Madama Butterfly is rare among operas for having a libretto that surpasses its original sources. Verdi's operatic versions of Shakespeare dramas are unequivocal masterpieces (and the libretti--operatic "scripts" or "screenplays"--Arrigo Boito wrote for Otello and Falstaff are brilliant). Verdi's Shakespeare adaptations co-exist with the Bard's plays, but they do not surpass Shakespeare's originals.
Puccini's librettists, Giacosa and Illica based their libretto on David Belasco's play, Madam Butterfly. Belasco based his play on a short story by John Luther Long. Belasco was known as the "Bishop of Broadway" for his innovative stagecraft (advanced lighting techniques and "special effects"). For Belasco, the play was not necessarily the thing, but the spark to fire the imagination for a spectacular production.
Giacosa and Illica's libretto, however, is brilliant. With Puccini, this "Trinity" of collaborators produced three of opera's most beloved masterpieces, La Boheme, Tosca and Madama Butterfly. And while no one loves a Puccini opera for its words ("it's the music, stupid!"), there are layers of the intricate onion of Butterfly's libretto worth peeling.
I want to consider two such layers. One is a through-line of nature references, with a concentration on birds and flowers. Puccini wrote "If you want to understand my music, you have to understand Pascoli." Giovanni Pascoli was a Tuscan nature poet. In addition to being the composer's colleague, Pacoli was a fellow Lucchesi (analogous to a "Roanoker; " regional pride is as marked in Italy as in the USA).
Nature images abound in Puccini's operas, and they infuse Madama Butterfly from start to finish. Each of the five principal characters reference flowers as metaphor, symbol &/or sign. Butterfly's maid, Suzuki speaks with flowery chatter when first introduced to Lt. Pinkerton. The marriage broker, Goro compares his bevy of Geisha girls to a "garland of fresh flowers" as he tries to sell one to the US Consul, Sharpless. One of the most famous musical excerpts from the score is the "flower duet" Butterfly and Suzuki sing in Act II. The opulence of that music mirrors the excess of the imagery of (literal) showers of flowers flooding the spring with vibrant color and fragrant perfume.
Such imagery also resonates with tragedy. The flower's fragility, and the blossom's inherent transience heighten the tragic drama of Madama Butterfly. Pinkerton's brief closing romanza is a "farewell to a little flower" (Addio, fiorito asil). That his remorse--however belated--is sincere is underscored by his aside in the elegiac trio he sings with Sharpless and Suzuki. "How bitter is the perfume of this flower..."
Sharpless, the messenger (and reluctant prophet of the unfolding tragedy), delivers one of the more ironic instances of floral imagery when he attempts to read Butterfly a letter from the "husband" who has abandoned her. Pinkerton asks him to "find that beautiful flower of a girl" (and break the news to her gently).
The "love duet" that closes Act I is one of Puccini's most beloved scenes. It also features poetry that foreshadows the tragedy with irony worthy of Greek drama. Near the close of the duet's first section, Butterfly expresses her fears, and Pinkerton dismisses them with the words "love won't kill you." Later in the scene, she worries she will be caught, pinned and encased like a real butterfly. Pinkerton retorts, "there's a little truth in that, but it's so you won't get away..."
That this unsettling exchange is set to ravishing music underscores the tension in great drama, and is one of the reasons opera wields such power.
There was another kind of tension when Butterfly first opened in 1904. That premiere at La Scala was one of the most notorious opening night disaster's in the history of the theatre (and if time permits, I'll write a bit about that fiasco). Besides incorporating Japanese melodies into his Italian opera, Puccini aimed for verisimilitude with other musical details. Japanese bells and chimes are called for, as are bird whistles, all intended to evoke atmosphere (or "local color").
One of Puccini's biographers wrote about the crowd's reaction to those bird whistles (in the orchestral Intermezzo, before the last scene). Their unexpected appearance evoked a "deafening variety of cackling and animal cries" from the already vociferous opening night audience. The din was so great "La Scala became a lunatic aviary."
Not quite the impression Puccini had in mind by evoking the dawn with sounds from nature.
“I am writing birdsong, so beautiful!” Pascoli wrote in 1903 (while Puccini was composing Butterfly). The birdsong Puccini writes in the beginning of Act II is colorful and witty. Pinkerton promised Butterfly he'd return when the Robins come "home" to nest. When Butterfly asks Sharpless (in the aforementioned "letter" scene) when the Robins nest in America, a comic exchange occurs:
SH: "I don't know, I've never studied ornithology."
MB: "Orni...?"
SH: ...thology."
This scene is full of such witticisms pointed up by Illica's clever rhyme scheme. In this same scene, Goro tries to peddle Butterfly to a rich prince, Yamadori. Butterfly's control here belies attempts to oversimplify her as a one-dimensional naif. As the eminent songwriter Stephen Sondheim points out, speaking in rhyme is a sign of a character's cultivated intelligence. Butterfly is alternately lampooning and sarcastic, and in command of an intricate ensemble situation. She mimes an American courtroom scene with perfect comic timing, stumping Sharpless in the process. Puccini's use of musical parody (a slow "English" waltz, reminiscent of operetta) is another fragrant layer of significance.
Like the variations on the flower theme, the wit of these internal scenes heightens the drama, turning the screws as this heart-breakingly beautiful opera unfolds.
Sunday, March 6, 2011
Wednesday, March 2, 2011
Why Madama Butterfly Matters...
Below is a short "preview" appearing in the current City magazine. Opera Roanoke's stellar cast and production team are currently in rehearsal for our March 18 & 20 performances of Puccini's masterpiece, Madama Butterfly. Over the next couple weeks I will share more about the opera and Opera Roanoke's fully-staged production of it.
WHY MADAMA BUTTERFLY MATTERS…
One summer night in 1900 London, a 41-year-old Italian, who spoke no English, went to see a new (English) play. This man, who preferred the country to the city, who loved his hunting rifles, who would soon become obsessed with racing cars, was the greatest opera composer alive. The play that inspired Giacomo Puccini that night became the most popular opera in the world, Madama Butterfly.
Madama Butterfly is an archetypal story that is both a relationship drama (a tragic love story) and a cultural one. The “east-meets-west” dynamic has always been vibrant. Consider the word “oriental.” In that single word (noun, adjective, stereotype) is an almost electric current that reminds us how powerful language can be. It also reminds us how important context & perspective are, and how volatile signs & symbols can be (“oriental” carries different meanings today than in Puccini’s time, for example).
Without getting too far afield, a (sensitive) word like “oriental” has enough of a spark to remind us that east-west “relationships” are still charged with energy and dramatic possibility. This potential for drama, emotional depth and catharsis is one of the reasons the Butterfly story is timeless. That this story, with the staying power of mythology and folklore, is best known as an opera tells us something significant about Puccini’s genius. It also opens a window on opera’s unique ability to evoke the entire range of human emotions, from the beautiful to the terrifying. Opera pinpoints these emotions with the concentrated focus of music (wedded to drama, theater and stagecraft) and brings them to life with one-of-a-kind power.
On the surface, Butterfly is a tragedy of lost love. A young Geisha marries a US Naval lieutenant, who leaves her (never having intended to stay), and only returns three years later, his American wife in tow, to claim his and Ms Butterfly’s child. She responds in the only way she knows how (in order to preserve her sacred, family honor): she takes her own life.
This classic, cross-cultural, wartime love story has currency from the ancient world to today, from Homer (Iliad) to Rodgers & Hammerstein (South Pacific). The opera’s abiding appeal resides with Puccini’s heroine, a complex, three-dimensional young woman whose apparent predestined fate never fails to move us. We love Butterfly because our hearts break with--and for—hers. She is an archetypal grieving mother (a variation on the Stabat Mater of Christian iconography). She is at once a self-determining tragic character, a sacrificial victim and a martyr.
And we have one of the world’s most gifted interpreters of Puccini’s heroine for our March production. Yunah Lee has made Butterfly her “signature role.” Opera companies around the world vie for the privilege of presenting Ms Lee’s “commanding and touching performance” consistently praised for “revealing the highs and lows of Madame Butterfly’s emotions.”
Hearing the drama and seeing the music of a great opera come to life before your senses is an experience unlike any other. Opera shares traits with musical theater, the world of “classical” music, and the soundtracks that accompany our movies and TV shows. One of the qualities that make a work of art “great” is its ability to transcend the limitations imposed by the specifics (of setting, situation, etc) to aim for the universal.
You don’t need to know anything about Nagasaki, the US Navy, Italian opera or Japanese tea ceremonies to “get” Madama Butterfly. Opera is special, but you don’t have to be a specialist to appreciate or enjoy it. Just get a ticket, bring a friend, and spend a couple hours with one of the world’s greatest musical stories. Come hear and see for yourself why Madama Butterfly is the most popular opera in the United States.
