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Guide to abbreviations used in text
Allen Dunning's numbered Guide to the Ring's Musical Motifs
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The Ring

Introduction


References
Appendix I
Appendix I I

Key Colour Coding

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I would be grateful for donations of any size, small or large, to help defray the cost (1) of maintaining this website, (2) and to finance my past and present research which produced my book posted here, Volume One of "The Wound That Will Never Heal," and my forthcoming revision of Volume One (to be submitted for publication), and completion of Volume Two on Wagner's six other canonic operas and music-dramas. I sacrificed at least seven years of paid employment and incurred debts to complete this project, and am currently unemployed, so I thank you in advance for any financial help you can provide. Your friend, Paul Heise.

Mime: (starting in surprise and turning to Siegfried) [[ #119 frag: ]] Nothung’s (:#119 frag?) the name of the fearsome sword: (#?: [Bruennhilde may sing this phrase to Siegfried in S.3.3?]) your mother told me the tale (:#?).

 

(#103 frag >>: while singing the following Siegfried fans the flames with the bellows.)

 

Siegfried: (#103 frag vari: [slowed down?]; [[ #119: ]] Nothung! Nothung (:#119)! [is “fearsome sword” also part of #119?] Fearsome sword! Why did you have to shatter? [[ #120: ]] I’ve turned your sharp-edged pride to chaff, in the melting-pot I smelt the splinters. (#119 harmonic vari over #103 frags:) Hoho! Hoho! Hohei! Hohei! Hoho (:#120)! [[ #121: ]] Blow, you bellows, fan the flames (:#121)! (#120 >>:) Wild in the woodland grew a tree: I felled it in the forest: the fallow ash I burned to charcoal, it now lies heaped on the hearth. (#119/#103 frag >>:) Hoho! Hoho! Hohei! Hohei! Hoho (:#120; :#119/#103 frag)! (#121:) Blow, you bellows, fan the flames (:#121)! (#120 >>:) How bravely the wood-coal is burning, how bright and glorious it glows! it spurts out spouting sparks: Hohei! Hoho! Hohei! It melts down the chaff-like steel (:#120). (#119/#103 vari >>:) Hoho! [etc.] (#119 vari)! (#121:) Blow, you bellows, fan the flames (:#121)!

 

Mime: (still to himself, sitting some distance away: #121 frag?: [6 notes speeded up, associated with Siegfried’s loneliness after he’s killed Mime?]) He’ll forge the sword and bring down Fafner: I see it clearly now; hoard and ring he’ll wrest from the fray (:#121 frag?): - (#17 >>:) how can I gain what he’s won (:#17)? (#41 >>:) With wit and cunning I’ll win them both and keep my head unharmed (:#41).

 

Siegfried: (still at the bellows: #119/#41:) Hoho! (etc.)!

 

Mime: (downstage aside: #46 frag:) When he’s fought himself weary with the dragon, a drink may refresh him from his efforts (:#46 frag) (#30b vari; #97 vari [music which sounds like that which accompanies Siegfried as he reaches the peak of the mountain, where Wotan left Bruennhilde asleep, after breaking Wotan’s spear and penetrating Loge’s ring of fire, in S.3.3]) from herbal juices I’ve gathered, I’ll brew a drink for him; (#97: [strongly emphasized!!!]) he’ll need to drink only very few drops (:#97 strongly emphasized!!!) before sinking, senseless, into sleep (:#30b vari;