Marschner - Overture to Der Vampyr
13 Pieces for Halloween, no.7. The name “Marschner” isn’t well known today. He was an important figure in German opera during the 19th century, and he was admired by Beethoven and Mendelssohn, and became an influence to Wagner. His opera Der Vampyr is based off of the book “The Vampyre” by John William Polidori, a Romantic writer who is considered to be the father of Vampire fiction. Before Count Dracula, there was Lord Ruthven. Polidori worked with Lord Byron, and while in Switzerland they hung out with another major poet, Percy Shelley, his fiancee Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin, and her step sister Claire Clairmont. Famously, the group were stuck in a lodge because of a thunderstorm, and after reading ghost stories, Lord Byron suggested they all make up scary stories to tell to each other. The most iconic work to be born out of this evening would be Mary Shelly’s Frankenstein. The other was Polidori’s The Vampyre. If this doesn’t fit for Halloween, I don’t know what does. Like most Gothic novels, the work follows a young woman who has been seduced by a mysterious figure, and she grows suspicious of him. The more time she spends with him, the slowly she starts to uncover the dark secrets he’s been hiding. Spoiler alert: he’s a vampire. Shocking I know. Marschner’s setting of the work keeps the novelty drama that comes with the new retelling of old legends, and the overture opens with a very dramatic, chromatic, and unstable theme [no surprise that Wagner would be inspired], before switching to a more noble and lighthearted theme. The two contrasting ideas wrestle with each other through grand orchestral writing until the rocking climax that then begins the story.
