but something even better by Wagner

If you’ve never heard Act III of Tristan und Isolde, that’s the very peak of Wagner’s art as well as some of the most powerful music ever written. It’s the kind of music that can shake you to the core to some extent, and make you long remember the first time you heard it. (I still remember the exact date that I listened to it for the first time– July 28, 1986.) Nietzsche was quite moved and disturbed by it as well.

[ADDENDUM: OK, the exact Nietzsche quote is “The world is poor for anyone who has never been sick enough to enjoy this voluptuousness of hell.” Two conductors dropped dead while conducting it, and Gabriele d’Annunzio had to be carried weeping from the Bayreuth Festpielhaus. That’s powerful!]