conducting haiku

Do I know the score?
How strong is the pulse in me?
Where is it going?

Viene la sera

“Viene la sera”

My first Madama Butterfly was in the summer of 1991 with the New York City Opera.  The company engaged me for a run of nine Butterfly performances and a pair of Mikado’s after hiring me for a ten-week national tour of La bohème the previous winter.  The legendary Frank Corsaro himself directed his own decades-old Butterfly production in a major revival.

I had prepared the work once before for the San Diego Opera, did my usual homework, memorized the score, rehearsed diligently with the cast and girded my loins for what I knew would be limited rehearsal time with the orchestra.   They did grant me two 2-½ hour rehearsals, one with singers.  The catch was that the first was with two-thirds of the orchestra in New York and the second was the next day with the remaining third in Washington.  We opened that very night at the Wolf Trap Center for the Performing Arts, without a proper dress rehearsal, without my ever having seen the chorus and orchestra together or been in the pit.  The highlight of the performance, for me at least, was when the principal oboe failed to play the lick at Suzuki’s entrance because he was ASLEEP.  Mind you, this was within the first eight minutes of the opera (“WAKE UP!” one of his wind colleagues yelled through a whisper).  The rest of the evening proceeded without further mishap, but there was something indescribably poignant about performing Butterfly outdoors as night began to fall, Pinkerton serenading Butterfly, “Viene la sera…”

Next stop, the New York State Theater at Lincoln Center.  By this time, a few weeks later, I felt more confident with the work and was excited about my New York debut.  My parents flew in from Minneapolis, my teacher from Ann Arbor; my sister arranged for the post-performance reception on the Club level of the fancy hotel at which she was a concierge.  She even contrived to have a little grand piano made of white and dark chocolate for the occasion.  The performance went well, everybody left happy.  Except for the reviewer from the New York Times.  Dad and I went out early next morning in search of the paper; we opened it to the Arts sections and read, first a paragraph about the production, another paragraph about the stage direction, another about the singers, all good.  The fourth paragraph began, “The problem with the evening was…” and devolved from there.  I was understandably devastated.

The next morning, Maestro Christopher Keene, general and artistic director of NYCO, called me in to his office and told me that the company stood firmly behind me.  At one point in the run, the soprano singing the title role made a snide remark about my tempos literally as we were bowing on stage before the public; I mentioned something to the administration; the next day a note of apology appeared under my dressing room door.  I was profoundly grateful for their support; not only did the company see me through the Butterfly production, it reengaged me for the next season. The following summer, I was entrusted with another major revival, that of Bizet’s lovely Les pêcheurs de perles (1863).  For Pêcheurs I took the bold but (in my opinion) historically justified step of rewriting the ending, music, orchestration, text and storyline, reworking material from the opera.  The company agreed to perform my version, as long as the press wasn’t informed in advance.  The production was a surprise hit; none of the critics noticed the new ending, not even the Times reviewer who was generous with his praise of my work, the same who lambasted me one year earlier.

My second season at NYCO ended with two more Butterfly’s, same Corsaro production.  I just stepped in to them, no rehearsal.  A lot of fun, that.  Seriously, if you have your craft down, it is exciting and you know that your gesture really matters, that the orchestra (most of the musicians, at any rate) are actually looking.  One anomaly: At the final performance of the run, the offstage “Humming” chorus began a half bar off and stayed that way for the rest of the act. I forget exactly how it happened, must have been my fault, I suppose.  These things do occur on occasion; the company nonetheless engaged for a third season.

I was delighted when they offered me Die Fledermaus.  It was again my first chance to conduct the work, having done the musical preparation on it years earlier.  Less than delighted when they mentioned Bohème (“One of our most treasured productions”).  In spite of my pleading, they pretty much forced it on me: Don’t worry, assured the artistic administrator, the orchestra can play it in their sleep.  An ill-considered cliché, given my Wolf Trap experience.  “That’s the problem – they do,” I replied.

Fledermaus turned out to be one of those “Everything you know is wrong” experiences.  I agonized over Hans Swarovsky’s critical edition of the score, in which he convincingly challenges all of the traditions encrusted on this masterwork.  I ended up compromising, keeping some traditions, overturning others.  In the process, I personally went through the orchestra material, revising phrasings and adjusting dynamics.  I was particularly happy with the tempo of the second act concertato, “Brüderlein, Brüderlein und Schwesterlein,” which I led in a slow but robust 1.  The company was not totally behind my efforts, but at the opening performance in Saratoga in upstate New York (another venue for pre-season run-outs; it was so chilly on opening night, some strings played wearing cut-out mittens), even the artistic administrator commented with enthusiasm, “Well!” after a brisk, virtuoso rendition of the overture.

