In evaluating Wagner or any other human being, one must weigh the good
and the bad, and not turn a blind eye toward either if we are to be honest.
Those who say that he was a great composer but an awful man do so as if
somehow the composer can be seperated from the man.  After all, it was the
man who composed the music.

Bigotry is a very ugly quality, and there is no excuse for it.  For anyone
to be regarded as a good human being overall, he must have some outstanding
beauty in his soul to outweigh such extraordinary ugliness.  The fact that
Wagner could compose such music shows that he had such beauty.  He is the
only person about whom I can make that observation.

Jocelyn Wang
Culver Chamber Music Series
www.bigfoot.com/~CulverMusic