WHY MADAMA BUTTERFLY MATTERS…
One summer night in 1900 London, a 41-year-old Italian, who spoke no English, went to see a new (English) play. This man, who preferred the country to the city, who loved his hunting rifles, who would soon become obsessed with racing cars, was the greatest opera composer alive. The play that inspired Giacomo Puccini that night became the most popular opera in the world, Madama Butterfly.
Madama Butterfly is an archetypal story that is both a relationship drama (a tragic love story) and a cultural one. The “east-meets-west” dynamic has always been vibrant. Consider the word “oriental.” In that single word (noun, adjective, stereotype) is an almost electric current that reminds us how powerful language can be. It also reminds us how important context & perspective are, and how volatile signs & symbols can be (“oriental” carries different meanings today than in Puccini’s time, for example).
Without getting too far afield, a (sensitive) word like “oriental” has enough of a spark to remind us that east-west “relationships” are still charged with energy and dramatic possibility. This potential for drama, emotional depth and catharsis is one of the reasons the Butterfly story is timeless. That this story, with the staying power of mythology and folklore, is best known as an opera tells us something significant about Puccini’s genius. It also opens a window on opera’s unique ability to evoke the entire range of human emotions, from the beautiful to the terrifying. Opera pinpoints these emotions with the concentrated focus of music (wedded to drama, theater and stagecraft) and brings them to life with one-of-a-kind power.
On the surface, Butterfly is a tragedy of lost love. A young Geisha marries a US Naval lieutenant, who leaves her (never having intended to stay), and only returns three years later, his American wife in tow, to claim his and Ms Butterfly’s child. She responds in the only way she knows how (in order to preserve her sacred, family honor): she takes her own life.
This classic, cross-cultural, wartime love story has currency from the ancient world to today, from Homer (Iliad) to Rodgers & Hammerstein (South Pacific). The opera’s abiding appeal resides with Puccini’s heroine, a complex, three-dimensional young woman whose apparent predestined fate never fails to move us. We love Butterfly because our hearts break with--and for—hers. She is an archetypal grieving mother (a variation on the Stabat Mater of Christian iconography). She is at once a self-determining tragic character, a sacrificial victim and a martyr.
And we have one of the world’s most gifted interpreters of Puccini’s heroine for our March production. Yunah Lee has made Butterfly her “signature role.” Opera companies around the world vie for the privilege of presenting Ms Lee’s “commanding and touching performance” consistently praised for “revealing the highs and lows of Madame Butterfly’s emotions.”
Hearing the drama and seeing the music of a great opera come to life before your senses is an experience unlike any other. Opera shares traits with musical theater, the world of “classical” music, and the soundtracks that accompany our movies and TV shows. One of the qualities that make a work of art “great” is its ability to transcend the limitations imposed by the specifics (of setting, situation, etc) to aim for the universal.
You don’t need to know anything about Nagasaki, the US Navy, Italian opera or Japanese tea ceremonies to “get” Madama Butterfly. Opera is special, but you don’t have to be a specialist to appreciate or enjoy it. Just get a ticket, bring a friend, and spend a couple hours with one of the world’s greatest musical stories. Come hear and see for yourself why Madama Butterfly is the most popular opera in the United States.
Tuesday, February 22, 2011
It's Iphy: Brush up Euripides
Iphy is opera-speak for Christoph Willibald Gluck's classical opera, Iphigenie en Tauride. Gluck (1714-1787) based the 6th of his 7 French operas on the Euripides drama, Iphigenia in Tauris (the title alone is a link to the previous entry, Nixon in China: another opera that connects history, mythology & journeys to distant places).
I won't try and unwind that thread from Ariadne's proverbial spool any further. Iphigenie en Tauride is the next Met "Live in HD" broadcast, Saturday at 1 pm, hosted by Virginia Western Community College (more info is online at both of our websites).
Gluck's operatic adaptation from Greek mythology was composed in 1779. It had a profound influence on the 23 year old Mozart (echoes of Iphy recur throughout the Magic Flute). A generation or two later, the young Hector Berlioz would cite Iphigenie en Tauride as a formative influence on his decision to pursue a life in music. Gluck features prominently in Berlioz's important book on orchestration (a textbook still in use by composition teachers).
Gluck is noted for the "beautiful simplicity" of his elegant music and is most remembered for the "reforms" he brought to 18th-century opera. He bucked conventions and broke operatic rules he thought impeded the drama. These included the baroque convention of the da capo aria (one where the opening section was repeated, ostensibly to highlight a singer's virtuosity with embellishments and ornamentation).
One of the reasons Gluck is not as well known today as the opera composers on either side of him (Handel and Mozart) is simply because his arias are more thoroughly embedded into the texture of his operas. Like Wagner, late Puccini and Strauss, the "songs" in these operas are not easily excerpted. Is it surprising that Gluck's most famous opera, Orfeo ed Euridice contains his single most famous aria, Orpheus' lament for his lost love, Che faro senza Euridice?
In addition to restoring a sense of dramatic continuity using "through-composed" arias (and recitatives that emerge and recede organically from the musical texture), Gluck was a master orchestrator. He was one of the first composers to use the orchestra as a real character in the drama. His colorful use of percussion instruments (cymbals were still new in European music at this point in time) began a trend whose popularity hasn't waned. Gluck also linked the dramatic effects of his orchestration to the emotional states of his characters.
Iphigenie opens with "calm sea & prosperous voyage" music (deceptively calm music which always heralds a great tempest). The storm music raging around this island of the Black Sea is mirrored in Iphigenie's heart as she recalls her fate. "Brush up Euripides" refers to the mythological backstory. Iphigenia was sacrificed by her father, Agamemnon to curry favor for the Greeks in the Trojan war. Euripides saves Iphigenia from death at the port of Aulis with a deus ex machina intervention from the goddess Diana (who whisks Iphy away to Tauris).
Another important chapter of the backstory concerns Iphigenia's brother, Orestes, who has avenged their father Agamemnon's death. Agamemnon (who sacrificed his daughter) was killed by his wife, Clytamnestra. Oreste kills his mother to avenge his father.That Iphigenie en Tauride ends with Oreste and Iphigenie happily reunited is but one of Euripides most potent examples of dramatic irony.
Gluck underscores the kinship of Iphigenie and Oreste with musical symbolism. The storm music that appears with Iphigenie at the opening of the opera recurs in another guise later. The furies interrupt a moment of Oreste's calm by demanding vengeance for the murder of his mother. The furies (or Eumenides) drive Oreste almost to madness in a scene with pitch-perfect music. (In another labyrinthine thread, the Eumenides both refers to the furies and an Aeschylus drama that connects to Elektra, Strauss's opera named after another sibling in this family.)
Iphigenie en Tauride is a compact opera (just under two hours of music) featuring a pivotal triangle of characters. One relationship hinges on the long-lost sibling's reunion; the other is one of genuine fraternal love between best friends. Both Oreste and Pylade would rather lay down their own life in order to save the other. The music they sing to that effect--especially (the tenor) Pylade's aria--is classic Gluck, noble and sincere, an elegant example of "beautiful simplicity."
Many opera fans will be attending this broadcast expressly to see and hear the great Placido Domingo. Maestro Domingo has been portraying the (lyric) baritone role of Oreste for several seasons now. The great trio of principals is complemented by beloved American artists. The mezzo soprano Susan Graham sings the title character, and Oreste's companion, Pylade is essayed by Paul Groves (one of my favorite tenors). Patrick Summers conducts, and Roanoke's own Steven White has been behind the scenes aiding the musical preparation as an assistant conductor.
Berlioz described the "sleepless nights" Gluck's music caused his excitable soul. He claimed Iphigenie left him "possessed by an ecstasy." Come see and hear for yourself Saturday.
(And if you read this in time, I'll be talking about Iphigenie at the Virginia Western Natural Science Center this Wednesday at noon, in the next of our ongoing lunchtime opera chats).
I won't try and unwind that thread from Ariadne's proverbial spool any further. Iphigenie en Tauride is the next Met "Live in HD" broadcast, Saturday at 1 pm, hosted by Virginia Western Community College (more info is online at both of our websites).
Gluck's operatic adaptation from Greek mythology was composed in 1779. It had a profound influence on the 23 year old Mozart (echoes of Iphy recur throughout the Magic Flute). A generation or two later, the young Hector Berlioz would cite Iphigenie en Tauride as a formative influence on his decision to pursue a life in music. Gluck features prominently in Berlioz's important book on orchestration (a textbook still in use by composition teachers).