Curiously, as with Butterfly two years prior, things were less happy when we returned to New York to prepare for the Lincoln Center opening.  Even though the production had already been successfully performed on the road, a chorus member challenged me in rehearsal and in front of the cast and staff, insisting about a tempo in Act 2, “We can’t sing it at this speed.”  No one had my back that day, not even the chorusmaster.  Nor did anyone leave a note of apology under my door this time when, during a performance, the concertmaster loudly demanded “Get your f__king marks out of my part” as I went to shake his hand at the close of Act 2, the public applauding above us in the house.

Bohème went no better, and my tenure as a staff conductor at the New York City Opera came to an end.  Hence I learned one of my three crucial rules for young artists, “Pack lightly.”  Since then however, there have been more Butterfly’s, more Bohèmes, and I remain thankful to the City Opera for affording me the opportunity to lead these two works for the first time in my career.  Puccini has never come easy to me; I still find his titles challenging to conduct.  Nothing for me is more difficult than leading a well shaped Act 3 of La bohème, the work I’ve conducted more than any other.  Alas, there have been no Pêcheurs productions since and I do miss The Mikado; Lotfi Mansouri’s production for City Opera remains a highlight of my career, even though I just stepped into them; it was delightful, gorgeous to look at and exquisitely humorous.  But as it is said, one door closes, another opens; we move on, and forward.

I share this story with you, readers, in anticipation of an article specifically about “Viene la sera,” one of the great duets in our literature; how to prepare it, how to conduct it, how to help make singers shine in it and above all, what to do when the snoring starts.

- Mark Gibson

Fishing for Pearls

ON REWRITING THE FINALE OF ACT III: Les pêcheurs de perles (1863) of Georges Bizet

The decision to revise the ending of the third act of Pêcheurs was not taken lightly.  On the contrary, in my view, one begins studying any score assuming that the composer's ideas work and that what was written is effective, otherwise, the composer would have written something else.  In the case of Pêcheurs, it is clear that the efficacy of the finale has always been in question.  Bizet himself did not seem convinced enough of what he had conceived to orchestrate it.  Later productions, most notably the revival of 1883 (after Bizet's death), featured wholesale recomposition of the music and a complete altering of the dramatic action.  It became clear to me in the course of my research that, historically speaking, anything went when it came to making Pêcheurs stageworthy.

With this in mind, I proceeded on the assumption that other music could be substituted for the weak duet originally offered by Bizet, "O lumiere sainte."  This particular piece was itself adapted from Bizet's grand opera, Ivan IV, written prior to Pêcheurs, though we do not know the precise date of its composition.  In the 1893 Paris revival of Pêcheurs, contrived nearly two decades after Bizet's death, the duet was replaced by a trio written by Benjamin Godard.  Through a not very subtle rearrangement of the set pieces in the last scene, the 1893 version concludes with the murder of Zurga at the hands of a villager while Leïla and Nadir escape.  While this ending may have been more in keeping with the tastes of the time, it bears no resemblance to Bizet's apparent intent.

Upon further investigation, I came to believe that the problem did not lie with the original duet itself, although this piece is certainly not the finest moment in the opera.  In fact, this type of religious invocation is not unique in Bizet's output; to my taste his other works of this type are no more memorable.

If one accepts the authenticity of the duet from the original 1863 version and the ending wherein Zurga is not killed, one must seek opportunities for revision in the music between the duet and the final ensemble, a reprise of the classic Act I duet, "Au fond du temple sainte," sung at the close of the opera by the lovers offstage.  Focussing on this passage, all seems to be dramatically coherent through the music that describes the return of the natives to their burning village.  A recitative ensues during which Zurga confesses to Leïla and Nadir that he himself set the fire to afford the two lovers time to escape.  He does not adequately explain his motives for doing so.  Instead, upon reaching a triumphant resolution in B-Flat major, he quickly urges Leïla and Nadir to flee.  When asked what will become of him, he replies that God alone knows his fate.  Eight bars of chromatic noodling follow, awkwardly resolving in the aforementioned duet reprise, which concludes the opera.

I began by eliminating the chromatic passage, the original intent of which was, I suppose, to depict the village women in frantic flight to save their offspring.  Instead, I wanted to resolve the recitative directly into the duet reprise, transposed down to D-Flat major for the remainder of the opera.  While making more musical sense, to my ear, this did not solve what I perceived to be a crucial dramatic flaw in the preceding recitative.  By a process which was for the most part intuitive, it occurred to me that, instead of a continuation of the recitative after the B-Flat major cadence, what was wanted was a little more descriptive music.

Descriptive of what, and from whence was this music supposed to come? To answer these questions, one must inquire as to the raison d'etre of Pêcheurs itself.  The answer is vague; the librettists Carré and Cormon didn't lose any sleep pondering the dramatic reason of the work.  On the contrary, their minimal interest in the piece was summed up in Carré's remark to the effect that, had they known that Bizet would write such beautiful music, they would not have stuck him with such a "white elephant" of a libretto.

While we cannot succeed in making a dramatic whole out of Pêcheurs, I feel that, with the revision I have suggested, some sense can be made of Zurga's motivation and ultimately of his actions.  The brief interlude I have put together employs motives from two lyric episodes heard earlier in the work.  The first motive refers back to the scene in Act I when Zurga describes the type of woman sought for the vigil on the rock; the second recalls the recent confrontation between Leïla and Zurga in the cabaletta of their Act III, Scene 1 duet.  By juxtaposing these two musical ideas, it is possible to convey something of the conflict in Zurga's mind and heart as he realizes the significance of the necklace. That Zurga didn't recognize Leïla from the necklace as the girl who had saved him years earlier is echoed by a solo cello, playing the tune, "Une femme inconnue."  I see him realizing now for the first time the futility of his passion for her.  The recollection of their previous encouter makes Zurga aware that Leïla is indeed too young for him and that he, who has sacrificed his integrity as leader of the tribe first by loving her and second, by abetting her escape, must now accept the consequences of his behavior.  The second, "confrontational" motive evoked by the cello appropriately describes the difficult decision Zurga now faces and the choice he is obliged by honor to make.

In making these revisions and in writing supplementary text for the protagonists, we have turned the focus both of the scene and inevitably of the whole opera more towards Zurga.  Yet, if Pêcheurs is about anything, why shouldn't it be about Zurga; his rise to power and his fall in the face of misplaced love and honor?  Perhaps more to the point, we can say that the opera describes the evolution of the relationship between Zurga and Leïla.  In a sense, their relationship has, by the end of the opera, reverted to that of their very first encounter, when Zurga was once again a fugitive.  Now however, Zurga no longer hides behind Leïla - he has learned from her bravery and from his foolish love.  Furthermore, it seems appropriate that the opera conclude as it began, with Zurga facing the elders of the tribe.  Where earlier he accepted from them the honor and responsibility of leadership, now he must accept from them, implicitly, his ultimate fate and demise.

It is not my intent to suggest that, by these changes, I have succeeded in transforming a dramatically troubled work into a piece that functions like Carmen.  If it proves more convincing than before, if the audience does not respond with laughter and disbelief during the final recitative, as so often occurs, that would be enough compensation.  Nor is it my intent to stop looking for more appropriate and effective solutions to the problems of Les pêcheurs de perles.  For now, this is another alternative, to be added tot he long list of efforts made, for better or worse, by producers, directors, composers and conductors out of their affection for and advocacy of this glorious, flawed work.

MG

Grande MOCA

A lovely day to go to the museum in Chicago.  That used to mean a few hours at the Art Institute; now it means an intense hour at the Museum of Contemporary Art up on E. Chicago.  Splendid today.  First, we joined; it turns out to be cheaper for me to get an out-of-town membership than to buy entries for Kirstin and Paula. Then 4 great pieces outside on and around the steps by Mark Handforth; sculptures reminiscent of Claes van Oldenburg, including a work based on Cockney slang, "Phone/Bone." Inside, a large exhibition of works by Mark Bradford, an African-American "painter" who creates his canvasses without paint, using paper which he sands and processes to resemble a painted surface.  A lot of the art is political in nature, which I don't so much care for, but so many of the works themselves are simply beautiful; his aesthetic is just fabulous, and the execution outstanding.

Then after seeing an absurd, self-important performance art/interactive installation based on deconstructing (literally) jeans to address the social issues around making them, we went up to the 4th floor for the exhibition drawn from the Museum's collection based around pieces by Joseph Cornell, whose work I know well from the Walker in Minneapolis.  So many great pieces by so many "old friends," LeWitt, George Segal, Judd, even Magritte, Duchamp, Marisol, Koons, Sherman, Rauschenberg, Warhol, many, many more.  Each room was devoted to a different aspect of Cornell's work.  Extremely satisfying.

