{"id":8638,"date":"2025-02-11T13:23:53","date_gmt":"2025-02-11T12:23:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/atorod.pl\/?p=8638"},"modified":"2025-02-12T17:00:34","modified_gmt":"2025-02-12T16:00:34","slug":"human-tragedies-of-witches-and-wild-women","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/atorod.pl\/?p=8638","title":{"rendered":"Human Tragedies of Witches and Wild Women"},"content":{"rendered":"

As I wait anxiously, but also with hope, for the long-awaited change of the management of Teatr Wielki-Polish National Opera, I have been closely following the activities of our southern neighbours. In both Poland and Czechia the advocates of entrusting leadership positions in national institutions to local artists and managers are still going strong. This, however, is where the similarities end. The Teatr Wielki-Polish National Opera has long abandoned the model of a repertory theatre with a permanent ensemble of soloists \u2013 which, in my opinion, calls into question the legitimacy of referring to the company as the \u201cNational Opera\u201d. At the two most important Czech companies \u2013 the National in Prague and the National in Brno \u2013 everything seems much more coherent. Both operate under the formula of a large organisational machine encompassing all types of theatre, managed by a general director supervising the artistic and administrative directors of the various \u201cdivisions\u201d. In both cities the structure of the national theatre contains more than one operatic stage. The repertoire is huge and clearly focused on cultivating national works, but both the managements and permanent ensembles feature individuals from abroad \u2013 especially in Prague, where Filip Barankiewicz has been in charge of the Czech National Ballet since 2017 and Per Boye Hansen, the former artistic director of Den Norske Opera in Oslo, has been at the helm of the National Opera since 2019.<\/p>\n

Such a national company \u2013 fulfilling its aesthetic, social and educational mission, and, at the same time, powered on a daily basis, and not once in a blue moon, by fresh ideas from outstanding artists and creators from around the world \u2013 is something I have long dreamed of in Poland. A company that is able to attract foreign visitors with its offerings and arouse the interest of international critics: in short, a \u201cnational\u201d theatre in the most modern sense of the word, without complexes, promoting the culture of its country wisely and effectively, primarily in order to make it part of the international scene for good.<\/p>\n

We can always dream, although we should be aware of the fact that it takes time and patience to accept such a state of affairs. Also in Prague, where the Norwegian management\u2019s actions continue come up against resistance from audiences and the more conservative among the critics. The same was true of the January premiere of Cherubini\u2019s Medea<\/em> at the State Theatre, met with a rather cool reception from the audience, whose expectations were clearly at odds with the musical and theatrical reality of the performance.<\/p>\n

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Medea\u00a0<\/em>in Prague. Svetlana Aksenova in the title role, and Arnhei\u00f0ur Eir\u00edksd\u00f3ttir as Neris. Photo: Petr Neubert<\/p>\n

Last year Warsaw\u2019s Teatr Wielki-Polish National Opera missed an opportunity to present the work in a well-prepared original version. M\u00e9d\u00e9e<\/em>, an opera or, more specifically, op\u00e9ra comique <\/em>with a French libretto by Fran\u00e7ois-Beno\u00eet Hoffmann based on Euripides\u2019 and Corneille\u2019s tragedies, was written in 1797 and premiered on 13 March that year at the Th\u00e9\u00e2tre Feydeau in Paris. The work, in which sung passages are interspersed with recited alexandrine lines, is classical in form and its musical structure stems from the spirit of Gluck\u2019s reform. Yet when it comes to the way the eponymous character is treated, it is a good hundred years ahead of its day, foreshadowing the great operatic psychological dramas of Verdi, Wagner and even Richard Strauss. The title role, fiendishly difficult and full of technical pitfalls, was written for Julie-Ang\u00e9lique Scio, an outstanding soprano and great actress who put so much heart and enthusiasm into it that her health deteriorated and she soon died. The orchestral layer \u2013 rich in recurring motifs, dense, yet fluid in its narrative \u2013 was beyond the perceptual capabilities of many listeners at the time.<\/p>\n

