As my dad noted, it would be a great trivia question: name a second composer named "Wolfgang." He really went all-out for this one; it was supposed to be his magnum opus, and...I suspect it is that. Don't get me wrong; Die tote Stadt remains very good. But THIS...is something else entirely.
It's based on a play by Hans Kaltneker, a little-known Austrian expressionist writer who died young of tuberculosis. It takes place in an unnamed dictatorship. There's a Stranger who's come to bring the people happiness and freedom, but he's condemned to death. The night before he's to be executed, the King's wife, Heliane (the only named character), comes to see him, and he falls in love with her. The King is tormented because he can't make her love him, but then he gets angry and orders his wife put in trial for sleeping with the Stranger (which she hasn't actually done). I could say more, but this is one of those rare instances with an opera where I genuinely had no idea where the story was going, so it's worth experiencing blind.
This is extremelyWagnerian, in terms of the ecstatic, mystical subject matter; the intensity of the music; and the eschewal of traditional arias in favor of an endless stream of melody. This production, from Komische Oper Berlin, is really terrific. It's fairly minimalistic, with just two sets--a prison and a courtroom--but somehow, that feels appropriate for the mythical nature of the story. And the performers are all just great. Brian Jagde as the stranger is actually the weak link, I feel; not that he's bad by any means, but I feel like he lacks the necessary presence for this charismatic, prophet-ish figure. But Josef Wagner is totally great as the King, bringing some pathos to this tormented, brutal figure and making him seem semi-sympathetic. And Sara Jakubiak is radiant as Heliane. She has a nude scene, but it's not gratuitous; it's right there in the libretto. I would imagine that most productions find some way to elide this--hard to picture your leading Met sopranos agreeing to it--but it DOES play a key role in the story, so I'm not sure how you square that circle. Anyway, I admire Jakubiak's bravery in just fucking going for it. It boggles my mind that people I have never heard of before who aren't superstars can still be so great.
Hmm. Other than this and Die tote Stadt, Korngold wrote two one-act operas and one more full-length one, Die Kathrin, which seems to suggest a reverse version of the Simpsons joke ("that's German for 'the Bart the'"). Alas, none of these are readily available on video. The man was such an arresting talent, you'd think he's be more performed. Well, hopefully he'll be further rediscovered in the future.
I could be totally wrong here, but I get the impression that the lack of videos for some of Korngold's operas may be that due to his having later become famous as a movie score composer, "respectable" opera venus feel it somehow wouldn't suit their dignity to put him on as if he were any classical composer?
ReplyDeleteThat might have something to do with it, but I think more relevant is this: I don't think Korngold was really known as an opera composer outside of Germany even in his time. Then the nazis came to power, and obviously Jewish composers were completely buried. After the war, the Germans are kind of shell-shocked and don't necessarily have the presence of mind to immediately bring back all the things that the nazis effaced. Hence, it's been a very gradual process.
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