You must see new art, see how people view the recent world.  Try not to criticize; accept what you see and open your mind to the possibilities of "expanded vision" (one of my definitions of art - "the manifestation of expanded vision").  Particularly the Americans over the past 60 years; this is something very important, the strongest period of American art, apart from the brilliance of Sargent, Homer and Whistler.  Dive head first into this, well worth it, the abstract expressionists, the conceptualists, the pops.  So much good stuff.

Back to Prokofiev; an incongruous but necessary segue.

MG

2nd movement, return of A section: The Fall of Berlin

The Fall of Berlin

The discussion of a concert with the EOS Orchestra (EOS – “Excellent Orchestral Sound”) began over two years ago, initiated by my student and now colleague, the wonderful violinist, Gao Çan.  Çan serves as artistic advisor and concertmaster of EOS, which functions essentially as the New World Symphony of China, a pre-professional orchestral training academy based at the Central Conservatory of Music in Beijing.

Not long after, during a week of masterclasses at CCoM, I was invited on a day’s notice to read Mahler 4 with the orchestra.  Delivered the next morning into the underbelly of the imposing National Centre for the Performing Arts (aka the “Egg”), I was escorted to a spacious basement rehearsal room.  We began promptly at 10 am; I was nervous, having not conducted the work for 5 years, but was delighted to learn that the principal flute had previously worked with me at the Chautauqua Festival in New York.  The principal cellist played in the China Philharmonic, the principal bassoon a guest from the Detroit Symphony.  A very satisfying experience; the orchestra played well and was quite attentive.  The reading was successful, or so I felt and so I was told.  Yet it would be quite a wait before I was invited to lead the EOS in concert, just last month.

Gao Çan, who for the longest time had assured me that such an invitation would be forthcoming, was finally proud and thrilled to deliver the news.  A concert,  in July 2011, at Beijing Concert Hall; a 5-star hotel, music of Shostakovich, plus a premiere of a new work commissioned by EOS.

Which music of Shostakovich - the ambitious 1^st Symphony, the popular 5^th Symphony, the playful 9^th, the mighty 10^th?  No, the 1^st Piano Concerto – an admittedly great, if not “deep,” piece – and “film music.”  I admit to having felt slightly crestfallen.  The specific titles remained unannounced till very late in the game, perhaps two weeks prior to my trip.  The new work, ink still wet on the Sibelius program, arrive barely a week before the departure, conveniently timed (by me) one week after a hernia operation.

Trepidation about the experience soon gave way to an intangible anticipation.  It turns out that Shostakovich wrote over 30 film scores, many of which are just now coming to light.  Some of the music is surprisingly well crafted, and Shostakovich was certainly motivated to execute them well – for all he knew, had Stalin not liked them, he could have ended up in the Gulag, or simply been disappeared and killed.

And so it was that I was sent scores to suites from “The Maxim Trilogy,” “The Gadfly” and “The Fall of Berlin.”  Each score had, among other incidental music, either a polka or gallop, or both, a battle scene in up-tempo 4/4 and a waltz (bring on the dancing bear!).  None of the scores were exceptionally difficult to play or to learn.  Many 4x4 phrases, simple tunes, basic accompaniments, classic Shostakovich gestures.  But his genius somehow managed to reveal itself in surprising touches of wit, pathos and sheer Soviet vigor.  A music-hall galop from “Maxim” features a soprano soloist singing an absurd ditty.  On the Aeroflot flight from Barcelona to Beijing through Moscow, I sat next to native Russian who agreed to explain the text to me; the singer is gleefully recounting the story of how she, a footballer, let the winning goal slip between her legs, causing her team to lose.  Shocking and delightful.

Arranging the works not in chronological order but in an order that made more musical sense was not difficult.  The obvious closer was “The Fall of Berlin,” a story of love, loss and triumph during World War II.  One discovers however that the thrilling final piece in the score, while effective, is in fact a choral/orchestral anthem celebrating the person of Joseph Stalin.  After the initial shock, I decided that, as  there would be neither chorus nor synopsis, there would be no harm done in closing the body of the program with it.

The new work on the first half, entitled “Pray,” was written by a very mild-mannered, innocent-enough looking young Chinese composer.  It turned out to be a bewildering and complex endeavor.  Gratuitously difficult and over-written, it nonetheless came together with some effect.  I was glad to see a new composition not overtly based in Chinese song tradition, although that model is by no means exhausted, witness the beautiful recent work of Zhou Long. 

Unlike my previous reading with EOS, our rehearsals for this concert did not really start on time, nor did I see the entire orchestra in one place at the same time until the next to last rehearsal.  Working with the ensemble, I dealt with typical problems of orchestral/string discipline; bow placement, speed, matching strokes, visual communication within the section, tuning and balancing wind and brass sonorities.  Our work was ultimately effective and I ended up enjoying most of the music.