Gluck is noted for the "beautiful simplicity" of his elegant music and is most remembered for the "reforms" he brought to 18th-century opera. He bucked conventions and broke operatic rules he thought impeded the drama. These included the baroque convention of the da capo aria (one where the opening section was repeated, ostensibly to highlight a singer's virtuosity with embellishments and ornamentation).
One of the reasons Gluck is not as well known today as the opera composers on either side of him (Handel and Mozart) is simply because his arias are more thoroughly embedded into the texture of his operas. Like Wagner, late Puccini and Strauss, the "songs" in these operas are not easily excerpted. Is it surprising that Gluck's most famous opera, Orfeo ed Euridice contains his single most famous aria, Orpheus' lament for his lost love, Che faro senza Euridice?
In addition to restoring a sense of dramatic continuity using "through-composed" arias (and recitatives that emerge and recede organically from the musical texture), Gluck was a master orchestrator. He was one of the first composers to use the orchestra as a real character in the drama. His colorful use of percussion instruments (cymbals were still new in European music at this point in time) began a trend whose popularity hasn't waned. Gluck also linked the dramatic effects of his orchestration to the emotional states of his characters.
Iphigenie opens with "calm sea & prosperous voyage" music (deceptively calm music which always heralds a great tempest). The storm music raging around this island of the Black Sea is mirrored in Iphigenie's heart as she recalls her fate. "Brush up Euripides" refers to the mythological backstory. Iphigenia was sacrificed by her father, Agamemnon to curry favor for the Greeks in the Trojan war. Euripides saves Iphigenia from death at the port of Aulis with a deus ex machina intervention from the goddess Diana (who whisks Iphy away to Tauris).
Another important chapter of the backstory concerns Iphigenia's brother, Orestes, who has avenged their father Agamemnon's death. Agamemnon (who sacrificed his daughter) was killed by his wife, Clytamnestra. Oreste kills his mother to avenge his father.That Iphigenie en Tauride ends with Oreste and Iphigenie happily reunited is but one of Euripides most potent examples of dramatic irony.
Gluck underscores the kinship of Iphigenie and Oreste with musical symbolism. The storm music that appears with Iphigenie at the opening of the opera recurs in another guise later. The furies interrupt a moment of Oreste's calm by demanding vengeance for the murder of his mother. The furies (or Eumenides) drive Oreste almost to madness in a scene with pitch-perfect music. (In another labyrinthine thread, the Eumenides both refers to the furies and an Aeschylus drama that connects to Elektra, Strauss's opera named after another sibling in this family.)
Iphigenie en Tauride is a compact opera (just under two hours of music) featuring a pivotal triangle of characters. One relationship hinges on the long-lost sibling's reunion; the other is one of genuine fraternal love between best friends. Both Oreste and Pylade would rather lay down their own life in order to save the other. The music they sing to that effect--especially (the tenor) Pylade's aria--is classic Gluck, noble and sincere, an elegant example of "beautiful simplicity."
Many opera fans will be attending this broadcast expressly to see and hear the great Placido Domingo. Maestro Domingo has been portraying the (lyric) baritone role of Oreste for several seasons now. The great trio of principals is complemented by beloved American artists. The mezzo soprano Susan Graham sings the title character, and Oreste's companion, Pylade is essayed by Paul Groves (one of my favorite tenors). Patrick Summers conducts, and Roanoke's own Steven White has been behind the scenes aiding the musical preparation as an assistant conductor.
Berlioz described the "sleepless nights" Gluck's music caused his excitable soul. He claimed Iphigenie left him "possessed by an ecstasy." Come see and hear for yourself Saturday.
(And if you read this in time, I'll be talking about Iphigenie at the Virginia Western Natural Science Center this Wednesday at noon, in the next of our ongoing lunchtime opera chats).
Wednesday, February 9, 2011
Adams & Sellars & Nixon in China
Below are some quotes from recent articles about John Adams' opera Nixon in China, and the Peter Sellars production that is having its belated Met debut (24 years after it premiered to widespread acclaim and notoriety). Check it out this weekend Live in HD from the Met at Virginia Western Community College.
At the bottom is (my personalized) shorthand outline on Adams' musical style, with a brief listening guide to Nixon.
Articles & features about Nixon in China on the Met website: metopera.org
Nixon in China tells of the groundbreaking visit of U.S. President Richard Nixon to Communist China in February 1972, during which he met with Party Chairman Mao Zedong (spelled Tse-tung in the opera) and other Chinese leaders, flinging wide the long-closed doors between the U.S. and China. This event inspired Adams to write his first opera: “part epic, part satire, part a parody of political posturing, and part serious examination of historical, philosophical, and even gender issues,” as he described it. [Met Educator Guides]
The Myth of History (from Adams & Sellars):
What made the project perfect?
JA As Americans, we’re obsessed with our president because that person embodies our national psyche, both the dark side—our paranoia and our tendency to abuse power—but also our idealism and our curiously American optimism…
People have forgotten what a shock it was to see Nixon and Mao together, shaking hands and chatting it up. After all, China was supposed to be the dark evil empire—I remember how the Cold War image of Mao was burned into our consciousness here in the U.S. So Nixon’s trip quickly became a kind of mythological moment—I think of it as a clash of ideologies.
Why do you object to people labeling Nixon a “CNN opera”?
PS I really want to emphasize that it’s exactly the opposite. CNN is fast-breaking, with instant reactions, and of course the rush to judgment. Opera is about a long view. What opera offers is poetry, is music. Alice Goodman has taken these historical events and transformed them not into headlines, which reduce and simplify, but into poetry, which expands and complexifies [sic].
on the distinctive vocal writing for each character:
JA It seemed obvious that Nixon’s music would be white, big band music from the ’30s and early ’40s, which is, of course, when Dick and Pat fell in love. Pat is the complete antipode of Chiang Ch’ing. I wanted her to be not just a shrieking coloratura, but also someone who in the opera’s final act can reveal her private fantasies, her erotic desires, and even a certain tragic awareness. Nixon himself is a sort of Simon Boccanegra—a self-doubting, lyrical, at times self-pitying melancholy baritone. Mao is the Mao of the huge posters and Great Leap Forward. I cast him as a heldentenor. [cf: Mozart & Wagner parallels…]
Political Spouses: A Study in Contrasts between Two Characters
JA Both wives of politicians, they represented the yin and the yang of the two alternatives to living with someone immersed in power and political manipulation. Pat was…the quintessence of ‘family values,’ a woman who stood by her man (preferably a foot or two in the background), embraced his causes and wore a gracious if stoic smile through a long career…. Chiang Ch’ing began her career as a movie actress and only later enlisted in the Party and…ultimately became the power behind his throne, the mind and force behind that hideous experiment in social engineering, the Cultural Revolution.
Madame Mao: I am the wife of Mai Tse-tung
Who raised the weak above the strong
When I appear the people hang
Upon my words, and for his sake
Whose wreaths are heavy round my neck
I speak according to the book.
Adams (and others) on Adams:
--1947 (Worcester, Mass); Harvard; twice Schoenberg’s “grandson:” studied with Leon Kirchner, then disciple of John Cage;
moved to SF Bay area in 70’s [East Coast/West Coast] “2nd gen. minimalist” BUT w/ “non-modernist expressivity;”
polymath of styles & inspirations (pan-Euro, -Mid/Far-East; poetry & philo/religion; myth/history/dreams…)
YET North American through & through; a "melting pot" of styles/influences:
*Americana style of Ives/Copland
*American Experimental/fringe school (also includes Ives) embodied in "loner"/"outsider" artists from Thoreau to Cage
*Minimalist style; a "less is more" aesthetic full of vibrant energy/pulse, musical Dada "thumbing of the nose at the establishment..."
“My operas have dealt on deep psychological levels with our American mythology…” and finding “mythic potential of contemporary icons.”
“I’m not interested in lecturing my audience….what appeals to me is their power as archetypes, their ability to summon up in a few choice symbols the collective psyche of our time”
“You use poetry, you use music, you use gesture to radiate out from that span…”
“One of the glories of opera is its capacity to show us, from without and within, the process of characters coming to terms with experience beyond their control. Through the intensity of all its components, opera makes this process…vivid.” [TM on Dr A]
Peter Sellars on Adams/Nixon/Opera:
“The odd thing is, it takes poetry, music, and dance to give back to our own history its actual dimensionality. What opera can do to history is deepen it and move into its more subtle, nuanced, and mysterious corners” (quoted in Thomas May)
“…music and poetry evoke a set of free associations (a set that can’t be censored)” [Dr Atomic]
“We’re on earth to try to figure out how to cross over. And opera is a quintessential art form of crossing over, which is why I think Nixon was so compelling, and why so many things in the history of opera are about that kind of border crossing of imagination, which is so rich” (Opera News)
[Adams & Glass] both represented a break-through in opera history—they made opera a living art form again…the resurgence was very profound, in part because what we brought was subject matter. Opera became about something, about figures that our generation could recognize and deal with, b/c we grew up with them…we inherited their political structures & their aspirations.”
