Baroque opera is a celebration of strangeness. The vocal qualities, instrumental ensembles, formal structures and plot devices seem soaked in the unfamiliar. Why then do so many commentators resonate with an idea expressed by Renée Fleming during one of the intermission interviews during the Live in HD presentation of Handel's opera Rodelinda? "Handel is modern," said Fleming.
Modern is the right word. This production by Stephen Wadsworth focused the existential qualities of this score and made the work seem a commentary on an afterlife where spirits were reunited because death was a misunderstanding.
"You say that I am dead," sang countertenor Andreas Scholl as Bertarido in his opening recitative. There was no one else onstage. He was singing to those who memorialized him with an engraved headstone because they believed him to have been killed in exile. The chilly tone and high pitches that Scholl produced sounded like the voice of the dead. Moments later, Bertarido heard Rodelinda mourning for him but could not reveal himself. It was as if he were dead and inhabiting an afterworld aware of, but just outside the world of the living.
Act three provides symmetrical balances. Bertarido's sister Eduige (played by Stephanie Blythe), recognizes him by hearing his disembodied voice. She follows the sound of the voice and finds him, and to her surprise he is alive.
In a wonderful and strange twist late in the third act, Rodelinda again becomes convinced that Bertarido has been killed because of bloody clothes left behind in his jail cell. Wadsworth set this scene in a jail cell that was physically underneath the tombstone monument from Act I. In an Aida-like moment, the horizon lifted as a section of the stage elevated and we could see that the jail was underground, like a crypt.
Between both images of false death is a reunion. Rodalinda sees Bertarido at the end of the second act. Is he still alive?
"I embrace you," they sing in the only duet in the opera, "stronger and harsher than death is this embrace...is this farewell that tears me from you." Wadsworth staged the duet at the site of the funeral monument. It all connected.
Handel set no indications that the dead could have been in a heavenly realm where they were freed from the struggles of living. Though there are occasional references to God in the libretto the references are exclamations of drama rather than prayer. What could be more different from the energy of Bach than this philosophical exploration? This is not Messiah.
Rodelinda explores a concept of death that remains alive and present, with us. "I marry vengeance," sang Rodelinda to Grimoaldo in the second act, "you marry death."
Showing posts with label Renée Fleming. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Renée Fleming. Show all posts
Saturday, December 3, 2011
Wednesday, September 22, 2010
Summer on the last day of Summer; Strauss and Fleming
The season has already changed. Light is slanting, and as the sun sets earlier we turn inward. Tonight is the last full moon of September. It has been called the "corn moon," or the "harvest moon," and it marks the Zhongqiu Festival in Chinese culture.
At age 84, Richard Strauss wrote his "Four Last Songs." He did not live long enough to hear them played. September, based on a poem written by Hermann Hesse, is the second song in the cycle; and here, sung by Renée Fleming at the proms in 2001, is a perfect setting for the harvest moon:
[0:27] The garden mourns in D major. The cool rain is chromatic but does not wander. One word is extended: Blumen. Strauss holds on to the flowers. The phrase closes in D:
[1:00] We move into a bright G major. An important oscillating figure is introduced. It will develop an association with shuddering. The harmony also oscillates between major and minor. The last line is set as a motion down a major third into B-flat major [1:21]. It is a Schubertian move.
[1:31] A deflection is all that is required to embed this music a major third further removed; travelling the cycle of major thirds into G-flat major. Falling leaves may appear golden but they turn beautiful colors in death--the second major third in a cycle. Falling motion is set in chromatic descent and we leave the acacia tree poised on the dominant of G major:
[2:14] How great it feels to return to G major even if only for an instant--long enough to hear the motive of oscillation transformed. The music becomes restless then floats over the word "sterbenden" (dying). Dying is encoded with the oscillation motive of summer:
[3:00] Fleming's ascending line is a sonic rose. The music shifts into E-flat major, hugging the Neapolitan and thinking about closing:
[3:33] The music arrives in the dominant--but a Straussian dominant with veils and dry ice. "Weary" is melismatic with a final transformation of the oscillating motive into triplets:
[4:30] The famous horn solo that closes this song carries with it a strong association with hunting, perhaps searching in this context, and it transforms the oscillation motive into the purely instrumental to close the song in D major.
At age 84, Richard Strauss wrote his "Four Last Songs." He did not live long enough to hear them played. September, based on a poem written by Hermann Hesse, is the second song in the cycle; and here, sung by Renée Fleming at the proms in 2001, is a perfect setting for the harvest moon:
[0:27] The garden mourns in D major. The cool rain is chromatic but does not wander. One word is extended: Blumen. Strauss holds on to the flowers. The phrase closes in D:
Der Garten trauert (The garden is mourning,)
kühl sinkt in die Blumen der Regen (Cool sinks into the flowers from rain)
[1:00] We move into a bright G major. An important oscillating figure is introduced. It will develop an association with shuddering. The harmony also oscillates between major and minor. The last line is set as a motion down a major third into B-flat major [1:21]. It is a Schubertian move.
