{"id":4239,"date":"2019-09-15T15:51:51","date_gmt":"2019-09-15T13:51:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/atorod.pl\/?p=4239"},"modified":"2019-09-18T21:00:14","modified_gmt":"2019-09-18T19:00:14","slug":"bearing-the-burden-of-convention","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/atorod.pl\/?p=4239","title":{"rendered":"Bearing the Burden of Convention"},"content":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s been nearly twenty years since the autumn review of cultural highlights, organised under the aegis of Berliner Festspiele, grew so much that it had to be divided into several separate strands. The new music festival, under a working name of Konzerte\/Oper, was launched in 2004, still in the HBF building, which hosted the concerts, alternating as the festival venue with the chamber hall of the Philhamonie. One year later the event acquired its current name, Musikfest Berlin. In 2006 it underwent another metamorphosis: into a three-week marathon organised in close collaboration with the Berlin Philharmonic Foundation and focused primarily on orchestral music. The man appointed new director of the festival was Winrich Hopp \u2013 historian of philosophy, musicologist specialising in Stockhausen\u2019s oeuvre, member of the Nordrhein-Westf\u00e4lischen Akademie der Wissenschaften und der K\u00fcnste, since 2011 also in charge of the Munich cycle Musica Viva, organised under the auspices of Bayerischer Rundfunk.<\/p>\n

From the very beginning Hopp did not hide his fascination with the orchestra, alongside theatre and opera \u2013 and then also cinema \u2013 one of the most powerful and most complex \u201ccultural machineries\u201d of the modern West. The programmes of the Berlin festivals are still constructed in defiance of the Philharmonie regulars, but the director strives to keep up with the tendencies to be found on the world music scene. He moves the boundaries very carefully in order not to put off \u201cordinary\u201d music lovers. This year he focused on, among others, the anniversary of Berlioz\u2019s death, and among ensembles traditionally invited to the Musikfest from outside Berlin he evidently favoured British orchestras \u2013 with a clear intention of stressing that the musical heritage of the United Kingdom had been an integral part of European culture and could not be squandered in the brouhaha surrounding Brexit. Both these strands were harmoniously combined in the inaugural evening featuring Benvenuto Cellini <\/em>performed by the soloists, Monteverdi Choir and Orchestre R\u00e9volutionnaire et Romantique conducted by John Eliot Gardiner. I could not have missed such a treat and as it was followed by a few other operatic-theatrical rarities, I decided to stay in Berlin a little longer.<\/p>\n

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John Eliot Gardiner and his Orchestre R\u00e9volutionnaire et Romantique. Photo: Adam Janisch<\/p>\n

Berlioz\u2019s first opera has not had an easy life on stage. The libretto by L\u00e9on de Wailly and Auguste Barbier, initially written for an op\u00e9ra comique<\/em>, was rejected on the spot by the company based in Paris\u2019 Salle Favart. After removing the spoken dialogues and making numerous corrections that were to make the text more coherent dramatically, the librettists transformed Benvenuto Cellini <\/em>into an op\u00e9ra semi-s\u00e9rieux<\/em> and submitted it for approval to Henri Duponchel, the then director of the Paris Opera. One year later, in 1836, Berlioz began composing. The censors intervened already during rehearsals, demanding that Pope Clement VII be replaced with Cardinal Salviati (although both Salviati brothers were made cardinals long after the period in which the action of the opera takes place, this must have been regarded as a mere trifle given the general inconsistency of the libretto). The premiere in September 1838 was a fiasco \u2013 despite the fact that the title role was sung by the famous Gilbert Duprez and the conductor was no less a figure than Fran\u00e7ois Habeneck. The work \u2013 brimming with melodic invention and original orchestration ideas like the goldsmith\u2019s crucible in Act II \u2013 was greeted by the audience with hissing and general commotion. In 1852, on Liszt\u2019s initiative and after a thorough revision of the score by the composer, Cellini<\/em> was staged in Weimar \u2013 without much success, just as in London some time later. Interest in this masterpiece began to rise gradually, although still tentatively, more or less half a century ago.\u00a0 Benvenuto Cellini<\/em> returned to the stage of Covent Garden in 1966 \u2013 together with the now uncensored Pope Clement. Perhaps the opera would have been completely forgotten, if it had not been for the overture, performed as a stand-alone piece, and Le carnaval romain<\/em>, a work composed six years later in which Berlioz used some material from Act I.<\/p>\n

