Today’s word is 真ん中 【まんなか】mannaka, (maw-naw-kuh) or “middle”

It’s just passed the two month mark – I got here September 17th and it is now November 23rd – and I am at the halfway point… possibly. I’m considering staying here for a bit longer, through March. I like it here enough to want to know it.

I’m such a centrist. I like to play devil’s advocate with myself, which often leads to agonizing indecision and a last-minute coin-toss. Or, at best, feigned indifference. Okay, I’m going to admit that what it really means is that I hate being wrong, which inevitably happens a lot. It also means I have yet to buy my plane ticket to anywhere, cement plans to anywhere, or give anyone a firm “yes” in a long time.

As I blipped on my Facebook page, here’s a recap of the past week/and a half:  I got a job, joined an environmental social group, saw the opera “Wozzeck” (incredible interpretation, more on this in a sec), went to “our spot” Casa del Bueno,  joined the political science club, mc’d an event with a leading Japanese politician, got lost in a cemetery, edited a paper for publication (hopefully!!), got sick (but no swine!), and made new friends!

Green Drinks is a worldwide network that seeks to inculcate environmental activism through social networking, good food, and a good buzz. Companies, non-profits, artists, community members, travelers, anyone is welcome to join or launch a chapter in their city. Tokyo has a Green Drinks chapter (but with a Z) and I joined this month. The event was held at a graphic design firm’s office – a sleek building of glass and steel with trees growing along the stairwell. Canadian Green Party deputy leader Melanie Mullen spoke to us about her green artist community campaign. An awesome endeavor, basically it’s a project that seeks to retain the affordability of up-and-coming neighborhoods, usually artist communes or areas subject to gentrification, while improving the eco-efficiency and sustainability of the buildings. It’s been really successful near Niagara Falls and Mullen hopes that the idea will take hold in places like Tokyo. I hope so too. There are so many cool little artist enclaves in Tokyo, neighborhoods like Naka-meguro, Shimokitazawa, and Yoyogiuehara that are home to artists of all stripes, delicious hole-in-the-walls, cleverly-themed bars and funky-super-cheap boutiques. There’s a boutique in Shimokitazawa, for instance, where you can watch the designer make her clothes in the window of her storefront. The hipsters in Seattle would go crazy. We need a Melanie Mullen to protect places like these.  Oh, I got lost on the way there (in a cemetery!) thanks to a policeman’s horrible directions (he told me they would be bad, but I figured his guess would be better than mine – wrong), and there I met a blogger for National Revolution- Japan and an architect whose husband was lead singer of Sugarbomb . National Revolution sponsored the event, hence the blogger dude, and the architect was there to learn about green architecture. The buffet was all local organic – sooo delicious!!! I felt awkward taking pictures, so I’ll just let your imagination run wild.

“Wozzeck” was incredible. This German/Austrian opera, the first to be dubbed, “avant-garde,”written in 1920, explores the pathology of poverty in post-war recovery/stagnation. A soldier for an unnamed but obviously defeated army is subject to ridicule, public shaming, paranoia and even medical experimentation because of his low financial and social position. He responds/revolts/gives in to the situation by killing the mother of his child and then himself. In light of all the fluff in Japanese media, including some of their opera and ballet productions, I was expecting a superficial interpretation of this intense thinking piece. I was pleased to discover the opposite. It was visceral and yet spiritual, the subject matter intense but its motifs effectively subdued. Perfect metaphor for the state of the world today. Check it.

To return to the “middle” theme,  I have midterms this and next week. That I’m taking five classes has finally sunk in. Wish me luck, or as they say in Japanese, “Ganbatte!”

Wozzeck-- Bastille Opera House Paris

I like change.  I like to go with the flow.  So when an opportunity presents itself I don’t stay on the same path.  I yell Carpe diem..latin  for “seize the day”….not really, not out loud, but you get it.

So when I got dressed up to go to dinner at Renee’s recommended Chez Janou restaurant on Wednesday I was open for anything.  I caught the bus off my island and headed north towards the Bastille.  I have public transportation mastered.  I was wearing a black ensemble (as usual, my wardrobe is funeral ready at any moment.  Black is the constant theme, with variations into grey and brown….boring, but Parisian) with a trench coat and heels. 

The bus takes me thought the Marais district to the Bastille area.  It  is a   flurry of activity, people coming home from work, families running errands and an interesting heated argument with the bus driver and a passenger.  Yelling and cussing in french…I can attest the French are a passionate people. 

I find my stop an exit to a large crowd standing outside an auditorium.  I poke around and discover that an opera is starting in 10 minutes.  I didn’t even know that Paris had more than one opera house.  This was a new modern one called the Opera Bastille de Paris.

OK….yes I’m hunger and it’s 7:30…. 19:30 to the French, but maybe I can get tickets, it would be fun.  Then I see a young guy make a sly transaction out of the corner of my eye.  Oh yes, I recognized it.  The international art of scalping.  I have experience here. 

I don’t know what I was thinking, I know I wasn’t thinking….it’s illegal.

I carried 3×5 note cards in my purse and a sharpy. (If you travel to another country these cards are my best advice, they saved me many times.  I basically play Pictionary with the french until they get my jist.  I also wrote out many email addresses of new friends, and scribbled notes to use in this blog)  So I pulled out a card and my dark black sharpy; I scribbled out a large, bold “1″ and confidently held it up.  I waved it around smiling at the well dressed french in evening gowns and suits.  I got a bite right away.  A handsome older gentlemen in a grey suit, smiled and spoke to me in beautiful french.  uh uh, Parlez-vous anglais? oui, oui.  Yes, he spoke perfect English and told me that he had excellent tickets on the main floor, dead center, and that they were 89 euro….what!!!  That’s about $150 us.  I didn’t even know the name of this opera, and it was turning into an expense impulse.  Too rich for me….I offered him 20 euros, he said sold.  

Carpe diem!!!  I was going to see a German opera, with French subtitles called Wozzeck.  Wozzeck was not what I expected.  When I think of opera, I think large sets, detailed period costumes, plump women and high drama.  The only one I got right was the high drama. 

Bastille Opera House Paris

Wozzeck stage is set with a contemporary, temporary (rhyming) tent like structure posing as a cafeteria/daycare.   You can see through the sides of the structure where there’s play ground equipment and kids running amuck on a blow up jumper.  The time period is now, no lavish attire, no big hair or dramatic phantoms playing scary organ music.  Yet I can’t say that I was disappointed.  The music was filled with breathtaking emotion mostly pain. It was tense …tragic.  unpretentious, anguished, raw… so not what I expected.  The story appeared to be about a former soldier, Wozzeck, that was about to have a nervous break down…..eventually he does and kills his cheating girlfriend.  The story follows themes of morality, revolution, disillusionment and complete solitude.  It was moving, distressful, biting and pungent.  A broadening experience for me.  I would like to see it again with English translations.  I know that I am just scratching the surface of “getting it”.   I can feel the undercurrent of a layered proverb..a caveat of wisdom.  It’s hard to deconstruction something into its primal parts without the full understanding of the experience.  If Wozzeck comes to Chicago, I plan to go, English subtitles…. please.

Sitting in the dark of the Paris Opera house I would glanced at my fellow  attendees.  Their faces tortured, many with tears.  Opera is absorbing, takes you in, you feel the story, you live it for a couple short hours.  I think that I am beginning to “get” opera a little more.  It’s the crescendo our culture, combining the arts of music, poetry, singing, acting, dance, storytelling, painting, costuming, performing, writing, lighting and design.  Building it into the ultimate artistic medium.  What more could you want?

It was a late decision for me to go to see Welsh National Opera’s production of Wozzeck last night (Friday 2nd October) at the Wales Milennium Centre. It has been a busy week and I’m travelling at the weekend too, so I wasn’t sure I could fit it in. In the end, I am really glad I did because it was by far the best of the three operas WNO are presenting in the current season; you can read about the other two here and here.

Stylistically, Wozzeck (composed by Alban Berg) is a far cry from Madam Butterfly and La Traviata but it is also a tragedy of some sort. The principal character – Wozzeck himself –  is one of life’s losers. The Opera opens with him establishing his servile nature by shaving a character called the Captain in order to supplement his salary. The original story has a military setting, but in this production it is moved to a factory producing tins of baked beans.

Wozzeck has fathered a child out of wedlock with Marie and is doing everything he can to earn money for her and their son. Later on we find out that he is also trying to earn cash by helping another character, the Doctor, in a medical experiment the main element of which seems to involve eating a large quantity of the baked beans produced in the factory.

Perhaps caused by his peculiar diet as well as the stress of his personal situation, Wozzeck is clearly losing his marbles. He suffers from hallucinations. Then Marie has an affair with another character, the Drum Major - we know he’s a bad guy because he likes golf and wears nasty white shoes. The Doctor and the Captain see the Drum Major and Marie in flagrante delicto and subsequently taunt Wozzeck with his lover’s infidelity. Wozzeck goes berserk, challenges the Drum Major to a fight and gets himself badly beaten up for his trouble. He takes  out his frustration on Marie, luring her outside and then killing her by cutting her throat with an opened baked bean tin. He doesn’t have the sense to wash the blood from his hands and when this is spotted he returns to the scene and tries to find the murder weapon. In the original story Wozzeck had thrown the weapon (a knife) into a lake: trying to get it back in order to hide it in a better place he falls in and drowns. In this production he had thrown the tin can into a huge hopper full of similar tins. He falls into this and dies among the rubbish. In the final scene, his young son is told of the death of his mother and father but it doesn’t really sink in. He sings a childish song and opens a tin of baked beans. Like father, like son.

The stark industrialised scenery and drably austere clothing  serve to reinforce the steady dehumanisation of Wozzeck and accentuate his descent into madness.  The subtext is about the exploitation of the poor and disadvantaged; the message is that those to whom evil is done, do evil in return. Wozzeck’s actions are not condoned, but we know from the start that he’s a man in trouble and if only someone had helped him rather than everyone tormenting him, things might have turned out for the better. Shades of Peter Grimes.

Peter Hoare was a creepily comical Captain and Cliver Bailey an appropriately ghoulish Doctor. Marie was sung beautifully by Wioletta Chodowicz. But even these were somewhat eclipsed by Christopher Purves’ wonderful and deeply moving performance as the tortured Wozzeck. His singing and acting raised the level of this to truly world-class. One of the best I’ve ever seen.

The real star of the show for me, though, was Berg’s amazing music, which managed to be both sumptious and edgy at the same time. This is an atonal piece, and I know some people are pretty much allergic to music that doesn’t rest on a tonal framework. But the orchestral colours Berg achieves have a remarkable effect in combination with the action on stage and some of the more lyrical passages are intensely beautiful.

Actually, it’s a remarkable opera altogether. For a start it’s exceptionally compact. Three Acts each of five Scenes but the overall running time is about 90 minutes (with no interval). The music for each act is constructed like a concert work. The three Acts are marked Five Character Pieces, Symphony in Five Movements and Six Inventions (five of the latter accompany the scenes, the sixth is an orchestral interlude before the final scene). There are leitmotifs, unusual vocal techniques such as Sprechgesang and Sprechstimme, innovative rhythmic explorations with strange uses of percussion, and so on. Berg packs so much into this work that it is definitely one to listen to over and over again.

I and the rest of the audience responded very enthusiastically both to the performers on stage and  to the Orchestra of WNO who did full justice to a 20th Century masterpiece. Bravo!

Postwar is post-nothing: it is the beginning of something.   “Ach!”, trained instinct cries, “but what of ‘tragen’, to carry heavy burdens, of its simple past  trug?  Do not ponderous and blackened memories determine future projections?”  No {we say, affected with blithe mannerisms}, because the burdens have been bombed away.  Digs, belongings, spouses, families, pensions: the war wiped it all away, and one has to begin again.

Rubble is a consequence of conflict, but so too are dandelions, and rain, and vegetable gardens on fields cleared where banks once stood.  Glorious dessication of the once-marble strongholds, giant stone shards become fodder for walls of ersatz properties marked off by pan-sellers hunched over wares.

Music takes new root, art moves steadily toward the AFTERGOLD, whisperings and snitches backstage at the opera portend Wozzeck’s return: With each “Jawohl, Herr Hauptman!” another ten boys turn their backs on Clausewitz.

Anti-war absurdism breaks out in the theaters, spreading like so many infected rats running crazed and joyful from Ishii Shiro’s neuro-bullpen at Pingfan.  Critters skitter across platforms morphed by atomic blasts, once warped by the ponderous weight of thousands of knees bent to worship state power…

let the sugared tongue lick the hand of absurd pomp /

and bend the ready hinges of the knee /

where profit may follow fawning

yet dawning aerodromes of B-52s limber upwards

and now we fawn upon our own strength,

clutched and grinning to the hand of the conqueror.

Music rockets and power chords sizzle to be pocketed by kids in hipster wards some fifty years hence.  Drizzles of paint-flecks lift drab reverso canvases toward the temple of the avant-garde, because avant – forward — is the only choice.  Here there is no déjà, no relapse into yesterday, and Paris was never beautiful anyway.  Like fluids passed into the oceanic, there is nothing to be recovered.  Instead horizons undulate, suns forge the world entire, species mingle up under sea surfaces and teem fatally toward the giant bay and its volcanic twin.

Laughter erupts like a jazz musician’s lifted aural thought in clubs once darkened by decree, now unregulated by all but the flow of spontaneous yen, unchained linguistic confusions, the syntax of Bach again bubbling up with no memory of the Hitler Youth’s pleasant journey to this old imperial capital in 1938.

Bismark is dead, Tojo is dead, Goebbels waits for his call from an American television network brewing in the mind of a shrewd Australian.  And no one talks today of Okamura, nested in Taiwan’s glorious army bureaucracy, and Taiwan itself only blinks like a traffic light on the edges of some unknown field, a road one has never seen before.  For they have their own postwar grippe as well.  AstroBoy doesn’t care for Liaodong.  And Kishi calmly dons his pinstripes, waiting for that detestable anthem to finish its forte arc over grass fields in the Bronx.

But no amnesia is ever wholly pragmatic: the ambrosia of the new day lifts and then plunges, digging powerfully down into minds rich with nitrogen.  New thoughts too, require Lebensraum.  Memories are thus rounded up, quickly cataloged, and pushed into corners, there to mew futile, to atrophy, or to be exterminated.

Massive distortion or malleable transition?  Wendepunkt/Stunde Null or bent by gentle insistence on a nightly Bierstube chat with the new immigrants?  Identity shifts, but the crows remain black, circling over limber Berlin meadows.  Trees that lived through hailstorms of Soviet bullets remain supple; Goethe has lost a limb but continues to recite.

Speak, memory!

Or remain mute, damply crumpled and dark, while the jazzman plies his trade.

Reptriates in Tokyo, from the Walter A. Pennino Postwar Japan Photo Collection, courtesy of the Center for Japanese Studies, University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa

20th Century Opera in a nutshell

Opera in the 20th century became totally cool from a plot standpoint. Gone were the days of a plot that really solves itself in 3 minutes but takes 2 and a half hours to get through (she loves WHO?!!), and in its place were plots about all kinds of fucked up shit, with music to match.

Because it was requested some moons ago by someone on something, I have decided to make another list, this time consisting of the 5 best operas of the 20th century. “Why 5?”, you’re not asking yourself right now. Frankly, it’s simple: I don’t feel like I know enough 20-century operas to pare down to 10, but I feel like I know enough to pare down to 5 while maintaining something resembling integrity. With that in mind:

5) Porgy and Bess–George (and Ira…and Ira) Gershwin

If aliens come to Earth intent on destroying us, it is distinctly possible that we could shield ourselves from their hellish death rays and mind control by simply joining in a world wide chorus of “Summertime,” quite possibly the most versatile and oft-interpreted piece of music ever (Ella Fitzgerald, Janis Joplin, Sublime, AND The Zombies?). But wait, there’s more. “Bess, You Is My Woman Now,” “I Got Plenty o’ Nuttin’,” “There’s a Boat Dat’s Leavin’ Soon for New York,” and on and on. Sportin’ Life is one of the all-time great opera characters (conceived for Cab Calloway as if it weren’t already cool as hell). And it’s historically relevant, casting an eye on the unseen side of life in the slums in the ’20’s.

Recommended Recording: Even though it’s cheating the system a little bit, it has to the Miles Davis/Gil Evans disc. My Lord is it good.

4) The Nose–Dmitri Shostakovich

Before Shostakovich had cemented himself as one of the premier composers of the 20th or any other century, he operated in quite a different sound world. The Nose comes from the pre-5th Symphony days (which seems to mark the cut-off point for a lot of things in Shostakovich) and more importantly squeaks in before Stalin came to power, which needs no further explanation; in fact, it lies between the 2nd and 3rd symphonies (as a reference point) and immediately precedes the infamous Nicolai Malko “bet you can’t re-orchestrate this from memory in an hour” Tahiti Trot challenge in Shostakovich’s opus numbers.

The music is a chaotic hodgepodge of styles, held together by strict musical forms (a concept we’ll see on this list again here shortly). The libretto is based on a short story by Gogol, possibly the best writer in the history of Russia and assuredly the best writer in Russian history if you’re asking me. It tells the story of a St. Petersburg official who manages to lose his nose and watches it achieve a greater social status than he himself before it magically re-attaches itself. Gogol’s ability to write satire is matched by Shostakovich’s ability to create it in sound, an ability Shostakovich would use in his “mature” years to great effect.

Recommended Recording: Rozhdestvensky/Moscow Chamber Theater/Leningrad Philharmonic in a recording of the folks who revived the opera after it was censored, overseen personally by Shostakovich himself.

3) Wozzeck–Alban Berg

The subject matter of this, Berg’s first opera, is quite literally enough to depress a person just by reading it: exploiting the poor (for the benefit of science!), jealousy, insanity, adultery, and the inevitable struggles of literally just existing. The music itself is an amazing exploration of form, with each act being broken up into 5 scenes, and each scene being a unique form. Because it’s such a rad plot and structured so awesome-rad, I’m going to just quote the WikiPedia synopsis, which explains the opera rather well.

Act I

Scene 1 (Suite): Wozzeck is shaving the Captain who lectures him for living an immoral life. Wozzeck protests that it is difficult to be virtuous when he is poor, but entreats the Captain to remember the lesson from the gospel, “”Laßet die Kleinen zu mir kommen!”" (“Suffer the little children to come unto me,” Mark 10:14). The Captain greets this admonition with pointed dismay.

Scene 2 (Rhapsody and Hunting Song): Wozzeck and Andres are cutting sticks as the sun is setting. Wozzeck has frightening visions and Andres tries unsuccessfully to calm him.

Scene 3 (March and Lullaby): A military parade passes by outside Marie’s room. Margret taunts Marie for flirting with the soldiers. Then Wozzeck comes by and tells Marie of the terrible visions he has had.

Scene 4 (Passacaglia): The Doctor scolds Wozzeck for not following his instructions regarding diet and behavior. However, when the Doctor hears of Wozzeck’s mental aberrations, he is delighted and congratulates himself on the success of his experiment.

Scene 5 (Rondo): Marie admires the Drum-major outside her room. He makes an advance on her, to which she first rejects but then gives in.

Act II

Scene 1 (Sonata-Allegro): Marie is telling her child to go to sleep while admiring earrings which the Drum-major gave her. She is startled when Wozzeck arrives and when he asks where she got the earrings, she says she found them. Though not convinced, Wozzeck gives her some money and leaves. Marie chastises herself for her behavior.

Scene 2 (Fantasia and Fugue on 3 Themes): The Doctor rushes by the Captain in the street, who urges him to slow down. The Doctor then proceeds to scare the Captain by speculating what afflictions may strike him. When Wozzeck comes by, they insinuate that Marie is being unfaithful to him.

Scene 3 (Largo): Wozzeck confronts Marie, who does not deny his suspicions. Enraged, Wozzeck is about to hit her, when she stops him, saying even her father never dared lay a hand on her. Her statement “better a knife in my belly than your hands on me” plants in Wozzeck’s mind the idea for his subsequent revenge.

Scene 4 (Scherzo): Among a crowd, Wozzeck sees Marie dancing with the Drum-major. After a brief hunter’s chorus, Andres asks Wozzeck why he is sitting by himself. An Apprentice delivers a drunken sermon, then an Idiot approaches Wozzeck and cries out that the scene is “”Lustig, lustig…aber es riecht …Ich riech, ich riech Blut!”" (“joyful, joyful, but it reeks…I smell, I smell blood”).

Scene 5 (Rondo): In the barracks at night, Wozzeck, unable to sleep, is keeping Andres awake. The Drum-major comes in, intoxicated, and rouses Wozzeck out of bed to fight with him.

Act III

Scene 1 (Invention on a Theme): In her room at night, Marie reads to herself from the Bible. She cries out that she wants forgiveness.

Scene 2 (Invention on a Single Note (B)): Wozzeck and Marie are walking in the woods by a pond. Marie is anxious to leave, but Wozzeck restrains her. As a blood-red moon rises, Wozzeck becomes determined that if he can’t have Marie, no one else can, and he stabs her.

Scene 3 (Invention on a Rhythm): People are dancing in a tavern. Wozzeck enters, and upon seeing Margret, dances with her and pulls her onto his lap. He insults her, and then asks her to sing him a song. She sings, but then notices blood on his hand and elbow; everyone begins shouting at him, and Wozzeck, now agitated and obsessed with his blood, rushes out of the tavern.

Scene 4 (Invention on a 6-Note Chord): Having returned to the murder scene, Wozzeck becomes obsessed with the thought that the knife he killed Marie with will incriminate him, and throws it into the pond. When the blood-red moon appears again, he wades into the pond and drowns. The Captain and the Doctor, passing by, hear Wozzeck moaning and rush off in fright. The orchestra rise during the drowning is quoted in Luciano Berio’s “Sinfonia” (1968–69).

Intermezzo (Invention on a Key (D minor)): This interlude leads to the finale.

Scene 5 (Invention on an Eighth-Note moto perpetuo, quasi toccata): Next morning, children are playing in the sunshine. The news spreads that Marie’s body has been found, and they all run off to see, except for Marie’s little boy, who after an oblivious moment, follows after the others.

Hop hop.

Recommended Recording: Claudio Abbado/Vienna State Opera

2) Salome–Richard Strauss

Sometimes when you baptize Jesus, you totally become famous. So much so that chicks start demanding your decapitation as a test for the creepy desires of their stepdad. Salome is based on the Bible by way of Oscar Wilde (that’s weird to type), and has everything you’d ever want in an opera, including nudity (which is great unless Birgit Nilsson happens to be in town), shield-crushing, veils, and King Herod. Strauss’ music is Strauss’ music, which is to say lush, evocative, and entertaining. The “Dance of the Seven Veils” is one of the great pieces of music, evidenced by the fact that it’s excerpted all the time, and the final scene is the craziest soprano lunacy this side of Brunnhilde taking a perfectly good horse with her into a huge fire. There’s something about the shock value that occurs when the story unravels…no matter how many times you see it, and you know what’s coming, you still feel completely repulsed, terrified, and enthralled all at once. Think of it as the Maury Povich “Who’s the father?” episode of opera. Shit, I should make an opera out of the transcript of one those…a new project born right before your very eyes. Your very eyes!

Recommended Recording: Karajan/Vienna Philharmonic and the only Jokaanan worth really sinking your teeth into…or cutting the head off of…Jose van Dam.

1) Bluebeard’s Castle–Bela Bartok

The beauty lies in the simplicity (that’s fucking ingenious if I understand it correctly, Walter…it’s a Swiss fucking watch). 2 onstage characters, 1 large set, 1 act, 1 hour. Bluebeard elopes with his new wife, Judith, and takes her back to his sweet pad (the importance of the castle is duly noted by Bartok, who actually lists it on the dramatis personae list…which is cool and creepy at the same time). Once there, Judith wants some natural light and begs Bluebeard to open some doors, but he refuses. She keeps nagging him until he gives in, making their relationship just like every other relationship ever, and we start seeing shit behind doors.

The doors and rooms all have colors associated with them, as follows:

1. (The torture chamber) Blood-red
2. (The armory) Yellowish-red
3. (The treasury) Golden
4. (The garden) Bluish-green
5. (The kingdom) White
6. (The pool of tears) Darkness; the main hall is darkened, as if a shadow had passed over
7. (The wives) Silvery

Blood stains everything she sees, and her mind begins to piece everything together. By the time she sees the pool of tears, she knows what’s up, but demands to see the 7th door opened. If there was anything that would be cooler than Bluebeard having killed all his wives…it would be making them wear heavy-ass jewelry and crowns and shit, worshipping them, forcing Judith to join them, and then locking them up (I hope my girlfriend isn’t reading this…I don’t have a castle anyway).

The minor second plays a huge role musically…they call it the blood motif, as you hear it anytime Judith notices blood on Bluebeard’s stuff. There is a broad arching key structure of F# moving to C and back to F# which some people apparently think represents darkness and light, and which, now that I think about it, makes perfect sense. That type of synergy is what makes this the best opera of the 20th century…it has so many awesome puzzles in it, it’s as ominous a story as you can imagine, and it has the benefit of Bartok at his “A” game.

Recommended Recording: Istvan Kertesz/London Symphony with Christa Ludwig as Judith and Walter Berry as Bluebeard, and also Walter Berry looking VERY suspiciously like a modern day Bluebeard taking women back to his apartment and acting inappropriately on the Decca Legends cover photo.

There it is. I issue apologies to every Britten opera, Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District, Elektra, The Rake’s Progress, Lulu, Der Rosenkavalier, Ariadne auf Naxos, Rusalka, Tosca, Jenufa, The Golden Cockerel (the suite is one of my all-time favorite pieces, though), The Love for Three Oranges, The Rise and Fall of the City of Mahogany, Moses und Aron, Antony and Cleopatra, Turandot, Die tote Stadt, and The Cunning Little Vixen. I literally immediately regret my list not having Britten or Janacek on it. But it’s too late…I’m already wearing the heavy-ass jewelry.

20th Century Opera in a nutshell

Opera in the 20th century became totally cool from a plot standpoint.  Gone were the days of a plot that really solves itself in 3 minutes but takes 2 and a half hours to get through (she loves WHO?!!), and in its place were plots about all kinds of fucked up shit, with music to match.

Because it was requested some moons ago by someone on something, I have decided to make another list, this time consisting of the 5 best operas of the 20th century.  “Why 5?”, you’re not asking yourself right now.  Frankly, it’s simple: I don’t feel like I know enough 20-century operas to pare down to 10, but I feel like I know enough to pare down to 5 while maintaining something resembling integrity.  With that in mind:

5) Porgy and Bess–George (and Ira…and Ira) Gershwin

If aliens come to Earth intent on destroying us, it is distinctly possible that we could shield ourselves from their hellish death rays and mind control by simply joining in a world wide chorus of “Summertime,” quite possibly the most versatile and oft-interpreted piece of music ever (Ella Fitzgerald, Janis Joplin, Sublime, AND The Zombies?).  But wait, there’s more.  “Bess, You Is My Woman Now,” “I Got Plenty o’ Nuttin’,” ”There’s a Boat Dat’s Leavin’ Soon for New York,” and on and on.  Sportin’ Life is one of the all-time great opera characters (conceived for Cab Calloway as if it weren’t already cool as hell).  And it’s historically relevant, casting an eye on the unseen side of life in the slums in the ’20’s.

Recommended Recording:  Even though it’s cheating the system a little bit, it has to the Miles Davis/Gil Evans disc. My Lord is it good.

4) The Nose–Dmitri Shostakovich

Before Shostakovich had cemented himself as one of the premier composers of the 20th or any other century, he operated in quite a different sound world.  The Nose comes from the pre-5th Symphony days (which seems to mark the cut-off point for a lot of things in Shostakovich) and more importantly squeaks in before Stalin came to power, which needs no further explanation; in fact, it lies between the 2nd and 3rd symphonies (as a reference point) and immediately precedes the infamous Nicolai Malko “bet you can’t re-orchestrate this from memory in an hour” Tahiti Trot challenge in Shostakovich’s opus numbers.

The music is a chaotic hodgepodge of styles, held together by strict musical forms (a concept we’ll see on this list again here shortly).  The libretto is based on a short story by Gogol, possibly the best writer in the history of Russia and assuredly the best writer in Russian history if you’re asking me.  It tells the story of a St. Petersburg official who manages to lose his nose and watches it achieve a greater social status than he himself before it magically re-attaches itself.  Gogol’s ability to write satire is matched by Shostakovich’s ability to create it in sound, an ability Shostakovich would use in his “mature” years to great effect.

Recommended Recording:  Rozhdestvensky/Moscow Chamber Theater/Leningrad Philharmonic in a recording of the folks who revived the opera after it was censored, overseen personally by Shostakovich himself.

3) Wozzeck–Alban Berg

The subject matter of this, Berg’s first opera, is quite literally enough to depress a person just by reading it: exploiting the poor (for the benefit of science!), jealousy, insanity, adultery, and the inevitable struggles of literally just existing.  The music itself is an amazing exploration of form, with each act being broken up into 5 scenes, and each scene being a unique form.  Because it’s such a rad plot and structured so awesome-rad, I’m going to just quote the WikiPedia synopsis, which explains the opera rather well.

Act I

Scene 1 (Suite): Wozzeck is shaving the Captain who lectures him for living an immoral life. Wozzeck protests that it is difficult to be virtuous when he is poor, but entreats the Captain to remember the lesson from the gospel, “”Laßet die Kleinen zu mir kommen!”" (“Suffer the little children to come unto me,” Mark 10:14). The Captain greets this admonition with pointed dismay.

Scene 2 (Rhapsody and Hunting Song): Wozzeck and Andres are cutting sticks as the sun is setting. Wozzeck has frightening visions and Andres tries unsuccessfully to calm him.

Scene 3 (March and Lullaby): A military parade passes by outside Marie’s room. Margret taunts Marie for flirting with the soldiers. Then Wozzeck comes by and tells Marie of the terrible visions he has had.

Scene 4 (Passacaglia): The Doctor scolds Wozzeck for not following his instructions regarding diet and behavior. However, when the Doctor hears of Wozzeck’s mental aberrations, he is delighted and congratulates himself on the success of his experiment.

Scene 5 (Rondo): Marie admires the Drum-major outside her room. He makes an advance on her, to which she first rejects but then gives in.

Act II

Scene 1 (Sonata-Allegro): Marie is telling her child to go to sleep while admiring earrings which the Drum-major gave her. She is startled when Wozzeck arrives and when he asks where she got the earrings, she says she found them. Though not convinced, Wozzeck gives her some money and leaves. Marie chastises herself for her behavior.

Scene 2 (Fantasia and Fugue on 3 Themes): The Doctor rushes by the Captain in the street, who urges him to slow down. The Doctor then proceeds to scare the Captain by speculating what afflictions may strike him. When Wozzeck comes by, they insinuate that Marie is being unfaithful to him.

Scene 3 (Largo): Wozzeck confronts Marie, who does not deny his suspicions. Enraged, Wozzeck is about to hit her, when she stops him, saying even her father never dared lay a hand on her. Her statement “better a knife in my belly than your hands on me” plants in Wozzeck’s mind the idea for his subsequent revenge.

Scene 4 (Scherzo): Among a crowd, Wozzeck sees Marie dancing with the Drum-major. After a brief hunter’s chorus, Andres asks Wozzeck why he is sitting by himself. An Apprentice delivers a drunken sermon, then an Idiot approaches Wozzeck and cries out that the scene is “”Lustig, lustig…aber es riecht …Ich riech, ich riech Blut!”" (“joyful, joyful, but it reeks…I smell, I smell blood”).

Scene 5 (Rondo): In the barracks at night, Wozzeck, unable to sleep, is keeping Andres awake. The Drum-major comes in, intoxicated, and rouses Wozzeck out of bed to fight with him.

Act III

Scene 1 (Invention on a Theme): In her room at night, Marie reads to herself from the Bible. She cries out that she wants forgiveness.

Scene 2 (Invention on a Single Note (B)): Wozzeck and Marie are walking in the woods by a pond. Marie is anxious to leave, but Wozzeck restrains her. As a blood-red moon rises, Wozzeck becomes determined that if he can’t have Marie, no one else can, and he stabs her.

Scene 3 (Invention on a Rhythm): People are dancing in a tavern. Wozzeck enters, and upon seeing Margret, dances with her and pulls her onto his lap. He insults her, and then asks her to sing him a song. She sings, but then notices blood on his hand and elbow; everyone begins shouting at him, and Wozzeck, now agitated and obsessed with his blood, rushes out of the tavern.

Scene 4 (Invention on a 6-Note Chord): Having returned to the murder scene, Wozzeck becomes obsessed with the thought that the knife he killed Marie with will incriminate him, and throws it into the pond. When the blood-red moon appears again, he wades into the pond and drowns. The Captain and the Doctor, passing by, hear Wozzeck moaning and rush off in fright. The orchestra rise during the drowning is quoted in Luciano Berio’s “Sinfonia” (1968–69).

Intermezzo (Invention on a Key (D minor)): This interlude leads to the finale.

Scene 5 (Invention on an Eighth-Note moto perpetuo, quasi toccata): Next morning, children are playing in the sunshine. The news spreads that Marie’s body has been found, and they all run off to see, except for Marie’s little boy, who after an oblivious moment, follows after the others.

Hop hop.

Recommended Recording: Claudio Abbado/Vienna State Opera

2) Salome–Richard Strauss

Sometimes when you baptize Jesus, you totally become famous.  So much so that chicks start demanding your decapitation as a test for the creepy desires of their stepdad.  Salome is based on the Bible by way of Oscar Wilde (that’s weird to type), and has everything you’d ever want in an opera, including nudity (which is great unless Birgit Nilsson happens to be in town), shield-crushing, veils, and King Herod.  Strauss’ music is Strauss’ music, which is to say lush, evocative, and entertaining.  The “Dance of the Seven Veils” is one of the great pieces of music, evidenced by the fact that it’s excerpted all the time, and the final scene is the craziest soprano lunacy this side of Brunnhilde taking a perfectly good horse with her into a huge fire.  There’s something about the shock value that occurs when the story unravels…no matter how many times you see it, and you know what’s coming, you still feel completely repulsed, terrified, and enthralled all at once.  Think of it as the Maury Povich “Who’s the father?” episode of opera.  Shit, I should make an opera out of the transcript of one those…a new project born right before your very eyes.  Your very eyes!

Recommended Recording: Karajan/Vienna Philharmonic and the only Jokaanan worth really sinking your teeth into…or cutting the head off of…Jose van Dam.

1) Bluebeard’s Castle–Bela Bartok

The beauty lies in the simplicity (that’s fucking ingenious if I understand it correctly, Walter…it’s a Swiss fucking watch).  2 onstage characters, 1 large set, 1 act, 1 hour.  Bluebeard elopes with his new wife, Judith, and takes her back to his sweet pad (the importance of the castle is duly noted by Bartok, who actually lists it on the dramatis personae list…which is cool and creepy at the same time).  Once there, Judith wants some natural light and begs Bluebeard to open some doors, but he refuses.  She keeps nagging him until he gives in, making their relationship just like every other relationship ever, and we start seeing shit behind doors.

The doors and rooms all have colors associated with them, as follows:

1. (The torture chamber) Blood-red
2. (The armory) Yellowish-red
3. (The treasury) Golden
4. (The garden) Bluish-green
5. (The kingdom) White
6. (The pool of tears) Darkness; the main hall is darkened, as if a shadow had passed over
7. (The wives) Silvery

Blood stains everything she sees, and her mind begins to piece everything together.  By the time she sees the pool of tears, she knows what’s up, but demands to see the 7th door opened.  If there was anything that would be cooler than Bluebeard having killed all his wives…it would be making them wear heavy-ass jewelry and crowns and shit, worshipping them, forcing Judith to join them, and then locking them up (I hope my girlfriend isn’t reading this…I don’t have a castle anyway).

The minor second plays a huge role musically…they call it the blood motif, as you hear it anytime Judith notices blood on Bluebeard’s stuff.  There is a broad arching key structure of F# moving to C and back to F# which some people apparently think represents darkness and light, and which, now that I think about it, makes perfect sense.  That type of synergy is what makes this the best opera of the 20th century…it has so many awesome puzzles in it, it’s as ominous a story as you can imagine, and it has the benefit of Bartok at his “A” game.

Recommended Recording: Istvan Kertesz/London Symphony with Christa Ludwig as Judith and Walter Berry as Bluebeard, and also Walter Berry looking VERY suspiciously like a modern day Bluebeard taking women back to his apartment and acting inappropriately on the Decca Legends cover photo.

There it is.  I issue apologies to every Britten opera, Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District, Elektra, The Rake’s Progress, Lulu, Der Rosenkavalier, Ariadne auf Naxos, Rusalka, Tosca, Jenufa, The Golden Cockerel (the suite is one of my all-time favorite pieces, though), The Love for Three Oranges, The Rise and Fall of the City of Mahogany, Moses und Aron, Antony and Cleopatra, Turandot, Die tote Stadt, and The Cunning Little Vixen.  I literally immediately regret my list not having Britten or Janacek on it.  But it’s too late…I’m already wearing the heavy-ass jewelry.

“Öffne dich, mein ganzes Herze!”

Kan man tala om söndagens geni utan att dra upp Bach? – ”Den Nja,  Förr eller senare måste man nog göra det, men det är inte helt lätt att hitta egenheter som inte känns igen. Alla känner till honom på något sätt, och många har utan att tänka på det sjungit en av hans melodier från Bondekantaten:

“Nu grönskar det…”.

Hans kännetecken som geni är många, men han var inte så känd för allt när han levde, eftersom de flesta då som nu inte funderar på varifrån musiken i kyrkan kommer, utan man sjunger med, lyssnar blir förtjust, men glömmer det sen igen när vardagens slit gör sig påminnt.  Det finns ju ett märkligt faktum att han hade väldigt stor energi, men också skrev så mycken musik att man undrar hur han har hunnit skriva den, så en förklaring skulle kunna vara att han faktiskt inte skrev allting utan ”spelade i ett band”

Yeah!!!  Groove it!!

Dvs alla gubar och gumor i stämmorna visste hur en chaconne i D-moll funkade så om han gav dem en där dessutom både melodi och generalbas var angivna så visste de hur de skulle spela, och när de fick göra sina solon. Så var det ganska många som gjorde. Och var det ingen som ställde upp fick man pröva allting själv. 

Här skulle damkören kunna improvisera över de ensamma långa trumpettonerna, samma idé men uppochnedvänd.

En annan lite skojig sak är att han trots sitt ganska pretentiösa tillmäle som evangelistäven skrev rent värdslig musik: En kaffe-kantat, en bonde-kantat, en tobaksmotett  

Annars är det han mest måste göras skyldig för att hans (bandets) musik hjälpt till att skapa det moderna tonspråket: Det är hel tiden en lek med melodier, temata och motiv som flätas hit och dit. Drar man bort en melodi på ena stället repas hela väven upp. Men för detta behövs regler om hur man får leka med melodierna:

I citatet här är dialogen mellan sopranstämman och oboen väldigt tydlig, samtidigt är alla modulationer, (samma snutt upprepad lite högre upp eller lägre ned) både i arian och körsatsen. Hans experiment gick så långt att han systematiserade den ganska populära kompositionstekniken ”fuga” med fasta regler – så till den grad att lyckades skriva en väv med fyra självständiga melodier som skall vändas och vridas hit och dit utan att slås knut på.

Tolvtonsmusiken i blöjor:

Detta näst sista stycket är alltså en fuga, en rent matematiskt skrivet – men spelas givetvis med en viss känslomässig inlevelse

HÄR har vi också grunden till den märkliga musik som skrevs för ca 100 år sen. Alban Berg har i sin opera Wozzeck skrivit in en fuga – förmodligen helt korrekt, men vridit på Bachs regler så mycket att musiken helt tappar styrsel och riktning för våra öron – så fiffig var alltså idén, och så mycket betyder klanger, skådespel, rösterna och dramaturgi. Även för en helt otränad i modern musik och opera går det att hänga med. Speciellt som han vid 9:00 minuter citerar Gustav Mahler.

Men för att citera en annan samtida med Schönberg och Alban Berg – Einstein som nämndes i förra inlägget.

“Wenn man zwei Stunden lang mit einem netten Mädchen zusammensitzt, meint man, es wäre eine Minute. Sitzt man jedoch eine Minute auf einem heißen Ofen, meint man, es wären zwei Stunden. Das ist Relativität.”

(Om man under två timmar sitter tillsammans med en söt flicka så tycks det som vore det en minut, men om man å andra sidan sitter en minut på en het spis, så tycks det som två timmar. Det är relativitet.)

Så därför slutar vi väl där vi började, med min förtjusande julupptäckt Christine Schäfer som sjunger om ”hjärta och mun” ………………  - Suck!!!

(märk hur stråke och sopran har en dialog mot en blyg och dov bakgrund, två solostämmor som delvis kan improviseras mot den färdigskrivna generalbasen)

*

Äh!! Vi avslutar väl förresten med en fräckis om Bach och hans åtminstone 21 barn :

First man: – Do you know why Bach had so many children?

Second man: – No!

First man: – Because his organ had no stops

(Hans orgel hade inga registerandrag)

6/6 stjerner

Opera: Alban Bergs proletariske mareridt af et musikdrama, »Wozzeck«, er skåret til med knivskarp præcision i Keith Warners rystende iscenesættelse på Det Kgl. Teater. Alt er ondt. Alt er godt. Det er stærke sager.

Der var ikke udsolgt til premieren i søndags, i Operaen, på britiske Keith Warners iscenesættelse af østrigske Alban Bergs opera »Wozzeck«. Og det var sådan set ikke spor overraskende. »Wozzeck« er ikke en opera, som operagængere som flest står i kø for at få billetter til. Det var den ikke dengang. Det er den ikke nu. Dertil er den for lidt indsmigrende, for fjern fra alt, hvad mange forbinder med opera som kunstform, altså noget med skøn sang, stoute helte og skønne heltinder.

»Wozzek«, der blev uropført for 83 år siden, er ekspressionisme uden sordin, et koncentreret mareridt af en underklassefortælling, tilsat musik, der overvejende er atonal, og det vil sige uden den dur-mol-tonalitet, som vi alle er så fortrolige med. Det er stærke sager. Selv for et nutidigt øre.

Uforglemmeligt rystende

Men »Wozzeck« er også – eller netop derfor – uforglemmeligt rystende, et hovedværk i det 20. århundredes musikdramatik, simpelthen, og rystende er også den version, man nu kan se på Det Kgl. Teater, hvor John Lundgren er den bamsede, men skrøbelige titelperson, der ikke kan flygte fra sin skæbne, hvor Tina Kiberg bruger sit enorme dramatiske talent til at fremmane hans fortvivlet liderlige kæreste, Marie, og hvor Johnny van Hal er grotesk mandhaftig som tambourmajoren, der tager Marie bagfra og kommer så tit, han kan komme til det.

Der er også Sten Byriel som doktoren, Gert Henning-Jensen som vennen Andres og Hanne Fischer som Magret, alle maksimalt udtryksfulde, og der er Bengt-Ola Morgny, der er vanvittig god som den gale kaptajn. Og der er Michael Boder, der dirigerer Det Kgl. Kapel så velturneret mareridtsagtigt, at den svære musik bliver næsten helt ligetil. Pengene passer. Alt er ondt. Alt er godt.

Og hvilket drama er forlægget ikke! »Woyzeck« hedder det. Det blev forfattet af tyskeren Georg Büchner, og det var stadig et fragment, da tyfusen i 1837 tog livet af den kun 23-årige. Men de dele af teksten, som Alban Berg knap et århundrede senere plukkede til sin libretto, giver god nok mening endda. Udgangspunktet er stadigvæk det samme: Et virkeligt menneske og dette menneskes virkelige historie. Johann Christian Woyzeck hed dette menneske, der i 1821 dræbte sin kæreste med en kniv, og var han nu tilregnelig i gerningsøjeblikket eller ej, blev der dengang spurgt.

Man gjorde med andre ored et tidligt forsøg på at anskue en morder som andet end en slet og ret kriminel, og hele denne såre moderne tænkemåde – der ganske vist ikke reddede Woyzeck fra at blive henrettet, men alligevelbevirkede, at også Büchners drama blev såre moderne i sin tilgang til stoffet: Woyzeck – eller Wozzeck – er fortvivlende fattig, og fattigdommen bliver hans skæbne. Kaptajnen, hans overordnede, håner ham på grund af hans uægte proletarsøn. For doktoren, for hvis medicinske eksperimenter han stiller sit usle legeme til rådighed, er han kun et forsøgsdyr. De sociale anklager står i kø.

Working class hero

Wozzeck er – og det er det, der er det moderne – et offer for omstændighederne. Både hos Büchner og hos Berg. Han er teater- og operahistoriens første working class hero, og i Keith Warners eminente iscenesættelse, tilsat Stefanos Lazaridis’ hvidflisede, hospitalsagtige interiør, understreges det, at det ikke er ham, men verden, den er gal med. Syg er den, og nu underkastes den så medicinernes granskende blikke. Nytter det noget? Næppe.

Men selv byen, som det hele foregår i, er blevet til et præparat, og også Wozzeck ender sine dage i et kar med sprit. Den druknedød, han lider, da han vil kaste mordvåbnet fra sig, bliver på den måde – hos Keith Warner – til hans definitive, såvel symbolske som konkrete overgiven sig til videnskaben. Først i døden gør hans besiddelsesløse legeme nytte. I den hvide verden går alt i sort.

Kun over Maries værelse hviler der et skær af nusset normalitet, men heller ikke her – i et hjørne af scenen – er der meget at grine ad. Her er hendes og Wozzecks fælles barn – sikkert gestaltet af Carl Philip Levin – et tavst vidne til galskaben og ydmygelserne. Til sidst synger drengen, men også han sidder, som faderen, helt fast, og til allersidst, endda helt bogstaveligt, modsat sine kammerater, der er frie. Den sociale arv kan ikke brydes. Der er ikke mere at håbe på.

Hvilken forestilling! Keith Warner & co. har givet »Wozzeck« det hvide snit og skåret til med knivskarp proletarisk præcision. Se den, hvis De tør!

-Af Søren Kassebeer 

6/6 stjerner

Grotesk samfundssatire, menneskelig tragedie og humanistisk manifest. Alban Bergs ”Wozzeck” er tilbage på Den kongelige Opera, og Keith Warners iscenesættelse er så god, at det gør ondt.

Juleforbrugsfest på lavt niveau, måske, men stadigvæk en fest. Så det kunne godt ligne en besk tanke fra Den kongelige Operas side, netop her i december at have premiere på operalitteraturens mest insisterende solidaritetserklæring til de, der intet har og intet nogensinde vil få.

Alban Bergs opera er ganske vist fra begyndelsen af 1920′erne, Georg Büchners skuespilforlæg – som Robert Wilson og Tom Waits lavede deres version af på Betty Nansen Teatret for otte år siden – er fra 1830′rne, og historien foregår i 1821. Men beretningen om den forarmede soldat Franz Wozzeck, hans kæreste Marie og de mere eller mindre groteske skikkelser og magtforhold, der omklamrer og til slut knuser dem, kan foregå og foregår hvor som helst.

Uforbeholden solidaritet
Ikke mindst sådan som Berg har sat den i musik. Den blot halvanden time lange opera er på samme tid højspændt ekspressionisme, cabaretlignende satire, stiliseret tragedie og gennemstrømmet af uforbeholden solidaritet med de mennesker, det går ud over – i en grad og et format, så man kan gribe sig selv i at tænke, at der egentlig ikke er sket meget nyt af betydning i europæisk opera siden.

Netop de mange samtidige lag af stemninger og genrer foldes virtuost ud i englænderen Keith Warners i forvejen berømmede iscenesættelse, der oprindelig blev skabt til Covent Garden Operaen i London. For så vidt holder han sig ret loyalt til Bergs anvisninger, men han udnytter derudover med stor fantasi scenerum, perspektiver, lys og bevægelse til at sammenbinde de mange, korte scener med deres filmlignende spring og krydsklip.

Tragedie i egen ret
John Lundgren er i titelrollen med sin store, forunderligt graciøse krop og alsidige basbaryton en mere end værdig arvtager til Aage Haugland, som var i centrum af Den kongelige Operas gamle, mere abstrakte opsætning. Imens får Tina Kiberg – der alternerer med Ylva Kihlberg – løftet Maries rolle op til at være meget mere end offerlam; hun bliver her nok så meget en tragedie i sin egen ret, hvad enten det er Wozzecks tiltagende vanvid eller Tambourmajorens brutale forførelser, hun skal lægge krop og sjæl til.

Alle partier er besat med lokale sangere, og der er ikke et svagt punkt. Bengt-Ola Morgny og Sten Byriel har de store bizarre numre som henholdsvis den paranoide kaptajn og den sadistiske læge – i begge tilfælde synes Berg i uhyggeligt profetisk grad at foregribe Det Tredje Rige – men også Johnny van Hal som Tambourmajoren, Gert Henning-Jensen som soldaterkammeraten og Imre György som Narren synger, og er af Keith Warner instrueret til at spille helstøbte, tredimensionelle figurer frem. 

Hvilken gæst
I orkestergraven er den tyske dirigent Michael Boder til gengæld gæst, og hvilken. Hans overblik og fordybelse er i særklasse medrivende, og han får Det kongelige Kapel til at realisere Alban Bergs komplekse kæmpepartitur som om de aldrig havde spillet andet end heftig 1920er-musik.

Keith Warners mest iøjnefaldende nyskabelse er, at han lader Wozzeck og Maries umælende søn (Carl Philip Levin) spille en langt mere markant rolle, end Berg lægger op til. Her er han på scenen konstant og indgår ofte i handlingen som en påmindelse om, hvor meget Wozzeck og Maries liv også bærer den sociale arv videre.

Alligevel er operaen ikke, og bliver her heller ikke, kun en pessimistisk fremvisning af den menneskelige jammerdal, med Wozzecks egne ord ”Som om verden var død”. Netop som tragedien er kulmineret suspenderes handlingen af et stort orkestermellemspil, der gør ondt som ikke megen anden operamusik.

Lige her er det, at Alban Berg minder tilskueren om, at kan man ikke gøre andet for at redde verden, kan man i hvert fald ind imellem sætte den i billeder og lyd næsten som den er. Ikke blot afbilde den passivt, men genkomponere den som et kunstværk, det ikke er til at komme udenom.

-Af JAKOB LEVINSEN

4/6 stjerner

John Lundgren spiller fremragende i det Kongeliges aktuelle og rørende iscenesættelse af Wozzeck.

Der var faktisk børn blandt publikum ved premieren søndag, så lad mig lige advare: Det kan godt være, der er en dreng på scenen i ’Wozzeck’. Han har endda fået en usædvanlig stor rolle at spille i Det Kongeliges nye opsætning af Alban Bergs opera. Men det betyder på ingen måde, at forestillingen er for børn. 

Faktisk er den dybt deprimerende historie et overraskende valg til julemåneden og for så vidt et trist supplement til den i forvejen grå og trøstesløse januar. 