Two days before the concert, I was handed a DVD, with the explanation, “Here is the movie.”  What movie, I asked.  They had neglected to inform me of this minor detail, that a disc of scenes from the movies themselves was to be projected on a screen above the orchestra at the concert.  A little chagrined at not having been informed, I just accepted it and sat down to watch the DVD that night in my hotel.  “The Gadfly” (1957) was a period piece set in Italy around the time of the Reformation, lots of fancy dress and a fiery protagonist with wild eyes, presumably railing against Church corruption and excess (the disc was silent, no dialogue) before being executed by a firing squad.  The Maxim set, taken from a trilogy of three movies dating from the ‘30’s, was a contemporary story of growing up in hard times.  Finally, scenes from “The Fall of Berlin” (1949) began with a pastoral love scene amidst fields of wheat (literally, though it could have been barley...).  Battle scenes were starkly staged; the obligatory waltz provided welcome visual relief.  The finale depicting the actual battle and Soviet victory in Berlin was exciting enough, until a silver plane alit, gleaming in the sunlight, the door opened and down the steps strode General Stalin himself, resplendent in a white formal uniform, bedecked with military honors and medals, saluting and greeting the troops, some of whom then broke out in Cossock dancing.  My jaw simply dropped.  So here we were, playing and showing an ode to one of history’s most notorious mass murders, now smiling at me in my hotel room.

Curious as to how this might play in Beijing, I asked a colleague, who assured me that it would be OK, that the Chinese respected a strong leader and that they were celebrating, after all, the 90^th anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party in China.  One is not quite sure how to respond to such a statement; I let it be.

At the dress rehearsal, coordination between orchestra and film proved not to be a problem, as I had feared it would be.  I did remain haunted by this feeling of participating in a sacrilege.  Luckily, we had a built-in encore, another waltz from the 2^nd Jazz Suite for orchestra, which was used in Stanley Kubrick’s last movie, “Eyes Wide Shut.”  The sight of Tom Cruise traipsing around Venice did provide welcome relief, at least for this viewer.  The performance was quite successful, but a final note of incongruity sounded afterward, when I was greeted backstage by my colleague, Kurt Sassmanshaus, Starling Chair of Classical Violin at CCM.  The synchronicity of irony finally struck home: An American Jew, conducting a Chinese orchestra in “The Fall of Berlin,” music by a Russian celebrating the man he despised and feared most, one of history’s most infamous tyrants, for an audience that included a German.

Got to get back to Copland – “A Lincoln Portrait,” perhaps? -  but the next project is Prokofiev 5.  Wonder who will be in the audience for that…

Mark Gibson

2nd movement, cont.: Heroism denied - Mahler's 6th Symphony

Heroism denied – Mahler’s 6^th Symphony

For four symphonies, from the 2^nd to the 5^th, Mahler employed and refined new paradigms of symphonic invention, primarily through the use of material – genre, motive and melody - from Des knaben Wunderhorn.  Prior to Mahler, formal models for symphonic movements were derived from Baroque dance movements, among them the Allemande, Sarabande, Gigue and Minuet.  Through Mahler, these models were replaced by the funeral or military march, the Ländler, the waltz and the chorale.  Symphonies 2, 3 and 4 deal with issues of immortality; of heavenly and earthly life, of redemption.  In them we experience resurrection, the tragedy of earthly life; we appeal to and are finally afforded a precious glimpse of heaven, all through the vehicle of folk songs, ditties and dances transformed into symphony. 

The 5^th Symphony, though not usually considered a “Wunderhorn” symphony, is less a different beast from its predecessors than it is the culmination, the apotheosis of Mahler’s symphonic metamorphosis up to that point.  In it, Mahler seems to set forth the ultimate funeral march, the most mordant scherzo, the grandest waltz, the most enchanting love song, the most complicated symphonic fugue, the most radiant chorale and throughout, the most virtuosic writing for orchestra.  It is, in effect, Mahler’s Heldenleben, a triumphant portrait of the symphonic master at the height of his compositional powers.

As a metaphor for turn of the century Viennese society, for a Europe surging into the modern era, Mahler’s 5^th Symphony perfectly reflects the Zeitgeist of a historical period that seemed not to know any boundaries, nor limits to human accomplishment and vision; an overabundance of talent, intellect and energy, slightly tinged with a degree a decadence.  It had, at least in appearance, the makings of a heroic time in Western civilization.

