On the electoral-vote site there has been a bit of a brouhaha over the music of one Richard Wagner ever since (Z) mentioned that he was not partial to that composer’s music and found it “too heavy”.

Over the next few weeks their mailbag had several letters form outraged Wagnerites defending the Sorcerer of Bayreuth and pointing out various compositions of Wagner’s that were among the most sublime pieces of music ever composed.

But none of Herr Wagner’s defenders proposed what I thought was the most obvious piece to combat the charge of “too heavy”, so I decided to jump into the fray. On Sunday my letter was published along with a short reply:

J.T. in Philadelphia, PA, writes: When you mentioned that you did not like the music of Richard Wagner (one of my favorite composers), I was disappointed, but I accepted that not all of us have to like the same music. But I was rather surprised when nobody suggested what I thought was the most obvious Wagner piece that is the very antithesis of “too heavy,” i.e., his “Siegfried Idyll,” which he wrote for his wife Cosima to celebrate the birth of their son Siegfried.

Incidentally, the composition figures prominently in a second season episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm (“Trick or Treat”), when someone overhears Larry David whistling a tune from it and accuses him of being a “self-loathing Jew.”

Most performances of it these days are of the orchestrated version, but here are students from Philadelphia’s Curtis Institute playing it as Wagner wrote it, one instrument to a part. I don’t expect it to turn you into a Perfect Wagnerite but perhaps you’ll agree that it is not “too heavy.”

(V) & (Z) respond: Certainly it’s an improvement on “Ride of The Valkyries.”

And here is that performance of “Siegfried Idyll”: