The idea of writing about this work came to me directly from one of the subjects of my last blog post, the overture to "The Birds" by Alphons Diepenbrock.
This time, the subject is a complete opera based on that ancient Greek satirical comedy by Aristophanes. And once again, it comes from a composer very little known. This time, though, he's not just unknown because of shifting tastes and fashions.
One of the many crimes committed by the Nazi Party during their years in power in Germany was the labelling of art by Jewish artists and Jewish sympathizers as "entartete" -- "degenerate". Any works or artists so labelled were of course banned. Many of the creative artists labelled as "entartete" escaped from Europe and resettled in North America. Others were swept up by the hundred-headed hydra that was the Nazi killing machine, and disappeared into the death camps. Their works, in many cases, also disappeared.
Some years back, the Decca Records label launched a special line called "Entartete Musik", dedicated to recovering the works of the "degenerate" composers from obscurity. And the opera Die Vogel ("The Birds") was one of the major recording projects in this line of CDs.
The composer (and librettist) was Walter Braunfels. He was not himself Jewish (in fact he was a devout Roman Catholic), but he did have partly Jewish ancestry and of course counted many eminent Jewish musicians among his friends and colleagues, and that was enough to put him on the Nazi radar. It didn't help his cause at all that this opera definitely skewers the heaven-storming delusions of ambitious, power-hungry people!
But don't get me wrong! Die Vogel is no political tract, and certainly not advanced music for the time when it was composed (the 1920s). The nearest benchmark to Braunfels' style that I know is found in some of the later operas of Richard Strauss. Braunfels certainly shared Strauss' ability to coax beautiful, bewitching sounds out of singers and players alike, and this score has many examples of that gift in it. Not only that, but the composer has most effectively devised musically beautiful material to suggest (without slavishly imitating) the songs of many different species of birds.
The Aristophanes play involves a plot, suggested by two humans, for the birds to build a citadel in the sky and intercept all the prayers and sacrifices winging their way to the gods. Inevitably, of course, the all-powerful Zeus destroys the city of the birds.
The opera is in 2 acts, the first considerably shorter. The best of the music comes in the second act. This begins with a duet of heart-tugging beauty between the Nightingale and the human Hoffegut ("Good Hope"). The Nightingale is a high lyric soprano, and her voice soars effortlessly along a gently curving vocal line while her human admirer's voice punctuates it. For sheer lyrical gift there are few passages in all of music to match this. Later there is a delightful wedding scene of two doves with appropriate vocal comments from different birds.
The comedy turns darker with the arrival of Prometheus who warns the birds that they are tempting the wrath of Zeus (pronounced "Zoyss" in German). This passage has a splendid chordal theme that sets the name of the god on the highest note. But they ignore him and carry on.
Zeus himself then appears, and in a passage of power and drama summons the winds from north and south, until the winds and a thunderbolt blast the city into fragments.
The cowering birds then sing a hymn of homage to Zeus, with the Nightingale's voice rising above them all onto the high note of the Zeus theme heard earlier. The hymn-like harmonies of this passage are plain block triads, but the simple modulations are all the more effective for that. The humans then make their way back to their homes, with Hoffegut trying to describe and fix in his mind the change that his hour with the Nightingale has brought over him. As he disappears, the opera ends with a last brief lyrical outpouring from the distant voice of the Nightingale.
It seems a little hard on the rest of the singing cast that the soprano who sings the Nightingale gets all the most memorable moments! But in the premiere recording in the Decca Entartete Musik series, Hellen Kwon proves more than memorable in the part, and especially in that marvellous duet.
Her partner, Endrik Wottrich (tenor) sings with clarity and precision as Hoffegut, but has a curious tone quality to his voice which is quite distinctive and hard to describe -- and may not be to all tastes. Baritone Michael Kraus is equally clear as the other human character, Ratefreund (Loyal Friend).
Baritone Matthias Görne sings powerfully in his one scene as Prometheus. Wolfgang Holzmair, another baritone, is nicely contrasted in tone to both Kraus and Görne in his role as Wiedhopf (Hoopoe, the king of the birds). The many smaller roles are all effectively taken by various singers. The entire opera is lovingly played by the German Radio Symphony Orchestra of Berlin under the direction of Lothar Zagroszek.
This marvellous opera absolutely deserves to be rescued from obscurity, and performed much more often. If you can find a copy of this Decca recording (dating from 1994), grab it fast!
No comments:
Post a Comment