Adams music is like “multi-paneled altarpieces that you cannot possible take in all at once” (re: El Niño)
On the expectation of spectacle [ie “the bomb” in Dr Atomic]:
“The Greeks were not interested in what an exploding eyeball looks like; when Oedipus tears out his eyeballs, they were interested in ‘why would this person tear out his eyes?!?’”
*****
Listening Guide: [big, brassy orchestra, 40’s swing band w/saxophones, etc]
Adams style: Janus-faced; Yin/Yang; manic & melancholy, antic & tragic
“trickster” side of restless, energetic “public” surface (minimalist, “pop”);
serious, lyrical, introspective, poetic/psychological/metaphysical depth…
style=color field paintings/abstract expressionist; (abstract rhythm; expressionist/impressionist harmony/line)
techniques=moto perpetuo, heterophony/layerings, orchestral "jabs" of staccato chords
1. Opening Chorus: “The People are the heroes now”
--minimalist (=Glass); repetitive/obsessive; hypnotic/narcotic/numbing;
2. a. Landing of the Spirit of '76 (orchestra interlude)
--huge orchestral "engine" of sound, energetic pulse, and form that
fits the content (ie: this music sounds like an airplane in flight...)
Premier Chou greets Nixon: “Your flight was smooth, I hope?”
--stylistic/character contrasts (note Nixon’s parody of Americana…)
b. Nixon’s first aria: “News” (repeated 12X!!!);
complex baritone role=Verdi/Wagner
3. Pat’s Act II aria: “This is prophetic”
lyric soprano (=sympathetic heroine; Pamina, Gilda, et al)
4. Madame Mao’s Act II aria: “I am the wife of Mao Tse-tung!”
--parody/irony; operatic type: “shrieking coloratura”=Queen of Night
5. The parody-ballet: “The Red Detachment of Women”
“a lurid emblem of the Cultural Revolution” (Mays)
Young as we are / We expect fear / Every year
More of us bow / Beneath the shadow
6. Act III: “the most extended ensemble in all of opera” (PS)
inward action; monologues & conversations;
all reflecting “an increasingly elegiac sense of regret” (Mays);
“nocturnal reverie” (JA);
“musical twilight” (PS)
The third act of Nixon in China is my favorite act of contemporary opera since Benjamin Britten's last essay in the genre (in 1973; he died in '76). Nixon's finale is memorably poignant, and powerful in part because so unexpected (this was the original "CNN Opera"). John Adams is a composer full of surprises. And that is an underrated virtue in the worlds of "art appreciation." We could all use a little newness every now and then: a new spark, a new perspective or stock-taking, a re-newed sense of purpose, or just "a new lease on life." Riffing on a word (like "new") echoes the amplifying capacities inherent in any concentrated form (minimalism being one example). John Adams concentrates his considerate compositional gifts and skills into music that is exceptionally well-crafted, pulsing with energy and coursing with life. It is music full of pleasant, unexpected, (sometimes unsettling but always engaging!) surprises.
At the bottom is (my personalized) shorthand outline on Adams' musical style, with a brief listening guide to Nixon.
Articles & features about Nixon in China on the Met website: metopera.org
Nixon in China tells of the groundbreaking visit of U.S. President Richard Nixon to Communist China in February 1972, during which he met with Party Chairman Mao Zedong (spelled Tse-tung in the opera) and other Chinese leaders, flinging wide the long-closed doors between the U.S. and China. This event inspired Adams to write his first opera: “part epic, part satire, part a parody of political posturing, and part serious examination of historical, philosophical, and even gender issues,” as he described it. [Met Educator Guides]
The Myth of History (from Adams & Sellars):
What made the project perfect?
JA As Americans, we’re obsessed with our president because that person embodies our national psyche, both the dark side—our paranoia and our tendency to abuse power—but also our idealism and our curiously American optimism…
People have forgotten what a shock it was to see Nixon and Mao together, shaking hands and chatting it up. After all, China was supposed to be the dark evil empire—I remember how the Cold War image of Mao was burned into our consciousness here in the U.S. So Nixon’s trip quickly became a kind of mythological moment—I think of it as a clash of ideologies.
Why do you object to people labeling Nixon a “CNN opera”?
PS I really want to emphasize that it’s exactly the opposite. CNN is fast-breaking, with instant reactions, and of course the rush to judgment. Opera is about a long view. What opera offers is poetry, is music. Alice Goodman has taken these historical events and transformed them not into headlines, which reduce and simplify, but into poetry, which expands and complexifies [sic].
on the distinctive vocal writing for each character:
JA It seemed obvious that Nixon’s music would be white, big band music from the ’30s and early ’40s, which is, of course, when Dick and Pat fell in love. Pat is the complete antipode of Chiang Ch’ing. I wanted her to be not just a shrieking coloratura, but also someone who in the opera’s final act can reveal her private fantasies, her erotic desires, and even a certain tragic awareness. Nixon himself is a sort of Simon Boccanegra—a self-doubting, lyrical, at times self-pitying melancholy baritone. Mao is the Mao of the huge posters and Great Leap Forward. I cast him as a heldentenor. [cf: Mozart & Wagner parallels…]
Political Spouses: A Study in Contrasts between Two Characters
JA Both wives of politicians, they represented the yin and the yang of the two alternatives to living with someone immersed in power and political manipulation. Pat was…the quintessence of ‘family values,’ a woman who stood by her man (preferably a foot or two in the background), embraced his causes and wore a gracious if stoic smile through a long career…. Chiang Ch’ing began her career as a movie actress and only later enlisted in the Party and…ultimately became the power behind his throne, the mind and force behind that hideous experiment in social engineering, the Cultural Revolution.
Madame Mao: I am the wife of Mai Tse-tung
Who raised the weak above the strong
When I appear the people hang
Upon my words, and for his sake
Whose wreaths are heavy round my neck
I speak according to the book.
Adams (and others) on Adams:
--1947 (Worcester, Mass); Harvard; twice Schoenberg’s “grandson:” studied with Leon Kirchner, then disciple of John Cage;
moved to SF Bay area in 70’s [East Coast/West Coast] “2nd gen. minimalist” BUT w/ “non-modernist expressivity;”
polymath of styles & inspirations (pan-Euro, -Mid/Far-East; poetry & philo/religion; myth/history/dreams…)
YET North American through & through; a "melting pot" of styles/influences:
*Americana style of Ives/Copland
*American Experimental/fringe school (also includes Ives) embodied in "loner"/"outsider" artists from Thoreau to Cage
*Minimalist style; a "less is more" aesthetic full of vibrant energy/pulse, musical Dada "thumbing of the nose at the establishment..."
“My operas have dealt on deep psychological levels with our American mythology…” and finding “mythic potential of contemporary icons.”
“I’m not interested in lecturing my audience….what appeals to me is their power as archetypes, their ability to summon up in a few choice symbols the collective psyche of our time”
“You use poetry, you use music, you use gesture to radiate out from that span…”
“One of the glories of opera is its capacity to show us, from without and within, the process of characters coming to terms with experience beyond their control. Through the intensity of all its components, opera makes this process…vivid.” [TM on Dr A]
Peter Sellars on Adams/Nixon/Opera:
“The odd thing is, it takes poetry, music, and dance to give back to our own history its actual dimensionality. What opera can do to history is deepen it and move into its more subtle, nuanced, and mysterious corners” (quoted in Thomas May)
“…music and poetry evoke a set of free associations (a set that can’t be censored)” [Dr Atomic]
“We’re on earth to try to figure out how to cross over. And opera is a quintessential art form of crossing over, which is why I think Nixon was so compelling, and why so many things in the history of opera are about that kind of border crossing of imagination, which is so rich” (Opera News)
[Adams & Glass] both represented a break-through in opera history—they made opera a living art form again…the resurgence was very profound, in part because what we brought was subject matter. Opera became about something, about figures that our generation could recognize and deal with, b/c we grew up with them…we inherited their political structures & their aspirations.”
Adams music is like “multi-paneled altarpieces that you cannot possible take in all at once” (re: El Niño)
On the expectation of spectacle [ie “the bomb” in Dr Atomic]:
“The Greeks were not interested in what an exploding eyeball looks like; when Oedipus tears out his eyeballs, they were interested in ‘why would this person tear out his eyes?!?’”