Or so society believed.  Without winding the clock forward to the almost inevitable reckoning of 1914, let us stay with Mahler as he faces his own crisis of faith, the result of which was the Symphony no. 6 in A Minor, referred to as the “Tragic.”  One cannot be sure what led to this crisis.   The personal disasters that would befall him shortly after the composition of the 6^{th –}  the diagnosis of his heart condition, the death of his eldest daughter, the loss of his position in Vienna - could not possibly have been predicted.  No, Mahler was himself at the summit of his career as both conductor and musical authority when he embarked on the 6^th; what ate at his soul, what caused in him this outcry of pain, remains to this day a secret.

Thus he knew it would not be understood, this new work, even by those familiar with his earlier symphonies.  To a public accustomed to the heroic sound of a Strauss tone poem, in an era of societal affluence previously unknown in Western history, the last movement of the 6th in particular must have been acutely distressing.  Yet from our perspective, we can see that Mahler, ever the striver, really had no other symphony to write after the 5^th; he had already gone over the top.   Perhaps prescient of a society overloaded with confidence, turning decadent to the point of collapse, Mahler gave his public a rare view into the possibility of tragedy, of tragedy to come perhaps; of vague origin, but of devastating, inescapable consequence.  What other symphonic work from any period of music paints (or at least concludes with) a grimmer sonic portrait than does the 6^th, especially when seen in relief against the splendor of fin-de-siècle Vienna?

For the public at the premiere, the first movement perhaps didn’t come as much of a surprise; a robust, if grim, march, a wayward transitional chorale, contrasted with an ecstatic love melody, in strict sonata-allegro form, thrillingly executed by a master of form and orchestral timbre.  The sound of distant, vague cowbells must have surprised and intrigued on first hearing, but all doubt would be vanquished by the triumphant surge of love with which the movement concludes. 

No, Mahler’s surprise apparently was to have been the Allegro that followed.  Was his audience ready for this relentless Scherzo, which is at root a continuation of the march of the 1^st movement, but in 3/8 meter?  The tempo is identical (8^th note = quarter note), the play of ½ steps from major to minor is inexorable, the contrasting sections a mockery of another outdated dance form, the gavotte, dubbed by Mahler “Ältväterisch” – “Old fashioned.”  To my sensibility, whatever radiant glow the public feels at the end of the 1^st movement is surely snuffed out by the initial timpani blow of the Scherzo.   We would not hear this type of music again until the Burleske-Rondo of the 9^th, in which bitterness becomes rage; mockery turns savage.

As challenging as this Scherzo might have been for the public, the bigger question for me is: Was Mahler, baton in hand, 1^st movement over, himself ready to launch into the Scherzo?  And here is the root of controversy, for Mahler never performed it this way; he switched the order of the middle movements after the work had already been published, opting instead to follow the Allegro with the elegiac Andante.   For over a century, this decision has been steeped in controversy.  Although nearly all documentary, empirical evidence points to the Andante-Scherzo sequence, vigorously so in the new critical edition of Reinhold Kubik and the Kaplan Foundation, I will vouch for the original order, after experiencing the work myself from the podium.

The logical issue I offer is this: Does the fact that Mahler never performed the original sequence necessarily mean that he didn’t want or wouldn’t have preferred it performed that way?  Is it not possible that in the heat of the first performance he simply couldn’t bring himself to do it; that he could not bear the emotional roller coaster of going from the ecstatic conclusion of the Allegro directly into the macabre horror of the Scherzo?

In our performance last March, we did follow the Allegro with the Scherzo, which made, at least for those of us performing it, a powerful, overwhelming effect.  Following the Scherzo, we gave the audience an extended breather (2-3 minutes), consistent with Mahler’s own indication of a 5-minute pause after the first movements of the 2^nd (1895) and 3^rd (1896) symphonies.  80 straight minutes of such intensity would have been awful burden on the audience (if not on their psyches, at least on their bladders,), not to mention on the orchestra.  We tuned and went into the E-flat glory of the Andante.

The second half of the equation – what best should precede the monumental 4^th movement – has been, to my knowledge, under-addressed.  What became obvious both to me and to the Philharmonia in preparing the work was a sense of rightness going from valedictory ending of the Andante into the oblivion of the initial augmented 6^th chord with which the final movement begins.  Rather than explain the why of it, which merely would reduce the effect to an equation of harmonic relationships, I ask the listener to experience it in this order.