Two years after the famous tour with three Monteverdi operas Gardiner returned to the Philharmonie in better form than ever. The huge orchestra \u2013 with an expanded percussion section, four harps, four bassoons, two guitars, cor anglais and ophicleide, included in the source text \u2013 wowed the listeners with the richness of its colours and abruptness of rhythmic changes from the very first bars of the overture. Every ensemble, every chorus scene heralded the future greatness of Les Troyens.<\/em> In all respects and in the best sense of the word, the music of Benvenuto Cellini<\/em> turned out to be \u201cexcessive\u201d: glittering, brimming with energy, striking with its typically Berliozian harmonic turns, especially in the truly revolutionary and romantic take by the British musicians presenting a version edited by Gardiner himself.<\/p>\n

Yet all their efforts would have been in vain, if it had not been for the sensational cast. Michael Spyres shone like a jewel as Cellini. He is a truly \u201cFrench\u201d heroic tenor with an incredibly wide range, boasting an almost baritonal bottom register and a light, very resonant top. His ardour in \u201cMa dague en main\u201d and dazzling lyricism in \u201cSur les monts les plus sauvages\u201d in Act II were something Duprez himself could have envied \u2013 after all, he essentially failed in his take on the fiendishly difficult part of the Florentine goldsmith and withdrew already from the third performance after the premiere. It would be hard to decide which of the female voices deserved the highest praise: the passionate and very musical Sophia Burgos in the soprano role of Teresa or the velvety-voiced and beautifully phrasing mezzo-soprano Ad\u00e8le Charvet in the trouser role of Ascanio \u2013 all the more so that both singers were impressive in their perfect mutual understanding in the inspired duet \u201cRosa purpurea\u201d. The Belgian baritone Lionel Lhote as the jealous Fieramosca demonstrated not only his acting skills but also phenomenal technique. The same could be said of Tareq Nazmi, a highly cultured singer with a beautiful bass voice, who was brilliant as the pretentious pope, clearly confused by the sudden move from carnival to Lent. In fact, each role was a gem \u2013 and as there were many of them, let me just mention the splendid and very stylish Maurizio Muraro, who at the last minute stepped in for Matthew Rose in the demanding part of Balducci.<\/p>\n

Huge praise should also go to the creative team, headed by the Israeli Noa Naamat, Jette Parker Young Artist at Covent Garden. I cannot imagine a better school for talented young opera directors than working with Gardiner, who demands from the creative teams of his staged concerts at least as much precision and care as from his musicians. Naamat entrusted complex but at the same time logical acting tasks not just to soloists and every member of the chorus, but also to individual orchestral musicians and… the conductor himself.\u00a0 Instead of heavy antics on the proscenium we saw a lively, witty performance \u2013 in simple but clear costumes (Sarah Denise Cordery) and lighting (Rick Fisher) that aptly highlighted the narrative. This production of Benvenuto Cellini <\/em>went straight from Berlin to the Proms and then to the Royal Opera of Versailles. I did not think I would see the day when semi-staged evenings would bring me more joy than \u201ctrue\u201d opera performances.<\/p>\n

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Die Frau ohne Schatten. <\/em>Ildik\u00f3 Koml\u00f3si (Nurse). Photo: Monika Karczmarczyk<\/p>\n