*****
Listening Guide: [big, brassy orchestra, 40’s swing band w/saxophones, etc]
Adams style: Janus-faced; Yin/Yang; manic & melancholy, antic & tragic
“trickster” side of restless, energetic “public” surface (minimalist, “pop”);
serious, lyrical, introspective, poetic/psychological/metaphysical depth…
style=color field paintings/abstract expressionist; (abstract rhythm; expressionist/impressionist harmony/line)
techniques=moto perpetuo, heterophony/layerings, orchestral "jabs" of staccato chords
1. Opening Chorus: “The People are the heroes now”
--minimalist (=Glass); repetitive/obsessive; hypnotic/narcotic/numbing;
2. a. Landing of the Spirit of '76 (orchestra interlude)
--huge orchestral "engine" of sound, energetic pulse, and form that
fits the content (ie: this music sounds like an airplane in flight...)
Premier Chou greets Nixon: “Your flight was smooth, I hope?”
--stylistic/character contrasts (note Nixon’s parody of Americana…)
b. Nixon’s first aria: “News” (repeated 12X!!!);
complex baritone role=Verdi/Wagner
3. Pat’s Act II aria: “This is prophetic”
lyric soprano (=sympathetic heroine; Pamina, Gilda, et al)
4. Madame Mao’s Act II aria: “I am the wife of Mao Tse-tung!”
--parody/irony; operatic type: “shrieking coloratura”=Queen of Night
5. The parody-ballet: “The Red Detachment of Women”
“a lurid emblem of the Cultural Revolution” (Mays)
Young as we are / We expect fear / Every year
More of us bow / Beneath the shadow
6. Act III: “the most extended ensemble in all of opera” (PS)
inward action; monologues & conversations;
all reflecting “an increasingly elegiac sense of regret” (Mays);
“nocturnal reverie” (JA);
“musical twilight” (PS)
The third act of Nixon in China is my favorite act of contemporary opera since Benjamin Britten's last essay in the genre (in 1973; he died in '76). Nixon's finale is memorably poignant, and powerful in part because so unexpected (this was the original "CNN Opera"). John Adams is a composer full of surprises. And that is an underrated virtue in the worlds of "art appreciation." We could all use a little newness every now and then: a new spark, a new perspective or stock-taking, a re-newed sense of purpose, or just "a new lease on life." Riffing on a word (like "new") echoes the amplifying capacities inherent in any concentrated form (minimalism being one example). John Adams concentrates his considerate compositional gifts and skills into music that is exceptionally well-crafted, pulsing with energy and coursing with life. It is music full of pleasant, unexpected, (sometimes unsettling but always engaging!) surprises.
Monday, January 31, 2011
Lunch this Wednesday with John Adams, Nixon & Mao!
I hope many of you will join me for an informal lunch-time discussion on the "modern classic" opera, Nixon in China. John Adams is the most celebrated opera composer alive. This Met premiere of Nixon (Adams' first opera, from 1987) is directed by Peter Sellars. The "maverick director" created the original production for Houston Grand Opera and has been called by Opera News the most "passionate advocate for classical music in the world today."
Adams music is vibrant and colorful, as contemporary as his subjects, yet firmly rooted in the operatic tradition. His stage works frequently elicit comparisons to Mozart, Verdi and Wagner. In the composer's own words, all of his operas "have dealt on deep psychological levels with our American mythology."
I will briefly discuss Adams and his music, and offer selections from some of the composer's operas, including Nixon in China. The informal lunch hour will conclude with a "Q & A" generated discussion.
Virginia Western hosts this week's discussion, and is the new home of exclusive Roanoke presentations of the Metropolitan Opera "Live in HD" broadcasts. More details on this "impromptu" presentation are below; I'll follow up with another piece on Nixon in China next week, in anticipation of the Met premiere of this great contemporary musical drama, LIVE in HD, Feb 12.
Location & other details:
Virginia Western Community College
Natural Science Center
February 2nd
12:00 noon-1 pm
(Bring a lunch; drinks will be provided)
Directions: On Colonial Avenue, turn onto Winding Way beside the Community Arboretum. At the top of the hill, turn left into the parking lot and the Natural Science Center is the first brick building on your left.
Adams music is vibrant and colorful, as contemporary as his subjects, yet firmly rooted in the operatic tradition. His stage works frequently elicit comparisons to Mozart, Verdi and Wagner. In the composer's own words, all of his operas "have dealt on deep psychological levels with our American mythology."
I will briefly discuss Adams and his music, and offer selections from some of the composer's operas, including Nixon in China. The informal lunch hour will conclude with a "Q & A" generated discussion.
Virginia Western hosts this week's discussion, and is the new home of exclusive Roanoke presentations of the Metropolitan Opera "Live in HD" broadcasts. More details on this "impromptu" presentation are below; I'll follow up with another piece on Nixon in China next week, in anticipation of the Met premiere of this great contemporary musical drama, LIVE in HD, Feb 12.
Location & other details:
Virginia Western Community College
Natural Science Center
February 2nd
12:00 noon-1 pm
(Bring a lunch; drinks will be provided)
Directions: On Colonial Avenue, turn onto Winding Way beside the Community Arboretum. At the top of the hill, turn left into the parking lot and the Natural Science Center is the first brick building on your left.
Thursday, January 20, 2011
Opera Weekend: Jan 22-23
This weekend music lovers around Roanoke can experience back-to-back treats of the operatic variety. Saturday at 1 pm the next Met "Live in HD" broadcast will play at Va Western Community College
(go to virginiawestern.edu or operaroanoke.org for more info & tickets).
It is my single favorite Puccini opera, La Fanciulla del West (The Girl of the Golden West). It was premiered 100 years ago at the Met conducted by the eminent Italian maestro, Arturo Toscanini and starring the great tenor Enrico Caruso.
It is arguably Puccini's greatest score and that is one of the primary reasons it
is a favorite among musicians, critics and opera buffs. When we talk about
"the score" we are referring literally to the entirety of the written music.
(We conduct from the score; the orchestra musicians play from individual parts; the singers use a piano/vocal score that contains their sung roles and a reduction of the orchestral music into a piano part. For those inquiring minds...)
So the score of Fanciulla is one of Puccini's greatest creations. He was struck by the innovations in harmony and orchestration by composers like Debussy (the style of musical impressionism) and incorporated these stylistic advances into his score. You'll hear music that evokes the wind and winter weather seamlessly interwoven with Puccini's signature sweeping melodies. Unlike La Boheme, from which arias are often excerpted, Fanciulla's arias are so integrated into the score they are rarely featured apart from their musical "home."
Like Puccini's most popular opera, Madama Butterfly (coming live in 3D to Roanoke March 18 & 20!), Fanciulla strives for the verisimilitude of "local color" by incorporating bits of folk music indigenous to its setting. Puccini studied Japanese music when composing his tragic masterpiece, and he used American tunes when composing this opera mirroring the American dream (one with a happy ending).
And speaking of the American aspect, its heroine is a gun-toting, Sunday-school-teaching bar owner named Minnie, beloved by a bad-guy-type Sheriff. The love triangle is completed by the lovable outlaw-bandit (tenor), whose life is saved by our heroine. Clint Eastwood, eat your heart out. The original "spaghetti western" is a gourmet delight of an opera, and "the good, the bad and the ugly" never had music so glorious.
If you think you've never heard any of the music of La Fanciulla del West, think again. Unless you've been asleep like Rip Van Winkle for the last 20 years, you have heard the music of Andrew Lloyd Webber's Phantom of the Opera one way or another. Its most famous ballads are "borrowed" directly from Puccini's evocative score. Fanciulla opens with "hello" and ends with "good-bye" and the two hours of music in between is some of the most compelling in the repertoire.
But please don't stop with Fanciulla because one of the rising stars of the Met will be here for one day only on Sunday, Jan 23 at 2:30 pm. Soprano Leah Partridge is establishing herself as one of the world's leading young singers, and you can see and hear why this weekend. Leah will be sharing a program of American songs from her soon-to-be released debut CD. Prominent on her program is the music of Ricky Ian Gordon. Ricky's music is the centerpiece of our season finale concert, Mother's Day Serenade, starring Elizabeth Futral. And Ms Partridge is poised to follow in the footsteps of eminent artists like Ms Futral.
This recital promises to be an engaging and inspiring afternoon of great music written by some of our country's most compelling voices. If you like Leonard Bernstein's music for the stage, then you'll love the likes of Ricky Ian Gordon and Jake Heggie. Their songs have been embraced by not only the likes of Elizabeth and Leah, but by other exceptional artists like Renee Fleming, Audra MacDonald and Frederica von Stade.
I hope you all will make it a weekend of opera in Roanoke.
I am away performing Carmina Burana with the Virginia Symphony and JoAnn Falletta this weekend and hate to miss these festivities. In my stead Sunday afternoon, WDBJ's Robin Reed will be your host for Leah Partridge's "Stars in the Star City" recital. I know you'll want to welcome both of them to the Shaftman Performance Hall stage.
