortas to reveal the Grail (“Enthüllet den Gral!”), and he finally does. The dark hall is illuminated by its radiant light and the round table of the knights is miraculously filled with wine and bread. Slowly, all the knights and squires disappear, leaving Gurnemanz and the youth alone. Gurnemanz asks the youth if he has understood what he has seen. As the boy is unable to answer the question, Gurnemanz dismisses him as just an ordinary fool after all and angrily exiles him from the realm with a warning to let the swans in the Grail Kingdom live in peace.
Act II
Klingsor’s castle and enchanted garden. Waking her from her sleep, Klingsor conjures up Kundry, now transformed into an incredibly alluring woman. He calls her by many names: First Sorceress (Urteufelin), Hell’s Rose (Höllenrose), Herodias, Gundryggia and, lastly, Kundry. She mocks his self-castrated condition, but cannot resist his power. He resolves to send her to seduce Parsifal and ruin him as she ruined Amfortas before.
The youth walks into a wondrous garden, surrounded by beautiful and seductive flowermaidens. They call to him and entwine themselves about him while chiding him for wounding their lovers (“Komm, komm, holder Knabe!”), yet the boy in his childlike innocent naïveté doesn’t comprehend their temptations and shows only little interest in them. The flowermaidens soon fight and bicker among themselves to win his devotion, to the point that he is about to flee, but a different voice suddenly calls out “Parsifal!” The youth finally recalls this name is what his mother called him when she appeared in his dreams. The flowermaidens back away from him and call him a fool as they leave him and Kundry alone.
Parsifal wonders if the whole Garden is but a dream and asks how it is that Kundry knows his name. Kundry tells him she learned it from his mother (“Ich sah das Kind an seiner Mutter Brust”), who had loved him and tried to shield him from his father’s fate, the mother he had abandoned and who had finally died of grief. She reveals many parts of Parsifal’s history to him and he is stricken with remorse, blaming himself for his mother’s death. Kundry tells him that this realization is a first sign of understanding and that, with a kiss, she can help him understand the love that had once united his parents, wanting thus to awake in Parsifal the first pangs of desire. However, as she kisses Parsifal, the youth suddenly recoils in pain and cries out Amfortas’ name: having just felt for the first time material desire with Kundry’s kiss, Parsifal finds himself in the same position in which Amfortas had been seduced and he feels the wounded king’s pain and suffering of evil and sin burning in his own soul. Only now does Parsifal understand Amfortas’ passion during the Grail Ceremony (“Amfortas! Die Wunde! Die Wunde!”).
Furious that her ploy has failed, Kundry tells Parsifal that if he can feel compassion for Amfortas, then he should also be able to feel it for her. In a distant past, she saw the Redeemer and mockingly laughed at His pains in malice. As a punishment for this sin, she has been cursed and bound by Klingsor and has fallen under his yoke. The curse condemns her to never be able to die and find peace and redemption. She cannot weep, only jeer diabolically. Longing for deliverance, she has been waiting for ages for a man to free her from her curse and yearns to once more meet the Saviour’s forgiving gaze, but her search for her redeemer in the end only ever turns into a desire to find her salvation in earthly desire with those who fall for her charms. All her penitent endeavours eventually transform into a renewed life of sin and a continued unredeemed existence in bondage to Klingsor. When Parsifal still resists her, Kundry curses him through the power of her own accursed being to wander without ever finding the Kingdom of the Grail again, and finally calls on her master Klingsor to help her.
Klingsor appears on the castle rampart and hurls the Holy Spear at Parsifal to destroy him. He seizes the spear in his hand and makes with it the sign of the Cross, banishing Klingsor’s dark sorcery. The whole castle with Klingsor himself suddenly sinks as if by terrible earthquake and the enchanted garden withers. As Parsifal leaves, he tells Kundry that she knows where she can find him.
Act III
Gurnemanz is now aged and bent, living alone as a hermit. It is Good Friday. He hears moaning near his hut and finds Kundry lying unconscious in the brush, similarly as he had many years before (“Sie! Wieder da!”). He revives her using water from the Holy Spring, but she will only speak the word “serve” (“Dienen”). Looking into the forest, Gurnemanz sees a figure approaching, armed and in full armour. The stranger removes his helmet and Gurnemanz recognizes the lad who shot the swan; to his amazement the knight also bears the Holy Spear.
Kundry washes Parsifal’s feet and Gurnemanz anoints him with water from the Holy Spring, recognizing him as the pure fool, now enlightened by compassion and freed from guilt through purifying suffering, and proclaims him the foretold new king of the knights of the Grail.
Parsifal looks about and comments on the beauty of the meadow. Gurnemanz explains that today is Good Friday, when all the world is purified and renewed.
Within the Castle of the Grail, Titurel’s funeral is to take place. Mourning processions of knights bring the deceased Titurel in a coffin and the Grail in its shrine, as well as Amfortas on his litter, to the Grail hall (“Geleiten wir im bergenden Schrein“). The knights desperately urge Amfortas to keep his promise and at least once more, for the very last time uncover the Grail again, but Amfortas, in a frenzy, says he will never again show the Grail, as doing so would just prolong his unbearable torment. Instead, he commands the knights to kill him and end with his suffering also the shame he has brought on the brotherhood. At this moment, Parsifal appears and declares only one weapon can help here: only the same spear that inflicted the wound can now close it (“Nur eine Waffe taugt”). He touches Amfortas’ side with the Holy Spear and both heals the wound and absolves him from sin. The spear, now reunited with the Holy Grail, starts to bleed with the same divine blood that is contained within the sacred chalice. Extolling the virtue of compassion and blessing Amfortas’ suffering for making a pure fool knowing, Parsifal replaces Amfortas in his kingly office and orders to unveil the Grail, which is never to be hidden again. As the Grail glows ever brighter with light and a white dove descends from the top of the dome and hovers over Parsifal’s head, a chorus mysticus of all the knights praises the miracle of salvation (“Höchsten Heiles Wunder!”) and proclaims the redemption of the Redeemer (“Erlösung dem Erlöser!”). Kundry, also at the very last released from her curse and redeemed, slowly sinks lifeless to the ground with her gaze resting on Parsifal, who raises the Grail in blessing over the worshipping knighthood.
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Meet the Artists
Listen to the Story
Arthur Hacker, The Temptation of Sir Percival, 1894 [].
Presented by Washington National Opera, host Saul Lilienstein takes you through the musical world of Wagner’s 1882 opera about a knight’s quest for the Holy Grail, Parsifal.
Learn More
Antonio Pappano of The Royal Opera introduces the music of Parsifal.
Related Resources
Media Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg
A quick overview of Wagner’s 1868 comic opera.
Media Tristan and Isolde
A quick overview of Wagner’s epic 1865 love story.
Media The Ring of the Nibelung
A quick overview of Richard Wagner’s epic 15-hour four-opera cycle.
Media The Flying Dutchman
A quick overview of Wagner’s 1843 maritime ghost story.
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