I am intrigued by and have thought a lot about the messages Mahler seeks to convey to the listener in the 6^th, particularly after the 1^st movement, even as I am hesitant to “explain” what I see and hear in the score.  That remains the challenge of every listener and student; to come to terms with Mahler’s language in his or her own way.  I will venture that the initial tune of the last movement, removed from its underlying harmony, bears the imprint of heroism.  The cut of the phrase, the expansiveness of its design, echoes similar ideas in his previous scores; it speaks to me of striving, of overcoming fate, of mankind’s ultimate ascendancy.  But set over the no-man’s land of the A-Flat augmented 6^th chord, the soaring line descends all too rapidly, losing faith in itself.  Suddenly and dramatically bolstered by and reinforced in A Major, the heroic tone rises again, only to stumble on the all-too-familiar ½ step shift to the minor, to the beat of the ever-fateful drum cadence.  The tragedy that unfolds over the next half hour is a journey that I, as a human and as a musician, approach with dread and awe.  While the symphony ends on the darkest side of Mahler’s worldview, it ultimately describes another chapter in our quest for and failure to realize the best within the human spirit.

Mahler’s view would not remain so desperate and hopeless.  In the continuum of his oeuvre, the 6^th will be followed by the mystery and magic of the 7^th, the majesty and pageant of the 8^th, the bittersweet musings on life and mortality of Das Lied von der Erde, and the ultimate symphonic statement that is the 9^th.  But at that moment in time, Mahler, at that premiere performance, knew only the extent of his terrifying vision for himself and perhaps for humanity.   He could only see on the podium, laid out in the score before him, his trajectory for disaster; future triumphs were if anything a distant dream.   Thus he chose, for whatever reason, to avoid what I consider the braver, more dramatic choice; the heroic choice.  Heroism denied.  We will never comprehend the why of his personal decision, but we are certainly entitled to question and to challenge it.   And indeed, to reverse it, if just this once.

- Mark Gibson

2nd movement - Perfection

PERFECTION

The kitchen is clean, the dishwasher is running, Paula is back home, safe and sound and it is another sunny Spoletino morning.  Am dwelling on the conclusion of the first act of Dominick Argento’s masterwork, Casanova, in which the true identity of a young woman, brought up as a male castrato so she can make a living on the stage, is discovered by our hero, who slyly asks if she has ever been “curious” about the opposite sex.  She responds coyly, “I have often wondered about men.”  Casanova puts out the last candle in the salon, gently offering, “Well then...?” as the scene goes to black, the principal motive echoing in the celesta.

I think, perfection.  As satisfying, beautiful and well crafted a 1^st act finale as has ever been written.  Other brilliant Act 1 finales come to mind - poignant, as in Der Rosenkavalier, passionate, as in Madama Butterfly; thrilling as in Don Giovanni.

Do first act finales tend to bring out the best of an opera composer?  Is that level consistently maintained in the following act, and if so, how?   I mean really, how do you follow up on the Te Deum from Tosca?  In fact, this transitional detail, often overlooked, is crucial to keeping the attention of an audience; great operas feature both a gripping conclusion and a continuation that is at least interesting, if not as compelling, and that brings the public back into the drama after an interval of socializing, tweeting, drinking or just lining up for the restrooms.

In the old days, it was perhaps easier, the convention having been established that the 2^nd act would begin with a recitative summarizing the state of affairs at the conclusion of Act 1; think of Barbiere di Siviglia, or the start of Act 3 Figaro.  Even in lyric bel canto and early Verdi, convention ruled, albeit a new one; Act 2 began with an extended scena (recitative-aria) for one of the protagonists.  Often, the occasion is marked by extreme contrast; the intimate conclusion of Act 1 of La bohème is followed by a boisterous chorus scene (same in La Rondine, in fact).   Act 2 of Rosenkavalier is a breathless sprint leading up to the Presentation of the Rose.  The aforementioned Casanova introduces a new character of mystery and magic as its curtain rises on the 2^nd act.

It is not my intent to catalogue systematically all of the notable Act 1 to 2 sequences and transitions (or Act 2 to 3, as in a work such as Figaro or Carmen, wherein the major dividing point of a four-act work is after the Act 2).  It is perhaps to be reminded – to paraphrase Lao Tse - that, between what it contains and what form it takes, the usefulness of a bowl is defined by the space within, not by the object itself.   The listener (and conductor, for that matter) may well take these moments in opera for granted, but the great works, of which I mention only a few, all feature an effective solution to this concern, conceived with much attention and care by the composer, be it the conventional – “Ella mi fu rapita” from Rigoletto – the narrative – “Ola Pang, Ola Pong!” in Turandot – or the “domestic” openings of Act 2 Butterfly and Manon.

