Why Is Wagner's Music Be Studied

Another reason why Wagner’s music should be explored and studied, rather than banished, is that he sets a standard of dedication to writing congruently with what is happening with the story. As a matter of fact, Wagner, like many other composers, had a set of his own “rules” that he had to follow when composing. This is explored throughoutly by William M. Marvin, as he goes into detail about specific sets of rules that Wagner established for his own compositions. These were not the exclusively the common contrapuntal rules, but also involved rhetoric, pacing, voice leading, use of the libretto (text of the opera), and whether these rules applied to the characters that were included in the drama (414). It also needs to be noted that these “rules”