Wagner’s opera Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg (1868) is set in an idealised 16th-century Nuremberg. The libretto pits tradition, represented by the ultra-conservative Meistersinger, against artistic innovation, championed by the young knight Walther von Stolzing. The introduction to the third act occupies a central place in the opera. Wagner himself regarded the score of Die Meistersinger as a ‘sequel to Bach’ and described this orchestral introduction as the essence of the entire work.

The P...