Completely different emotions were generated by a concert performance of Die Frau ohne Schatten<\/em> by the Rundfunkchor, Staatsoper\u2019s children\u2019s chorus, RSB orchestra and a large group of soloists conducted by Vladimir Jurowski. This time the loudest applause was earned by the various ensembles and the conductor. As I have already written elsewhere, Richard Strauss\u2019 beloved operatic child of woe, to which he fondly referred using the acronym \u201cFrosch\u201d (\u201cFrog\u201d), deserves the title of the most convoluted narrative in the history of the composer\u2019s collaboration with Hugo von Hofmannsthal.\u00a0 It has literally everything, from loose inspiration by Wilhelm Hauff\u2019s fairy tale Das kalte Herz<\/em> and fragments of Goethe\u2019s The Conversations of German Refugees<\/em>, through references to his other works, including Wilhelm Meister<\/em>, part two of Faust<\/em> and Der Zauberfl\u00f6te zweyter Theil<\/em>, to One Thousand and One Nights<\/em> and the Grimm brothers\u2019 Fairy Tales.<\/em> And all this can be heard in the music, as erudite as it is ethereally beautiful. In order to cope with the demands of this masterpiece, we need an experienced and very imaginative kapellmeister, disciplined choirs, very capable orchestra and at least six outstanding soloists.<\/p>\n

Unfortunately, the most important among the protagonists: the Emperor, the Empress and (to a lesser extent) the Nurse were disappointing. Anne Schwanewilms never commanded a beautiful soprano voice \u2013 as years went by, the ugly timbre began to be compounded by problems with voice production, \u201cthinning\u201d of the middle register and shrill top notes, particularly difficult to endure in Act III, when the singing has to cut through a very dense orchestral texture. Torsten Kerl sang his role merely correctly and with no imagination \u2013 what is worse, he wavered at \u201cFalke, Falke, die Wiedergefundener\u201d, destroying one of the most magical moments in the history of opera. Ildik\u00f3 Koml\u00f3si\u2019s mezzo-soprano had betrayed signs of serious wear and tear already two years before in Bluebeard’s Castle<\/em> in Katowice \u2013 <\/em>but like then, this time, too, the singer masked an imprecise intonation and uncontrolled vibrato by excellent phrasing and brilliant acting. Judging by the audience\u2019s reaction \u2013 quite effectively.<\/p>\n

In such a situation \u2013 paradoxically \u2013 beautiful voices and subtle interpretation were to be found in \u201cordinary\u201d characters of the Dyer\u2019s Wife (superb Ricarda Merbeth) and Barak (even better Thomas J. Mayer), not to mention the finely sung roles of the One-Eyed Man, the One-Armed Man and the Hunchback (Jens Larsen, Christian Oldenburg and Tom Erik Lie). Another memorable performance came from Yasushi Hirano (Messenger of Keikobad), a full sounding baritone with an excellent lower register. The performances of the other soloists varied. I also have to admit that I doubts about casting a countertenor to sing the Guardian of the Threshold \u2013 even if his voice is as ringing and well-placed as Andrey Nemzer\u2019s.<\/p>\n

To put together a good cast for Die Frau ohne Schatten<\/em> verges on the impossible, so perhaps I should not complain, although in my opinion more courageous casting choices would not have been amiss. Fortunately, Strauss\u2019 work resembles at times a very complex symphonic poem, which Jurowski conducted with incredible panache, using surprisingly sharp tempi, with the intricate orchestral texture pulsating with a lively rhythm of two interpenetrating worlds \u2013 the land of human beings and the tonally unstable sphere of fairy tale creatures. The reactions of the Berlin audience were beyond belief \u2013 the listeners followed the complex narrative perched on the edge of their seats, accompanied the soloists singing along voicelessly and at the end exploded in rapturous applause. Strauss\u2019 Sorgenkind finally grew to become a beautiful swan.<\/p>\n