(go to virginiawestern.edu or operaroanoke.org for more info & tickets).
It is my single favorite Puccini opera, La Fanciulla del West (The Girl of the Golden West). It was premiered 100 years ago at the Met conducted by the eminent Italian maestro, Arturo Toscanini and starring the great tenor Enrico Caruso.
It is arguably Puccini's greatest score and that is one of the primary reasons it
is a favorite among musicians, critics and opera buffs. When we talk about
"the score" we are referring literally to the entirety of the written music.
(We conduct from the score; the orchestra musicians play from individual parts; the singers use a piano/vocal score that contains their sung roles and a reduction of the orchestral music into a piano part. For those inquiring minds...)
So the score of Fanciulla is one of Puccini's greatest creations. He was struck by the innovations in harmony and orchestration by composers like Debussy (the style of musical impressionism) and incorporated these stylistic advances into his score. You'll hear music that evokes the wind and winter weather seamlessly interwoven with Puccini's signature sweeping melodies. Unlike La Boheme, from which arias are often excerpted, Fanciulla's arias are so integrated into the score they are rarely featured apart from their musical "home."
Like Puccini's most popular opera, Madama Butterfly (coming live in 3D to Roanoke March 18 & 20!), Fanciulla strives for the verisimilitude of "local color" by incorporating bits of folk music indigenous to its setting. Puccini studied Japanese music when composing his tragic masterpiece, and he used American tunes when composing this opera mirroring the American dream (one with a happy ending).
And speaking of the American aspect, its heroine is a gun-toting, Sunday-school-teaching bar owner named Minnie, beloved by a bad-guy-type Sheriff. The love triangle is completed by the lovable outlaw-bandit (tenor), whose life is saved by our heroine. Clint Eastwood, eat your heart out. The original "spaghetti western" is a gourmet delight of an opera, and "the good, the bad and the ugly" never had music so glorious.
If you think you've never heard any of the music of La Fanciulla del West, think again. Unless you've been asleep like Rip Van Winkle for the last 20 years, you have heard the music of Andrew Lloyd Webber's Phantom of the Opera one way or another. Its most famous ballads are "borrowed" directly from Puccini's evocative score. Fanciulla opens with "hello" and ends with "good-bye" and the two hours of music in between is some of the most compelling in the repertoire.
But please don't stop with Fanciulla because one of the rising stars of the Met will be here for one day only on Sunday, Jan 23 at 2:30 pm. Soprano Leah Partridge is establishing herself as one of the world's leading young singers, and you can see and hear why this weekend. Leah will be sharing a program of American songs from her soon-to-be released debut CD. Prominent on her program is the music of Ricky Ian Gordon. Ricky's music is the centerpiece of our season finale concert, Mother's Day Serenade, starring Elizabeth Futral. And Ms Partridge is poised to follow in the footsteps of eminent artists like Ms Futral.
This recital promises to be an engaging and inspiring afternoon of great music written by some of our country's most compelling voices. If you like Leonard Bernstein's music for the stage, then you'll love the likes of Ricky Ian Gordon and Jake Heggie. Their songs have been embraced by not only the likes of Elizabeth and Leah, but by other exceptional artists like Renee Fleming, Audra MacDonald and Frederica von Stade.
I hope you all will make it a weekend of opera in Roanoke.
I am away performing Carmina Burana with the Virginia Symphony and JoAnn Falletta this weekend and hate to miss these festivities. In my stead Sunday afternoon, WDBJ's Robin Reed will be your host for Leah Partridge's "Stars in the Star City" recital. I know you'll want to welcome both of them to the Shaftman Performance Hall stage.
Monday, January 10, 2011
Faust: Myth and Music
Below is an outline and listening guide for a presentation I gave this afternoon to Roanoke's Shakespeare Book Club. It was inspired by Opera Roanoke's October presentation of "Faust and Furious: A Ride with the Devil." It is intended as a journey through the symbols of the Faust legend, the archetypes resonant with it, with parallel applications inspired by one of our great stories.
Faust: Myth and Music
“I am the anti-Faust! Wretched was he who, having acquired the supreme science of old age, sold his soul to un-wrinkle his brow & recapture the unconscious youth of his flesh! Let the labyrinth of wrinkles be furrowed in my brow with the red-hot iron of my own life, let my hair whiten & my step become vacillating, on condition that I can save the intelligence of my soul” [Salvador Dali]
“Faust embodies (Goethe’s contemporary) Lessing’s famous aphorism that if god had two hands, one representing the truth, the other the search for truth, one must choose the latter” [from Theological writings; quoted in Hollis]
“Faust represents the renaissance appetite to know everything” [Borges: "The Enigma of Shakespeare"]
“A classic [American] tale of reinvention, self-delusion and broken dreams” [a tagline for a theatrical adaptation of The great Gatsby]
“I don’t believe in answers; I believe in vibrant questions…
… the unfinished aspect, the searching, the existential longing…”
[American baritone Thomas Hampson, on playing Busoni’s Dr Faustus]
And the questions Faust raises are as legion as the variations the legend has inspired: “the deal with the devil;” the morality play; an alchemical & metaphysical mystery, a love story, adventure and thriller, the hero/anti-hero epic…
Faust: theme & variations—parallel literature
Blake: The Four Zoas [Urizen=Meph; Marriage of Heaven & Hell]
Dostoyevsky: Demons/Possessed [political allegory on nihilism]
Brothers Grimm: The Devil’s Sooty Brother
[parallels the source for Stravinsky's A Soldier’s Tale]
Thomas Mann: Doctor Faustus (Faustian composer & allegory of Germany in the Nazi era; see also Death in Venice for the Doppelgänger/Shadow allegory)
Istvan Szabo’s 1981 film, Mephisto (another Nazi/political allegory)
Other Films:
Humoresque (Joan Crawford as a Mephistophelean soul stealer)
Bergman’s The Seventh Seal;
The Devil and Daniel Webster; Mephisto Waltz;
The Devil's Advocate (Al Pacino) Angel Heart (DeNiro=Louis Cyphre)
Wall Street (Gordon Gekko=Doppelgänger of Faust/Mephisto)
Broadway Musical: Damn Yankees
Pop culture honorable mention: "The Devil went down to Georgia" (Charlie Daniels Band)
“Marlowe’s take on Faust, an archetypal encounter between good and evil and the imperiled human soul, was more greek than Christian." James Hollis points us in the direction of mythology. And continues:
"The function of myth is to initiate the individual &/or the culture into the mysteries of the gods, the world, society & oneself.”
Myth & Tragedy: Hamartia=the tragic flaw or “Wounded vision”
(and the source of hubris)
Ambition/Over-reaching: Phaeton—“your lot is mortal/but what you ask beyond the lot of mortals” (warned by his father Eos/Helios: heaven’s charioteer)
Icarus & Daedalus, the architect of the Cretan Labyrinth who “turned his thinking/toward unknown arts, changing the laws of nature” (from Ovid's Metamorphoses; a nod in the direction of Faustian alchemy...)
"Faust is the first modern, full of yearning, which in its excesses becomes ‘faustian.’ Stepping free of metaphysical supports or constraints, he becomes responsible for his soul’s meaning."
[Hollis: Tracking the Gods, The Place of Myth in Modern Life]
In “stepping free” he most closely resembles the bad-boy Titan of mythology, Prometheus: bestower of the divine gifts of fire and the arts (whose “shadow” or symbolic “sister” is Pandora…)
Faust is the promethean man; Prometheus the faustian titan;
The adjectives ascribed to their names are interchangeable…
As myth then, the Faust legend embodies classic archetypes;
identifying them enables us to amplify these types as symbols;
one of the primary means through which our experience with these stories resonates with meaning…
Archetypes:
Faust=Prometheus; tragic hero; Renaissance man
(and "Everyman?" good question...)
Mephisto=Lucifer (fallen angel); the shadow; “dark side;” the great "negator:"
“The spirit of evil is fear, negation” (Carl Jung)
Helen/MargueriteGretchen=Anima/Soul; The virgin; Guardian Angel
Martin Bidney’s study Blake and Goethe posits “Authentic life consists of creative tension between contraries” and it is in the 19th century Romantic period where the Faust legend proliferates; this tension is amplified by writers like Blake & Goethe. “The spirit of Negation can be transcended, transformed by the spirit of imaginative mediation.” Whether that mediator is Helen of Troy or God, these romantic “modern books of Job” continue the dialectic tension in the quest for proverbial meaning & authenticity.