No wonder, then, that M\u00e9d\u00e9e<\/em> soon disappeared from the reportoire. And, as is often the case, it began to be \u201cimproved\u201d. Staged in a German translation in 1800, it was quite favourably received by the Berlin audiences. Two years later it reached Vienna with a libretto translated into Italian. In 1855 Franz Lachner threw out the spoken dialogues and replaced them with veritably Wagnerian recitatives, using an abridged Viennese version, but with a German libretto. In 1909 Carlo Zangarini translated Lachner\u2019s version into Italian with a view to having the work premiered at La Scala. This is the form \u2013 most familiar to opera lovers today, yet woefully different from the original \u2013 in which Medea<\/em> was \u201cresurrected\u201d in 1953 by Maria Callas, who, after her 1953 performance in Florence, sang it with variable success until the early 1960s.<\/p>\n

This is also the version that was chosen in Prague \u2013 the idea was quite risky from the beginning given the inevitable comparisons with the vocal art of the Primadonna Assoluta. I have to admit that I, too, had my doubts about how Svetlana Aksenova would cope with this killer role \u2013 I heard her in 2018 in the role of Liza in The Queen of Spades<\/em> and thought her voice was lovely but exceedingly lyrical, even girlish in expression. Since then it has become somewhat dull and less secure intonation-wise, and failed to develop in the upper range \u2013 it sounded relatively stable only in the middle. The singer clearly attempted to sing a role that lay beyond the limit of her abilities, and since she also lacked charisma, admirers of the divine Callas may have felt disappointed indeed. Much more impressive was Jana Sibera (Glauce), whose sensuous, sparkling soprano I was able to admire recently in Zemlinsky\u2019s Kleider machen Leute<\/em>. It was a mistake to entrust the role of Creonte to Marcell Bakonyi \u2013 his bass, undoubtedly well-controlled, proved too bright and not noble enough in tone for this royal part. The brightest points of the cast were Evan LeRoy Johnson, an excellent Giasone with a large, resonant, typical spinto tenor and an admirable ability to dynamically shape a phrase; and Arnhei\u00f0ur Eir\u00edksd\u00f3ttir as Neris \u2013 not only does the Icelandic artist possess a beautiful mezzo-soprano sparkling with harmonics, but she is also an excellent actress. I am not surprised that the audience appreciated the work of the chorus (prepared by Pavel Van\u011bk), but I do not quite understand why it was so unenthusiastic about the conductor responsible for the whole, Robert Jindra, who made every effort to bring out from this \u201cItalianised\u201d score as many elements as possible to demonstrate the uniqueness of Cherubini\u2019s style \u2013 peculiarities of texture, dramatic tension lurking in almost every bar, evocative orchestral images foreshadowing Beethoven\u2019s symphonic music, images in which the classical cohesion of form and sound gives way at times to feverish dialogues of the individual instrumental groups.<\/p>\n

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Arnhei\u00f0ur Eir\u00edksd\u00f3ttir, Marcell Bakonyi (Creonte), and Svetlana Aksenova. Photo: Petr Neubert<\/p>\n

Nor did the Prague audiences like the staging, prepared by the German director Roland Schwab in collaboration with Paul Zoller (set design), Sabine Blickenstorfer (costumes) and Franck Evin (lighting). Schwab, who saved Bayreuth\u2019s honour during the pandemic with his economical and functional concept of Tristan,<\/em> approached Medea<\/em> in a similar fashion \u2013 with surprisingly good results, in my opinion. Maintaining the classical unity of time and place, he played the whole thing out on two levels \u2013 Creonte\u2019s austere palace, stripped of all ornaments, painted only by the light coming in through the high windows, and the dark world of Medea gnawing at it from below \u2013 damp, full of black rubbish bags, reeking of decay that would soon start seeping into the Corinthian residence. With each successive scene the palace gets darker and darker \u2013 until the house of the would-be newlyweds bursts into flames and Jason carries Glauce\u2019s charred body out of the fire: so blinded by despair over the loss of his beloved that he completely forgets about his sons and only in the finale does he notice their corpses hanging from the ceiling. There was no intrusive psychologising in this staging, nor any attempt to place the classical tragedy in the current political context \u2013 the simple contemporary costume only served to make the message clear.<\/p>\n