Virkelige hændelser
Wozzeck – som historiens stakkel af en hovedperson ved en fejl staves i operaverdenen – er en arm soldat fra tyskeren Georg Büchners sjælespændte drama ’Woyzeck’, som Robert Wilson og Tom Waits lavede på Betty Nansen for otte år siden. 

Büchner skitserede historien efter virkelige hændelser. 

At Wozzecks samlever Marie lader sin lille dreng se til, mens hun lader sig binde til tremmesengen og kneppe af majoren, når hendes menige mand af en soldat ikke er der, er ikke noget for mindreårige. 

I sin afmagt får hun til sidst Wozzeck til at skære halsen over på sig. Derpå drukner han selv – om det så er uheld eller selvmord. 

Musikalsk operagyser
Alban Bergs atonale koncentrat af en musikalsk operagyser handler om samfundets fornedrelse og ydmygelse af mennesker, der i forvejen ikke har en chance. Medicinske eksperimenter placerer ligefrem Wozzeck i rollen som laboratorierotte. Eller i Det Kongeliges aktuelle iscenesættelse snarere som en slags stor, mishandlet menneskeabe. 

Laboratorierotte eller menneskeabe. Ned med nakken kommer den gode Wozzeck under alle omstændigheder. 

Og at han faktisk er god, det er netop pointen. 

Mens operaens halvanden times hjerneudgravning handler om, hvordan samfundets autoriteter frakender Wozzeck al form for moral, er han i virkeligheden den eneste, der trods sin håbløse fattigdom faktisk opfører sig ordentligt. 

Snusket hvid uniform
Tung i kroppen og iført en snusket hvid uniform, der lige så godt kunne være en spændetrøje fra det galehus, opsætningens beskidte, tilgroede laboratoriescenografi (også) giver associationer til, er barytonen John Lundgren en fremragende titelperson. 

Efter en flot præstation som Den Flyvende Hollænder på Den Jyske Opera i sommer lader han sig nu, sløv og afmægtig, puffe hid, did og direkte ind i en ny vellykket operarolle. 

Denne Wozzeck er for dum til at gennemskue, hvordan han bliver manipuleret. Vi ender med at se stykkets Nar vralte fra bagscenen som en slags King Kong i miniformat, kun for at fjerne abemasken og afsløre Wozzecks eget ansigt. 

Tina Kiberg tager Maries elendighed på sig. Hun har til gengæld mistet al moral på grund af den elendighed, hun og hendes abemand og hendes barn lever i derude på scenens yderste venstrekant. 

Halvnøgen og druknet
Barnet er stumt – og flot spillet af Carl Philip Levin i Keith Warners gode personinstruktion. 

Barnet ser det hele og gemmer sig under sengen, når det bliver alt for slemt. Til sidst slider han sig løs. Ikke for, som librettoen tilsiger, at hyppe ned til søen på sin kæphest og se sin mor død. 

Men for at gå hen til det store akvarium på scenen, hvor far (hvis Wozzeck da ellers er hans far …), ligger halvnøgen og druknet i vandet, der er farvet rødt af Maries blod. 

Far har skåret halsen over på mor med køkkenkniven, og nu er de begge døde og borte. Tag lige den. 

Scenografien fanger operaens stemning af socialt bundskrab. På den anden side yder den ikke operaens omhyggeligt konstruerede dramaturgi retfærdighed. 

Den har ikke den elegante styrke, Konwitschnys ’Wozzeck’ i Hamburg havde. Her var Bo Skovhus titelfiguren i kjolesæt, og pengesedler regnede fra loftet som eneste rekvisit. 

Budskabet var, at kapitalisme fordærver alt. Stikordet var taget fra Wozzecks egne læber. 

Perifer replik om skovsvampe
Med tre terrarier på scenen – af samme dimensioner som det tragiske akvarium – samler scenografien i Operaen en mere perifer replik om skovsvampe op og forsøger at gøre den til et visuelt holdepunkt. 

Med en før afprøvet spejlvirkning lader den Marie svæve som luder skråstreg madonna for Wozzecks blik på bagvæggens nattehimmel, mens Wozzeck samler siv med kammeraten Andres ved søen. 

Man kunne have ramt mere centralt ved at tage visuelt udgangspunkt i kaptajnens skarpe replik om Wozzeck, der »løber gennem verden som en åben ragekniv«, hvis det endelig var. 

Berg skrev sin atonale fortælling med dens kogende orkestrale psykodrama og figurernes vokale ingenmandsland af talesang i femten ultrapræcise scener. 

Omhyggeligt struktureret på det musikalske plan. Den musikalske struktur er så fantastisk en feature i det højspændte psykodrama, at det ville være forløsende at se den afspejlet i det sceniske. 

Linjen holdes
Keith Warners scenograf skaber i stedet en grundstemning. Men modsat Mozarts ’Don Giovanni’, som Warner debuterede med på Det Kongelige forrige år, knækker betydningslaget denne gang ikke på midten. Linjen holdes, og personinstruktionen er præcis. 

Opsætningen havde premiere på Covent Garden i London. I København yder sangerne den fuld retfærdighed. Johnny van Hal er en tungt prustende, overraskende nuanceret tamburmajor. 

Hanne Fischer har en god birolle som liderlig snerpe. Bengt-Ola Morgny med krykker alias Kaptajnen plus Sten Byriel som Doktoren skærer samfundets autoriteter uhyggeligt præcist ud. 

I løbet af spilleperioden skal Ylva Kihlberg og Ingeborg S. Gillebo alternere som henholdsvis Marie og Margret. 

Det Kongelige Kapel under en dejligt wienerisch Michael Boder er selve laboratorieabens blottede, sydende hjernebark. Med deres præstation får Alban Bergs partitur alligevel det fokus, det fortjener, i en opsætning, som med garanti vil tage toppen af julestemningen. 

-Af Thomas Michelsen

13. 11. 08

Um es gleich vorweg zu sagen: Michael Volle  ist an diesem Abend   ein alles und alle überragender Sängerschauspieler. Wie er den immer mehr sich in seinen Irrsinn steigernden und sich ausweglos darin verfangenden Wozzeck singt und darstellt, das ist einfach bewundernswert. Um es gleich vorweg zu sagen: ich mag weder Büchners fragmentarisches Theaterstück noch die Musik des Alban Berg. Unterschichttragödien und die Ästhetik des Hässlichen auf der Bühne finde ich einfach unerträglich. Geradezu unappetitlich ist es, wie die satten, elegant gekleideten, gut verdienenden  Bürger und Rentiers nebst Gattinnen sich am proletarischen Theater der Hässlichkeit verlustieren, mögen sie sich dabei auch in der Gesellschaft solch illustrer Literaten wie Baudelaire, Zola, der Frères Goncourt und vieler anderer dekadenter Künstler befinden, die allesamt den morbiden Reiz der Armen und der Irren genossen und das Hässliche und das Deformierte gesucht haben, weil sie, unsere so feinsinnigen Literaten, des Schönen, des Sublimen und des Erhabenen überdrüssig geworden waren. Auch unser guter B. B. liebte es ja, seine Theatergeschäfte mit der Not und dem Leiden der Unterschicht zu machen, und ein offensichtlich Brecht geschädigter Starregisseur wie Andreas Kriegenburg fährt  munter auf dieser gänzlich abgefahrenen Schiene weiter, wohl wissend, dass sie mühelos zum Erfolg führt. Und wenn zur Brechtmanie auch noch das Traumtheater oder anders gesagt: das Delirium hinzukommt, dann kann nichts mehr schief gehen. Das Panoptikum grotesker Figuren, das sich da auf der Bühne versammelt, begreift sich ja leicht als Traumvisionen eines kranken Hirns, als Fieberphantasien eines ausgehungerten und gequälten Individuums. Vor allem in diese Richtung und wohl weniger auf die Brecht Tradition hin sucht die Regie die Aufmerksamkeit zu lenken. Die Fieberphantasien wären es dann, die die grotesken Leiber und die nicht minder grotesken Situationen produzieren: den Hampelmann von Tambourmajor, den Fettklos von Hauptmann, die Marionette bzw. die seelenlose Maschinenfigur des Doktors, die schwarz kostümierten Arbeitslosen, die sich wie hungrige Fische auf der Suche nach Nahrung in einen See stürzen und die wie Erinnyen dem irren Wozzeck, der gerade seine Marie abgestochen hat, immer wieder das Messer reichen.
Ja, man hält es eigentlich nicht für möglich. Trotz der so unwirklichen Traumphantasien gibt es einen richtigen See zum Plantschen auf der Vorderbühne, in dem der arme Wozzeck sich nach getaner Tat ersäufen kann. Und unser eleganter Generalmusikdirektor muss, wenn er den Schlussapplaus huldvoll entgegen nimmt, doch sage und schreibe zum Frack Gummistiefel tragen, um im Bühnensee die Lackschuhe nicht zu nässen. Groteskes Theater auch nach dem Theater.
Aber was macht unser altkluger Zauberlehrling Harry Potter nun eigentlich in der Wozzeck Groteske? Er darf das Kind von Wozzeck und Marie sein, das für jeden Akt das entsprechende Thema an die Wände des leeren Zimmers, in dem das unglückliche Paar  haust, schreibt: „Papa“, „Geld“, „Hure“. So ist doch zu guter Letzt unser armer B.B. mit seiner Sucht zur plakativen Belehrung sogar in der Märchen- und Zauberwelt eines Harry Potter angekommen. Oder will uns die Regie so ganz nebenbei noch suggerieren, dass aus Sinnlichkeit und Irrsinn, aus der Sinnlichkeit der Marie und dem Irrsinn eines Wozzeck, Literatur entsteht, dass der Wozzeck ein Intertext für die Harry Potter Romane ist und beide doch nur Phantastereien sind? Das ist vielleicht ein bisschen weit hergeholt. Wie dem auch sei. Wenn man Irrsinn und Groteske, Hoffnungslosigkeit und Leiden auf der Bühne sehen, wenn man grandiose Sängerschauspieler erleben will, dann sollte man zum Münchner Wozzeck gehen. Wenn man eine perfekt angerührte Mischung aus Brecht- und Traumspiel Ingredienzien mag und nichts gegen die Klänge eines Alban Berg hat, dann kann man in München einen großen Opernabend erleben.
Wir sahen die zweite Vorstellung – in der Premierenbesetzung. Die Premiere war am 10. November 2008.