The Faustian Pact is its own archetype and its energy still animates ancient stories and the modern imagination—whether a bargain with god or a "deal with the devil," the Pact informs Biblical stories and myths:
The sacrificial pact with God: Jephthah, Idomoneo (an early Mozart masterpiece); Admetus & Alcestis (an opera by Glück)
The mythological (“heroic”) quest is tripartite: Departure/Initiation/Return
From Homer and Virgil to Dante the mythopoeic journey charts a singular course—with countless variations. Joseph Campbell describes a “call to adventure,” a departure, an embarkation…
This is followed by a series of episodes, trials & adventures that initiate, challenge & change the protagonist, and like Ulysses’ Odyssey, each chapter is a tale all its own…
The return finds the Hero changed--bringing back the “boon” of a golden fleece, an awakened princess, a treasure, a pearl of great price-- to the betterment of society. And just as a “hero” can refuse the call (or like Rip Van Winkle, slumber away the years) the return can end in failure, tragedy or death…
Faust: A musical journey
Tartini: Devil’s Trill sonata
(one of the earliest examples of the "devil in music")
Liszt: Mephisto Waltz (a classic example of the "dance with the devil")
Schumann: Scenes from Goethe’s Faust
Stravinsky: A Soldier’s tale; The Rake’s Progress
Britten: Death in Venice
(the baritone portrays multiple manifestations of the "shadow" figure)
Extra Credit: Wagner’s entire life & work IS Faust incarnate…
Campbell likens myth to dream (echoing, mirroring, amplifying Jung):
“The dreamer is a distinguished operatic artist…”
Ferruccio Busoni would agree. His Doktor Faustus opens with a spoken prologue by the poet, evoking the “magic mirror” of the stage:
“Such plays of unreality require
the help of Music, for she stands remote
from all that’s common; she can wake desire
that’s bodiless; in air her voices float…”
Departure:
Busoni’s dark, dense opera (unfinished at his death in 1924) is closer to Marlowe in spirit (though Busoni based the libretto on Goethe; Gretchen/Marg. does not appear but Helen of Troy does, as the Duchess of Parma…)
Arrigo Boito’s Mefistofele opens with a "Prologue in Heaven" that parallels the celestial conversation between God and Satan in the book of Job and evokes the music of the spheres...
Franz Schubert set poems from Goethe’s Faust,
but the Goethe setting for today’s journey is his titanic song, Prometheus
(and if a qualifier were appended to this song, it would be Prometheus Defiant)
The Pact: Stravinsky wastes no time in introducing his devil and sealing the deal in The Rake’s Progress. Like Gounod's Faust this opera cuts to the chase...
Initiation/Adventure: or “A Date with the Devil!” &/or ‘Eros & Thanatos’
Marguerite/Gretchen/Helen:
“O thou art fairer than the evening air
clad in the beauty of a thousand stars” [among Marlowe's most ravishing couplets...]
Witches Sabbath/Walpurgis Night/Ride with the Devil/To Hell & Back...
Berlioz's "Ride to the Abyss" is frighteningly evocative...
Apparition/Vision/Dream: Busoni’s "Traum der jugend" (Faust's paradox: “unknowable/unattainable/unfulfilled…”)
The return: Redemption/Damnation (Gounod: Meph: "Jugée!" Angels: "Sauvée!")
*Gounod’s final trio & apotheosis; (AND Liszt & mahler: Faust II)
*Stravinsky’s “hero” Tom Rakewell, after being cursed by the hellbound villain Nick Shadow, calls for Venus (and Achilles, Persephone and co, from the Asylum)
*Britten evokes Faust’s death in a humanist elegy after WWII based on Edith Sitwell's haunting poetry
[Canticle III: Still falls the Rain:
..."O I'll leape up to my God/who pulls me doune/see, see where Christ's blood/streams in the firmament...]
*Busoni’s curtain falls with Mephisto (the tenor) as the Night-watchman who "finds" Faust’s body and flatly declares
“this man has met with some misfortune.”
Busoni gives the last word to the poet in his Epilogue to Doktor Faustus:
So many metals cast into the fire
does my alloy contain sufficient gold?
if so, then seek it out for your own hoard;
the poet’s travail is his sole reward.
still unexhausted all the symbols wait
that in this work are hidden and concealed…
let each take what he finds appropriate;
the seed is sown, others may reap the field.
So rising on the shoulders of the past,
the soul of man shall reach his heaven at last.
The penultimate line recalls the end of Gatsby:
"we beat on, boats against the current, born back ceaselessly into the past."
And the last line is aspirational as the end of Goethe's Faust II, where
“the eternal feminine/leads us onward."
With the ravishing apotheosis of Mahler's 8th, the "Symphony of a Thousand" the journey is accomplished.
For reference:
Alighieri, Dante. The Inferno (trans. R. Pinsky, FSG, 1996).
Bidney, Martin. Blake and Goethe: Psychology, Ontology, Imagination
(Univ. of Missouri, 1988).
Borges, Jorge Luis. Selected Non-Fictions (Penguin, 1999).
Boyle, Nicolas. Goethe: The Poet and His Age, Vol. 1 (Oxford, 1992).
Campbell, Joseph. The Hero with a Thousand Faces (Bollingen, 1949).
Graves, Robert. The Greek Myths (Penguin, 1955, 1960)
Hollis, James. Tracking the Gods:
The place of myth in Modern life (Inner city, 1995)
Homer. The Odyssey (Trans. R. Fagles, Viking, 1996).
Kerenyi, C. The gods of The Greeks (Thames & Hudson, 1951).
Mann, Thomas. Doctor Faustus (Everyman, Knopf, 1947, 1992).
Ovid. Metamorphoses (Trans. R. Humphries, Indiana, 1955).
Faust on CD/DVD
Berlioz: La Damnation de Faust (LSO Live, Colin Davis).
Boito: Mefistofele (Decca, De Fabritis; DVD: Kultur, Ramey).
Busoni: Doktor Faustus (DG, Leitner; DVD: Arthaus, Hampson)
Gouno: Faust (EMI, Pretre; DVD: DG, Binder)
Other Faustian scores:
Britten: Canticles (CD: Naxos, Langridge; Decca, Pears)
Death in Venice (CD: Chandos; DVD: Kultur, Tear)
Liszt: Faust Symphony (CD: DG, Bernstein; Decca, Solti)
Mahler: Symphony no. 8 (CD: Decca, Solti; DVD: DG, Bernstein)
Schubert: Prometheus (CD: BBC, Britten/Fischer-Dieskau)
Stravinsky: The Rake’s Progress (CD: Decca, Chailly; Met, Levine)
Faust: Myth and Music
“I am the anti-Faust! Wretched was he who, having acquired the supreme science of old age, sold his soul to un-wrinkle his brow & recapture the unconscious youth of his flesh! Let the labyrinth of wrinkles be furrowed in my brow with the red-hot iron of my own life, let my hair whiten & my step become vacillating, on condition that I can save the intelligence of my soul” [Salvador Dali]
“Faust embodies (Goethe’s contemporary) Lessing’s famous aphorism that if god had two hands, one representing the truth, the other the search for truth, one must choose the latter” [from Theological writings; quoted in Hollis]
“Faust represents the renaissance appetite to know everything” [Borges: "The Enigma of Shakespeare"]
“A classic [American] tale of reinvention, self-delusion and broken dreams” [a tagline for a theatrical adaptation of The great Gatsby]
“I don’t believe in answers; I believe in vibrant questions…
… the unfinished aspect, the searching, the existential longing…”
[American baritone Thomas Hampson, on playing Busoni’s Dr Faustus]
And the questions Faust raises are as legion as the variations the legend has inspired: “the deal with the devil;” the morality play; an alchemical & metaphysical mystery, a love story, adventure and thriller, the hero/anti-hero epic…
Faust: theme & variations—parallel literature
Blake: The Four Zoas [Urizen=Meph; Marriage of Heaven & Hell]
Dostoyevsky: Demons/Possessed [political allegory on nihilism]
Brothers Grimm: The Devil’s Sooty Brother
[parallels the source for Stravinsky's A Soldier’s Tale]
Thomas Mann: Doctor Faustus (Faustian composer & allegory of Germany in the Nazi era; see also Death in Venice for the Doppelgänger/Shadow allegory)
Istvan Szabo’s 1981 film, Mephisto (another Nazi/political allegory)
Other Films:
Humoresque (Joan Crawford as a Mephistophelean soul stealer)
Bergman’s The Seventh Seal;
The Devil and Daniel Webster; Mephisto Waltz;
The Devil's Advocate (Al Pacino) Angel Heart (DeNiro=Louis Cyphre)
Wall Street (Gordon Gekko=Doppelgänger of Faust/Mephisto)
Broadway Musical: Damn Yankees
Pop culture honorable mention: "The Devil went down to Georgia" (Charlie Daniels Band)
“Marlowe’s take on Faust, an archetypal encounter between good and evil and the imperiled human soul, was more greek than Christian." James Hollis points us in the direction of mythology. And continues:
"The function of myth is to initiate the individual &/or the culture into the mysteries of the gods, the world, society & oneself.”