I have devoted more room to operatic events from the first few days of the Musikfest, which does not mean that there was nothing to enthuse about during a recital by Alexander Melnikov, who presented a programme of Rossini\u2019s charming ditties and Berlioz\u2019s Symphonie fantastique<\/em> in Liszt\u2019s transcription, playing a finely restored concert \u00c9rard from the 1880s. The Russian pianist impresses with his musicality and plays with a very light hand, \u201cabove\u201d the keyboard, as it were, which irritates the purists, but which most listeners, including myself, find absolutely inoffensive. His wonderful ability to shape musical landscapes more than made up for a few missed notes.<\/p>\n

What proved to be a rather nice surprise was an evening with one of my favourite orchestras (Concertgebouw) under one of my least favourite conductors (Tugan Sokhiev). It turned out that in a programme featuring a composition well known to the musicians (German premiere of Andriessen\u2019s Mysteri\u00ebn<\/em>) and a piece quite close to the kapellmeister (Tchaikovsky\u2019s Symphony No. 1<\/em>) Sokhiev was much better than Daniele Gatti, who two years before, conducting the same orchestra, horribly massacred Bruckner\u2019s Ninth.<\/em> On top of that Sokhiev was amazingly good in the encore, an excerpt from Prokofiev\u2019s Symphony No. 1.<\/em> Another proof that one has to fight one\u2019s prejudices.<\/p>\n

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Okutsu Kentar\u014d as the Thunder God in Kaminari<\/em>. Photo: Adam Janisch<\/p>\n

As a farewell to Muskfest I treated myself to an evening with the Japanese N\u014d theatre by the Tokyo company Umewaka Kenn\u014dkai led by Manzabur\u014d Umewaka III called Makio \u2013 representing the fourteenth generation of a family of actors continuing the tradition of the Kanze school, founded in the 14th century by Master Kan\u2019ami Kiyotsugu. The artists presented three plays: The Ghost of the Rice Wine<\/em> (Sh\u014dj\u014d \u2013 Midare\/S\u014d no mai<\/em>), a ceremonial dance show with elements of the ky\u014dgen <\/em>farce; The Thunder God<\/em> (Kaminari<\/em>), or a comic ky\u014dgen<\/em> intermezzo; and The Deadweight of Love<\/em> (Koi no Omoni<\/em>) \u2013 one of the most famous works by Motokiyo Zeami, 14th-century playwright and N\u014d theorist \u2013 featuring Makio himself as the spirit of a dead gardener, who fell unhappily in love with a lady-in-waiting and was cruelly humiliated by her. I have always been fascinated by N\u014d theatre as \u201csung\u201d drama \u2013 in the characteristic septuple metre of classical Japanese poetry, with a chorus and four-member instrumental ensemble, hayashi<\/em>, comprising three percussionists and a musician playing the nokhan<\/em> flute. However, its most intriguing element is the invariability of the convention, cultivated for nearly six hundred years \u2013 which naturally encourages comparisons with the convention of European opera, frequently said to be doomed, which for young spectators with no links to the tradition may prove as hermetic as the plays by Kan\u2019ami and Zeami.<\/p>\n

I last talked to Winrich Hopp six years ago, when Musikfest focused on the oeuvre of Lutos\u0142awski and Britten. He told at the time that he believed both in the young and in tradition. That no matter what happened to music, he would accompany it. It is nice to see that there are still people who can keep their promises.<\/p>\n

Translated by: Anna Kijak<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s been nearly twenty years since the autumn review of cultural highlights, organised under the aegis of Berliner Festspiele, grew so much that it had to be divided into several separate strands. The new music festival, under a working name of Konzerte\/Oper, was launched in 2004, still in the HBF building, which hosted the concerts, … [Read more…]<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10,7],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"entry","1":"post","2":"publish","3":"author-mangusta","4":"post-4239","6":"format-standard","7":"category-posts-in-english","8":"category-wedrowki-operowe"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/atorod.pl\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4239","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/atorod.pl\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/atorod.pl\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atorod.pl\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atorod.pl\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4239"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/atorod.pl\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4239\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4247,"href":"https:\/\/atorod.pl\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4239\/revisions\/4247"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/atorod.pl\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4239"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atorod.pl\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4239"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atorod.pl\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4239"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}