It will be interesting to see if the production will grow over time and get a more sympathetic audience. It fully deserves it in my opinion \u2013 compared to other Regietheater<\/em> proposals, Schwab\u2019s concepts seem exceptionally clear and singer-friendly. Stagings presented in an equally spare and modern stage language have long been a staple in Brno, where they are much better received by both the audiences and the critics. That is why the day after the Prague premiere I went to the Jan\u00e1\u010dek Divadlo to see one of the most talked-about productions of the current season: Rusalka<\/em>, directed by David Radok, whose earlier Salome<\/em> made such an electrifying impression on me.<\/p>\n

This time, however, I left the theatre a little confused. First, I was confused by Radok\u2019s insufficiently clear declaration that he brought to Brno not so much a new stage concept for Dvor\u00e1k\u2019s masterpiece, but a reconstruction of the staging he directed in 2012 in Gothenburg with phenomenally beautiful decorations by Lars-\u00c5ke Thessmann that made a reference to paintings by the Danish artist Vilhelm Hammersh\u00f8i, author of monochromatic interior views filled with intimate light. Radok, who was also listed in the programme of the Brno production as set designer, admitted that he drew inspiration from Thessmann\u2019s work, but what I saw on the stage of the Jan\u00e1\u010dkovo Divadlo, however, was an almost literal reproduction of the visual setting from G\u00f6teborgsoperan, except perhaps for Act II, where Radok expanded the sets depth-wise, making full use of the space of the Brno theatre. The same is true of Zuzana Je\u017ekov\u00e1\u2019s costumes, which draw unambiguously on Ann-Mari Anttila\u2019s designs \u2013 true, they sometimes differ from them in details of colour and cut, but I have seen revivals of legendary productions in which the costume designers dared to deviate much further from the original. I do not suspect the creators or the company\u2019s management of bad intentions, but I would have preferred this kind of information to be clearly stated in the programmes and on the website \u2013 especially since this is about a production that caused quite a stir and not only in the small operatic world.<\/p>\n

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Rusalka\u00a0<\/em>in Brno. Peter Berger (Prince). Photo: Marek Olbrzymek<\/p>\n

Secondly, Radok used the same procedure in Brno as he did earlier in Gothenburg: suggesting that Rusalka<\/em> be read through Jungian archetypes and Freudian psychoanalysis, he decided to remove all folk and fairy tale motifs from the work, which in practice means reducing the cast by throwing out the characters of the Gamekeeper and Kitchen boy, making cuts in the role of Je\u017eibaba and meddling with the rest of the text. Thus, roughly one-fifth of the music and the text was removed from the work. I can understand if the director would have been the first to come up with the idea of a Freudian-Ibsenian Rusalka<\/em>, but productions staged in this spirit have been seen on the world\u2019s stages for nearly half a century, and the creators of the most successful among them \u2013 primarily Pountney and McDonald \u2013 have used the \u201cfairy tale element\u201d contained in the opera to great advantage for their concepts. After all, Jaroslav Kvapil\u2019s libretto had its sources of inspiration in both the fairy-tale-naturalistic plays of Hauptmann and the late, symbolist oeuvre of Ibsen. Kvapil tackled the theme of a clash of two world orders in his own plays. He was one of the pioneers of Czech modernist theatre. His Rusalka<\/em>, masterfully constructed in terms of language and drama, is a masterpiece on its own, betraying an affinity with the oeuvre of Oscar Wilde. Dvo\u0159\u00e1k treated it with almost pious reverence, as is evidenced by his correspondence with Kvapil. Radok, who is a Czech himself, saw only pessimism and decadence in it, completely ignoring the grotesque and black humour, so characteristic of Central European modernism.<\/p>\n