[1:31] A deflection is all that is required to embed this music a major third further removed; travelling the cycle of major thirds into G-flat major. Falling leaves may appear golden but they turn beautiful colors in death--the second major third in a cycle. Falling motion is set in chromatic descent and we leave the acacia tree poised on the dominant of G major:
[2:14] How great it feels to return to G major even if only for an instant--long enough to hear the motive of oscillation transformed. The music becomes restless then floats over the word "sterbenden" (dying). Dying is encoded with the oscillation motive of summer:
[3:00] Fleming's ascending line is a sonic rose. The music shifts into E-flat major, hugging the Neapolitan and thinking about closing:
[3:33] The music arrives in the dominant--but a Straussian dominant with veils and dry ice. "Weary" is melismatic with a final transformation of the oscillating motive into triplets:
sehnt sich nach Ruh. (yearning for peace,)
Langsam tut er (slowly it closes)
die müdgeword'nen Augen zu (its weary eyes.)
[4:30] The famous horn solo that closes this song carries with it a strong association with hunting, perhaps searching in this context, and it transforms the oscillation motive into the purely instrumental to close the song in D major.
Lange noch bei den Rosen (Lingering still near the roses)
bleibt er stehn, (it remains standing,)
Sommer lächelt erstaunt und matt (Summer marvels and smiles seeing)
In den sterbenden Gartentraum. (the dying garden-dream)
Golden tropft Blatt um Blatt (Golden leaves; leaf upon leaf,)
nieder vom hohen Akazienbaum (Fall from the tallest acacia tree.)
Der Sommer schauer still (The summer shudders quietly)
seinem Ende entgegen. (as it meets its end.)
Thursday, August 12, 2010
I'm American. I'm eclectic: Renée Fleming
In an interview between Renée Fleming and Paula Zahn that originally aired on Sunday Arts on April 22, 2010, Fleming described herself as a "voracious musician" centered by her interest in learning.
After a brief discussion of Fleming's performance on opening night of the Met 2008-2009 season, Zahn opened a new thread by quoting from an article written by Matthew Gurewitsch in the New York Times on October 22, 2009. Fleming said:
"I was constantly being pushed toward a European ideal of what it means to be a classical or opera singer, let’s say in the Renata Tebaldi mode. I reject that. I’m American. I’m eclectic. I’m going to follow my musical passions."
Fleming deflected with oft-repeated stories, but she reengaged in her discussion of the opera Der Rosenkavalier by Strauss. She demonstrated her "voracious" interest in learning new roles, guided by planing and strategy, and tempered by the "eclectic."
She performed the Marschallin in several productions "and I said: I'm going to put this away now, I can sing this role later, and focus on much higher repertoire. I focused on Manon, Traviata, Thaïs, that I knew I wouldn't be able to sing later." But she lights up when she thinks of the Marschallin, "It was so wonderful to come back to it!"
There is a lovely articulation of the passage of time in Rosenkavalier: "There is something strange about time," sings the Marschallin in soliloquy, "day follows day and time is like nothing, but one day it happens, and all you feel is time."
Time led Fleming back to the Marschallin. She had absorbed this opera to such an extent that her increased sense of being "authoritative in the part" was more deeply harmonious and sympathetic than she realized.
After a brief discussion of Fleming's performance on opening night of the Met 2008-2009 season, Zahn opened a new thread by quoting from an article written by Matthew Gurewitsch in the New York Times on October 22, 2009. Fleming said:
"I was constantly being pushed toward a European ideal of what it means to be a classical or opera singer, let’s say in the Renata Tebaldi mode. I reject that. I’m American. I’m eclectic. I’m going to follow my musical passions."
Fleming deflected with oft-repeated stories, but she reengaged in her discussion of the opera Der Rosenkavalier by Strauss. She demonstrated her "voracious" interest in learning new roles, guided by planing and strategy, and tempered by the "eclectic."
She performed the Marschallin in several productions "and I said: I'm going to put this away now, I can sing this role later, and focus on much higher repertoire. I focused on Manon, Traviata, Thaïs, that I knew I wouldn't be able to sing later." But she lights up when she thinks of the Marschallin, "It was so wonderful to come back to it!"
There is a lovely articulation of the passage of time in Rosenkavalier: "There is something strange about time," sings the Marschallin in soliloquy, "day follows day and time is like nothing, but one day it happens, and all you feel is time."
Time led Fleming back to the Marschallin. She had absorbed this opera to such an extent that her increased sense of being "authoritative in the part" was more deeply harmonious and sympathetic than she realized.
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