Myth & Tragedy: Hamartia=the tragic flaw or “Wounded vision”
(and the source of hubris)
Ambition/Over-reaching: Phaeton—“your lot is mortal/but what you ask beyond the lot of mortals” (warned by his father Eos/Helios: heaven’s charioteer)
Icarus & Daedalus, the architect of the Cretan Labyrinth who “turned his thinking/toward unknown arts, changing the laws of nature” (from Ovid's Metamorphoses; a nod in the direction of Faustian alchemy...)
"Faust is the first modern, full of yearning, which in its excesses becomes ‘faustian.’ Stepping free of metaphysical supports or constraints, he becomes responsible for his soul’s meaning."
[Hollis: Tracking the Gods, The Place of Myth in Modern Life]
In “stepping free” he most closely resembles the bad-boy Titan of mythology, Prometheus: bestower of the divine gifts of fire and the arts (whose “shadow” or symbolic “sister” is Pandora…)
Faust is the promethean man; Prometheus the faustian titan;
The adjectives ascribed to their names are interchangeable…
As myth then, the Faust legend embodies classic archetypes;
identifying them enables us to amplify these types as symbols;
one of the primary means through which our experience with these stories resonates with meaning…
Archetypes:
Faust=Prometheus; tragic hero; Renaissance man
(and "Everyman?" good question...)
Mephisto=Lucifer (fallen angel); the shadow; “dark side;” the great "negator:"
“The spirit of evil is fear, negation” (Carl Jung)
Helen/MargueriteGretchen=Anima/Soul; The virgin; Guardian Angel
Martin Bidney’s study Blake and Goethe posits “Authentic life consists of creative tension between contraries” and it is in the 19th century Romantic period where the Faust legend proliferates; this tension is amplified by writers like Blake & Goethe. “The spirit of Negation can be transcended, transformed by the spirit of imaginative mediation.” Whether that mediator is Helen of Troy or God, these romantic “modern books of Job” continue the dialectic tension in the quest for proverbial meaning & authenticity.
The Faustian Pact is its own archetype and its energy still animates ancient stories and the modern imagination—whether a bargain with god or a "deal with the devil," the Pact informs Biblical stories and myths:
The sacrificial pact with God: Jephthah, Idomoneo (an early Mozart masterpiece); Admetus & Alcestis (an opera by Glück)
The mythological (“heroic”) quest is tripartite: Departure/Initiation/Return
From Homer and Virgil to Dante the mythopoeic journey charts a singular course—with countless variations. Joseph Campbell describes a “call to adventure,” a departure, an embarkation…
This is followed by a series of episodes, trials & adventures that initiate, challenge & change the protagonist, and like Ulysses’ Odyssey, each chapter is a tale all its own…
The return finds the Hero changed--bringing back the “boon” of a golden fleece, an awakened princess, a treasure, a pearl of great price-- to the betterment of society. And just as a “hero” can refuse the call (or like Rip Van Winkle, slumber away the years) the return can end in failure, tragedy or death…
Faust: A musical journey
Tartini: Devil’s Trill sonata
(one of the earliest examples of the "devil in music")
Liszt: Mephisto Waltz (a classic example of the "dance with the devil")
Schumann: Scenes from Goethe’s Faust
Stravinsky: A Soldier’s tale; The Rake’s Progress
Britten: Death in Venice
(the baritone portrays multiple manifestations of the "shadow" figure)
Extra Credit: Wagner’s entire life & work IS Faust incarnate…
Campbell likens myth to dream (echoing, mirroring, amplifying Jung):
“The dreamer is a distinguished operatic artist…”
Ferruccio Busoni would agree. His Doktor Faustus opens with a spoken prologue by the poet, evoking the “magic mirror” of the stage:
“Such plays of unreality require
the help of Music, for she stands remote
from all that’s common; she can wake desire
that’s bodiless; in air her voices float…”
Departure:
Busoni’s dark, dense opera (unfinished at his death in 1924) is closer to Marlowe in spirit (though Busoni based the libretto on Goethe; Gretchen/Marg. does not appear but Helen of Troy does, as the Duchess of Parma…)
Arrigo Boito’s Mefistofele opens with a "Prologue in Heaven" that parallels the celestial conversation between God and Satan in the book of Job and evokes the music of the spheres...
Franz Schubert set poems from Goethe’s Faust,
but the Goethe setting for today’s journey is his titanic song, Prometheus
(and if a qualifier were appended to this song, it would be Prometheus Defiant)
The Pact: Stravinsky wastes no time in introducing his devil and sealing the deal in The Rake’s Progress. Like Gounod's Faust this opera cuts to the chase...
Initiation/Adventure: or “A Date with the Devil!” &/or ‘Eros & Thanatos’
Marguerite/Gretchen/Helen:
“O thou art fairer than the evening air
clad in the beauty of a thousand stars” [among Marlowe's most ravishing couplets...]
Witches Sabbath/Walpurgis Night/Ride with the Devil/To Hell & Back...
Berlioz's "Ride to the Abyss" is frighteningly evocative...
Apparition/Vision/Dream: Busoni’s "Traum der jugend" (Faust's paradox: “unknowable/unattainable/unfulfilled…”)
The return: Redemption/Damnation (Gounod: Meph: "Jugée!" Angels: "Sauvée!")
*Gounod’s final trio & apotheosis; (AND Liszt & mahler: Faust II)
*Stravinsky’s “hero” Tom Rakewell, after being cursed by the hellbound villain Nick Shadow, calls for Venus (and Achilles, Persephone and co, from the Asylum)
*Britten evokes Faust’s death in a humanist elegy after WWII based on Edith Sitwell's haunting poetry
[Canticle III: Still falls the Rain:
..."O I'll leape up to my God/who pulls me doune/see, see where Christ's blood/streams in the firmament...]
*Busoni’s curtain falls with Mephisto (the tenor) as the Night-watchman who "finds" Faust’s body and flatly declares
“this man has met with some misfortune.”
Busoni gives the last word to the poet in his Epilogue to Doktor Faustus:
So many metals cast into the fire
does my alloy contain sufficient gold?
if so, then seek it out for your own hoard;
the poet’s travail is his sole reward.
still unexhausted all the symbols wait
that in this work are hidden and concealed…
let each take what he finds appropriate;
the seed is sown, others may reap the field.
So rising on the shoulders of the past,
the soul of man shall reach his heaven at last.
The penultimate line recalls the end of Gatsby:
"we beat on, boats against the current, born back ceaselessly into the past."
And the last line is aspirational as the end of Goethe's Faust II, where
“the eternal feminine/leads us onward."
With the ravishing apotheosis of Mahler's 8th, the "Symphony of a Thousand" the journey is accomplished.
For reference:
Alighieri, Dante. The Inferno (trans. R. Pinsky, FSG, 1996).
Bidney, Martin. Blake and Goethe: Psychology, Ontology, Imagination
(Univ. of Missouri, 1988).
Borges, Jorge Luis. Selected Non-Fictions (Penguin, 1999).
Boyle, Nicolas. Goethe: The Poet and His Age, Vol. 1 (Oxford, 1992).
Campbell, Joseph. The Hero with a Thousand Faces (Bollingen, 1949).
Graves, Robert. The Greek Myths (Penguin, 1955, 1960)
Hollis, James. Tracking the Gods:
The place of myth in Modern life (Inner city, 1995)
Homer. The Odyssey (Trans. R. Fagles, Viking, 1996).
Kerenyi, C. The gods of The Greeks (Thames & Hudson, 1951).
Mann, Thomas. Doctor Faustus (Everyman, Knopf, 1947, 1992).
Ovid. Metamorphoses (Trans. R. Humphries, Indiana, 1955).
Faust on CD/DVD
Berlioz: La Damnation de Faust (LSO Live, Colin Davis).
Boito: Mefistofele (Decca, De Fabritis; DVD: Kultur, Ramey).
Busoni: Doktor Faustus (DG, Leitner; DVD: Arthaus, Hampson)
Gouno: Faust (EMI, Pretre; DVD: DG, Binder)
Other Faustian scores:
Britten: Canticles (CD: Naxos, Langridge; Decca, Pears)
Death in Venice (CD: Chandos; DVD: Kultur, Tear)
Liszt: Faust Symphony (CD: DG, Bernstein; Decca, Solti)
Mahler: Symphony no. 8 (CD: Decca, Solti; DVD: DG, Bernstein)
Schubert: Prometheus (CD: BBC, Britten/Fischer-Dieskau)
Stravinsky: The Rake’s Progress (CD: Decca, Chailly; Met, Levine)
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