Radok\u2019s concept has many advocates, also among the lovers of Rusalka.<\/em> I \u2013 paradoxically \u2013 found the narrative dragging on at times; it was monotonous, on one level of emotion, without moments of dramatic counterbalance, which in Kvapil and Dvo\u0159\u00e1k\u2019s work serve not only as interludes, but also as important commentaries that complete the context. Visually, however, it is a truly dazzling staging \u2013 a painting-like tale of a thousand shades of loneliness, emptiness and solitude, balancing on the border between two worlds that only seem to intermingle. Harbingers of misfortune are hiding everywhere. The reeds covering the edges of piers linking the indoors to the outdoors are yellowed already in Act I; the room is empty and grey, but in comparison with Act III, where the remains of fallen blades lie around the wet floor, it may indeed seem like cosy shelter. The castle garden is lit by chandeliers hanging under the black sky. Nothing is visible in their light: the weeding guests seem not to notice to Rusalka\u2019s silent despair or Vodnik\u2019s anguish, or what is going on between the Prince and the Foreign Princess. Radok clearly highlights the Wagnerian aspects of the story: the wood sprites\u2019 banter with Vodnik, who is desperate for intimacy, brings to mind the beginning of Das Rheingold<\/em> and Alberich\u2019s humiliation; the cold and unapproachable Je\u017eibaba has some traits of Erda; the Prince\u2019s death and Rusalka\u2019s return to the world of watery night resembles the finale of Tristan and Isolde.<\/em><\/p>\n

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Jana \u0160rejma Ka\u010d\u00edrkov\u00e1 (Rusalka). Photo: Marek Olbrzymek<\/p>\n

The performance I saw was excellent in musical terms as well. With her resonant, sparkling soprano Jana \u0160rejma Ka\u010d\u00edrkov\u00e1 sang all the hope, pain and resignation of the eponymous heroine. Peter Berger once again demonstrated that in the fiendish role of the Prince \u2013 heroic, but requiring a large dose of lyricism and, above all, a very wide range \u2013 he has no rivals today. Jan \u0160\u0165\u00e1va was a magnificent Vodnik. He is a typically \u201cCzech\u201d bass, impressive with the depth of his sound, phenomenal diction, lightness of phrasing and insight in creating this ambiguous character. V\u00e1clava Krej\u010d\u00ed, a singer with an assured, well-controlled mezzo-soprano, created a convincing portrayal of a cold and principled Je\u017eibaba. I was slightly less impressed by Eli\u0161ka Gattringerov\u00e1 as the Foreign Princess. Her soprano has a volume worthy of Brunhilde, but at times is too harsh, especially at the top of the range. Some extraordinary musicality was demonstrated by the other soloists: Doubravka Novotn\u00e1, Ivana Pavl\u016f and Monika J\u00e4gerov\u00e1 as the three Wood Sprites, and Tade\u00e1\u0161 Hoza as the Hunter. The whole thing \u2013 including the company\u2019s excellent chorus \u2013 was conducted by Marko Ivanovi\u0107. His tempi were too steady for my taste at times, but he showed great attention to detail in this intimate, irresistibly sensual score.<\/p>\n

I complained, I enthused and I hereby declare that this is a good sign. A real opera theatre is happening across Poland\u2019s southern border. It is very active, and impresses with the breadth of its repertoire, stable musical level and courage in embarking on ambitious ventures that are not always fully successful. A theatre whose productions do not need to be ignored with embarrassment or praised in advance, because at this stage it can also face criticism. How I miss this every day \u2013 fortunately, Czechia is not far away.<\/p>\n

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

As I wait anxiously, but also with hope, for the long-awaited change of the management of Teatr Wielki-Polish National Opera, I have been closely following the activities of our southern neighbours. In both Poland and Czechia the advocates of entrusting leadership positions in national institutions to local artists and managers are still going strong. This, … [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-8638","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\/8638","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=8638"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/atorod.pl\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8638\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8646,"href":"https:\/\/atorod.pl\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8638\/revisions\/8646"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/atorod.pl\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8638"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atorod.pl\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8638"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atorod.pl\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8638"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}