Volume 25 Issue 7 - April 2020

Staatsoper is captivating, providing a gritty
interpretation of Janáček’s work. Featuring
an onstage cage in which the majority of the
large ensemble cast is contained throughout
the performance as well as superb costumes,
including an homage to the famous Day of
the Dead, the visual plays as important a role
in this opera as the music. It is fascinating to
see how this production so ably serves the
dramatic requirements of Janáček’s opera and
reinforces just how confined and uncomfortable
this Siberian prison camp is, as told by
Dostoyevsky.
The Staatsoper soloists, chorus and
orchestra are superb throughout this short yet
intense work, conveying the depth and darkness
of the score without once coming across
as melodramatic. One of the 20th century’s
most profound and significant operatic
composers, Janáček displays his mastery in
full force in From the House of the Dead, and
this production is highly recommended to all
who enjoy this Czech master’s works.
Matthew Whitfield
Zemlinsky – Der Traumgörge
Josef Protschka; Pamela Coburn; Janis
Martin; Hartmut Welker; Hessischer
Rundfunk Youth Chorus; RSO Frankfurt;
Gerd Albrecht
Capriccio C5395 (naxosdirect.com)
!!
In 1907, Alexander
Zemlinsky’s
new opera Der
Traumgörge was
set to premiere
at Vienna’s Court
Opera. But after
its conductor,
Zemlinsky’s mentor
Gustav Mahler, abruptly resigned as music
director of the opera house, the production
was cancelled. Zemlinsky was already
well-established as a composer, pianist,
conductor and teacher (his students included
Schoenberg, Korngold and Alma Schindler,
who later married Mahler). But it took almost
75 years for Der Traumgörge to get its first
performance.
This version, recorded live at a concert
performance in 1987, seven years after the
much-delayed premiere, has long been
unavailable. Now, with Zemlinsky’s music
finally getting the attention it deserves,
Capriccio has reissued it.
The psychological undercurrents of Der
Traumgörge’s libretto by Leo Feld resonate
with Freudian profundity. Görge the Dreamer,
who lives in a world of fairy tales, sets off on
a quest to find the princess he’s been fantasizing
about. Instead he encounters a troubled
woman, Gertraud. When she is brutally
attacked for being a witch, Görge rescues her
and brings her back home. Finally he figures
out that she is the woman of his dreams
after all.
Conductor Gerd Albrecht shows an incisive
grasp of Zemlinsky’s opulent late-Romantic
style. The terrific cast of singers get right to
the heart of this inspired music. With the only
other recording of this opera, James Conlon’s
from 2001, unavailable, it’s disappointing
that Capriccio did not include the libretto
with this release. Otherwise, it’s a most
welcome reissue.
Pamela Margles
Clytemnestra
Ruby Hughes; BBC National Orchestra of
Wales; Jac van Steen
BIS BIS-2408 SACD (naxosdirect.com)
!!
The maverick
Welsh soprano Ruby
Hughes is the star of
this alluring collection
of song cycles
which opens with
five songs by Gustav
Mahler based on the
poetry of Friedrich
Rückert, sung with admirable sensitivity and
a clear, light voice. There are of course landmark
recordings of these lieder that are richer
in tone and emotionally more compelling,
by the likes of Janet Baker, Christa Ludwig
and Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau; nevertheless
Hughes offers a youthful and well-considered
take on these intimate songs.
The Viennese premiere of Alban Berg’s
Altenberg Lieder in March 1913 was the cause
of a legendary riot. Though only two of the
five songs of the cycle were programmed, a
member of the audience soon bellowed out
that both the composer and poet (the whimsical
picture-postcard texts were authored by
Peter Altenberg) should be sent to the insane
asylum. In fact, the poet was already there!
Fisticuffs ensued and the remainder of the
concert was abandoned. The effect on Berg
was devastating. A complete performance of
this astounding composition, which presages
advances in chromaticism (including some
proto-serial elements) that foreshadow those
of his mentor Schoenberg, would not take
place until 1952, long after his death. This is
a most worthy contribution to the limited
roster of recordings of this great work.
Clytemnestra, a 25-minute song cycle by
the Welsh composer Rhian Samuel, is a vivid,
blood-curdling setting of Aeschylus’s tale
of the murder of Agamemnon by his wife.
Commissioned by the BBC Wales Orchestra
in 1994, Samuel’s libretto is constructed
solely from Clytemnestra’s point of view. This
is a garish, unabashedly cinematic work,
massively orchestrated and incorporating
some provocative electric bass guitar solos,
compellingly brought to life in a riveting
performance from both soloist and orchestra
under the direction of their principal guest
conductor Jac van Steen.
Daniel Foley
Apparition
Agata Zubel; Krzysztof Książek
CD accord ACD 263-2 (naxos.com)
!!
The 20th century
was a time of
immense creativity,
with the fundamental
building
blocks of musical
composition and
interpretation
disassembled and reconstructed by some
of Western music’s most legendary figures.
Apparition explores a number of lesserknown
and underappreciated composers
from this period, including Barber, Crumb
and Szymanowski.
This disc opens with Maurice Ravel’s
Shéhérazade, an art song triptych based
on the renowned Arabic folk tales of One
Thousand and One Nights, most famously
set to music by Rimsky-Korsakov. Ravel’s
songs feature characteristic exoticism,
combining “oriental” material with impressionistic
harmonies and long vocal lines,
expertly interpreted by Zubel and Książek.
These traditional, almost Debussian works
are sharply contrasted with George Crumb’s
Apparition, a set of songs which combine the
familiar with the avant-garde. Within this
cycle, Crumb gives the singer her expected
role, singing texts set to tunes, with a few
exceptions such as the three Vocalises,
which utilize the timbral aspect of the voice
independent of textual tethers. The piano
part, however, is a demanding essay in
extended techniques throughout the cycle, as
the pianist is required to utilize every part of
the piano to produce percussive, shimmering,
and rattling effects.
The remainder of this disc’s contents
fall between these two stylistic extremes:
Szymanowski’s Songs of a Fairy Tale
Princess, Barber’s Opus 13 songs, and
Fernando Obradors’ Canciones all align
themselves more closely with Ravel than
Crumb, bringing the 19th-century tradition
of art song forward into the 20th. As a whole,
Apparition is a well-thought-out and equally
well-performed survey of piano-voice repertoire
from the last century and well worth a
listen, especially for those who appreciate the
radical genius of George Crumb.
Matthew Whitfield
David Lang – The Loser
Rod Gilfry; Conrad Tao; Bang on a Can
Opera Ensemble; Lesley Leighton
Cantaloupe Music CA21155
(cantaloupemusic.com)
! ! When I hear a
line like, “Strangely
enough I met
Glenn on Monk’s
Mountain, my
childhood mountain,
which is also
56 | April 2020 thewholenote.com