Les 17 et 18 avril, l’Amphithéâtre Bastille rend hommage au compositeur Stefan Wolpe, grande figure de l’antifascisme qui dut s’exiler aux Etats-Unis pour fuir les nazis, auteur d’une oeuvre influencée par le Bauhaus, par le mouvement Dada et par Brecht. Dans le sillage de Wozzeck, le chef-d’oeuvre d’Alban Berg, deux soirées pour aller plus loin dans cette musique qui porte en elle toute une part de l’Histoire du XXème siècle.

Le compositeur Stefan Wolpe (1902-1972), l’une des grandes figures de l’antifascisme et de la lutte sociale à la fin de la République de Weimar, dut s’exiler aux Etats-Unis, doublement menacé en tant qu’intellectuel et Juif. Sa musique et ses chansons destinées au cabaret, au théâtre de rue et au combat social devinrent très populaires. Dans l’oeuvre de Wolpe, le modernisme du Bauhaus et le mouvement Dada s’entremêlent. Son oeuvre se rapproche de Maïakovski, Brecht ou Schwitters, mais aussi du free-jazz et des musiques du monde.Caroline Petrick, mise en espace
Viviane De Muynck, voix
Johan Bossers, piano
Gunnar Brandt, ténor

Amphithéâtre Bastille
Représentation 17, 18 avr. 2008 20h
Prix des places Plein Tarif 16€, Tarif réduit 14€, Jeunes 10€

The purpose of this post is to quickly insult the guy who destroyed Alban Berg’s Wozzeck in tonight’s new production at the Opéra Bastille in Paris. He is an idiot.

(You can perhaps trust this review from Libération, but definitely not this one from Le Monde.)

IV: Humanidad Sonoramente Organizada

• Cuando los venda sienten hambre, o están ocupados evitándola, no encuentran tiempo ni energía para hacer música. Ni tampoco imaginan que la música pudiera, de una forma mágica, aliviar su hambre, del mismo modo que los magos que provocan la lluvia no esperan que la lluvia caiga si no han visto primero el movimiento de los insectos que la anuncia. La música está en ellos, pero para surgir requiere unas condiciones especiales. Los venda hacen música cuando tienen el estómago lleno porque, conscientemente o no, sienten las fuerzas de la separación inherentes a la satisfacción de la autopreservación y se sienten impulsados a restaurar el equilibrio mediante una conducta especialmente cooperativa y exploratoria.

• La tshikona (tipo de música/danza venda) es universal tanto en su contenido como en su forma: todo el mundo asiste o participa en ella; sintetiza el principio de individualidad en comunidad (como un coral de Bach, es interesante para todos los intérpretes, en contraste con el acompañamiento habitual de los himnos, que reduce a contraltos y tenores a la condición de esclavos de sopranos y bajos).

• Si la música inglesa parece mas compleja que la venda y es practicada por un porcentaje menor de personas, ello se debe a la división social del trabajo, no a que los ingleses estén menos dotados para la música o a que su música sea cognitivamente más compleja. Los individuos de diferentes culturas no han de aprender ni más ni menos cosas y, en el contexto de cada cultura, éstas no son básicamente ni más ni menos difíciles.

• Los problemas en las sociedades humanas comienzan en el punto en que las personas aprenden menos de lo necesario sobre el amor, pues el amor es la base de nuestra existencia como seres humanos. Kierkegaard lo expresó en los siguientes términos: “una generación puede aprender mucho de otra, pero lo que es propiamente humano, ninguna generación puede aprenderlo de la precedente. En este aspecto, cada generación comienza de nuevo desde el principio. [...] Ninguna generación ha aprendido de otra cómo amar, ninguna comienza en otro punto que no sea el principio y ninguna tiene ante sí una tarea menor que la generación precedente.”

• Aunque un compositor pueda sentir el mayor respeto por la música de Tchaikovski, si fuera consciente y le preocupara la tarea contemporánea de ser humano y quisiera decir algo sobre ello en su música, no podría reproducir ese tipo de música en una sociedad cuyas tareas son distintas de las de la sociedad de Tchaikovski. Así, si un compositor quiere producir una música relevante para sus contemporáneos, su principal problema no es realmente de naturaleza musical: es un problema de actitud hacia la sociedad y la cultura contemporáneas en relación con el problema humano básico de aprender a ser humano.

• Como me dijo un jefe venda: “vas a oír la interpretación más brillante imaginable de nuestra danza nacional: llamaré a todos los músicos disponibles en el distrito para que acudan aquí“. Mahler, de un modo muy parecido, afirmó: “para mí, escribir una sinfonía significa construir un universo con todas las herramientas de la técnica disponible“.

• Muchos críticos han descalificado la Cuarta Sinfonía de Tchaikovski como pobremente construida sobre la base de que su material temático no fue tratado de acuerdo con las reglas convencionales de la construcción sinfónica. En realidad, esta obra podría describirse como un salto intelectual hacia delante en el que Tchaikovski fue conducido hacia una manera innovadora de elaborar la forma sinfónica; y resulta interesante que las consecuencias musicales de este logro básicamente humano sean apreciadas de manera intuitiva por los oyentes legos, aunuqe sean tan pobremente entendidas por las mentes cerradas de algunos expertos musicales.

• Las diferencias entre culturas y el desarrollo de sus tecnologías son el resultado de diferencias no de intelecto, sino de organización humana.

• La historia de muchas civilizaciones ha mostrado que una sociedad y su cultura pueden acabar colapsándose a causa de la alienación humana. La máquina deja de funcionar cuando falta el único poder que puede moverla: la fuerza creativa que surge de la autoconciencia humana.

• La música no puede cambiar las sociedades como pueden hacerlo los cambios en la tecnología o la organización política. No puede llevar a la gente a actuar, a menos que esté social y culturalmente predispuesta a hacerlo. No puede infundir hermandad, como esperaba Tolstoi, ni ningún otro estado o valor social. Lo más que puede hacer en las personas es confirmar situaciones que ya existen. Por sí misma no puede generar pensamientos que beneficien o dañen a la humanidad. Pero puede hacer a las personas más conscientes de sentimientos que han experimentado.

• En un mundo de crueldad y explotación como el nuestro, en el que en aras del beneficio económico proliferan la mediocridad y el fraude, es necesario entender por qué un madrigal de Gesualdo o una Pasión de Bach, una melodía de sitar de la India o una canción africana, el Wozzeck de Berg o el War Requiem de Britten, un gamelán balinés o una ópera cantonesa, una sinfonía de Mozart, Beethoven o Mahler pueden ser profundamente necesarios para la supervivencia humana, al margen del mérito que puedan tener como ejemplos de creatividad y progreso técnico. Es también necesario explicar por qué, en determinadas circunstancias, una “sencilla” canción “popular” puede tener más valor humano que una “compleja” sinfonía.

John Blacking: ¿Hay Música En El Hombre? (Alianza)

WTF? I think I need a discussion with Amazon’s metadata staff.