Of the works mentioned above, I am especially interested in how Acts 2 of Giovanni and Tosca begin, for different reasons, of course.  Giovanni’s little 3/8 ditty “Eh via, buffone,” may well grab the listener, but I find it gratuitous, if virtuosic.  The descending three-note scale motive that sets up Act 2 of Tosca is among Puccini’s most intriguing inventions; both passages I find challenging to conduct and to render musically effective.  And yet for the audience and in their function as part of their respective theatrical stories, they are both perfection.

Time to practice some Mendelssohn.  It’s fun to write again, hope you will enjoy reading these missives from Umbria.

Mark Gibson

7/18/11

Puccini's Turandot - a conductor's perspective, 1st draft for public consumption

Puccini’s Turandot - a conductor’s perspective

Puccini’s last opera, Turandot (1924, final scene completed by Franco Alfano, 1926) is an icon, among the grandest of grand operas in any language, style or period.  Based on a fable of the Venetian master, Carlo Gozzi (1720-1806), it is in large part pageant and masque. Overcoming a narrative that is at times slender, Puccini transcends its dramatic limitations with a score that is in many respects his most ambitious and beautiful.  Yet in expanding this Commedia dell’Arte tale into operatic spectacle, Puccini seemed to fall into a dramatic trap that afforded little hope of convincing resolution, even had he survived to attempt it.

The initial proclamation of the Mandarin lays out the dramatic premise of Acts 1 and 2 in two sentences.  First, the come on: “Turandot, la pura, sposa sarà, di chi di sangue regio spiega tre enigmi ch’ella proporrà.”  Simple enough –Turandot the pure will be the bride of anyone of noble blood (i.e. a Prince) who can explain three riddles she will propose.  Then, the catch: “Ma chi affronta il cimento e vinto resta porge alla scura la superba testa.”  Get one wrong and you lose your head.  No lifeline, no audience input.

The Mandarin further reports that Fortune did not smile on the Prince of Persia (“…avversa ebbe fortuna…”) and therefore at the rising of the moon, he will die at the hand of the executioner.  What follows is almost impossible to reenact on the stage, a riot by the assembled masses, including a clash with armed, brutal guards.  Cinematic in scope, it is a logistical nightmare for even the most gifted stage director.  At a moment like this, we appreciate the opportunity to present the work in concert.  The savagery of the music, the breadth of the phrase needs no stage action to communicate its intent and scope.  At this point, the chorus is revealed as a major protagonist in the opera (which is why we have chosen to place the choral forces downstage), at turns bloodthirsty, empathetic, entranced by the wonder of the moon, as well as by the mystique of Turandot herself.  While they cry for blood in the beginning of the initial choral sequence (“Gira la cote!”), they later implore mercy from Turandot, who merely gestures that the Prince of Persia be put to death. An unknown prince falls in love - or becomes obsessed - with that cruel, beautiful princess at the exact moment she condemns yet another would-be suitor to beheading.

While it is made clear through her tacit appearance in Act 1 that Turandot is responsible for condemning the Prince of Persia and others to their fate, we do not grasp until much later that Turandot actually delights in the murder of her failed suitors.  The recounting by Turandot’s three ministers, Ping, Pang and Pong, in Act 2, Scene 1, of how many have died in pursuit of the Princess, from whence they came and the handicapping of the latest Prince does not address her motives.  The rationale for the murders is not made explicit until the 2^nd scene of Act 2, the opera more than half over, when Turandot herself finally speaks, “In questa reggia or son mill’anni e mille, un grido disperato risuonò.” (“In this reign, now thousands of years old, a desperate cry rang forth”).   In this celebrated aria, she offers no welcome, there is no joy, there is no spark of love in her, so bent is she on avenging the rape and murder of her ancestor, Lou-Ling.  She is obsessed to the point of being estranged from her own father, the Emperor, who, by now tired of the killing (“Basta sangue; giovine, va!” “Enough blood!  Young man, leave!”), pleads three times for the Prince to leave.  It is interesting that Turandot tells the assembled no one will ever have her (“No, mai nessun m’avra!” – “No, no one will ever have me!”) to some of Puccini’s most ravishing music.  The intent of Turandot’s final, menacing trope - “Gli enigmi sono tre, la morte è una” (“The riddles are three, death is but one”) - is reversed by the unknown Prince, responding that, while there may be three riddles, there is one life.  Only Puccini would dare to pair the two protagonists on an ecstatic high C (over a minor harmony; note the motion from A-Flat Major to F Minor).

Puccini sets the three riddles, recited by the Princess herself, with relative economy.  Rather than resorting to the obvious tritone interval, he employs a rising ½ step and descending diminished 4^th in the vocal line, saving the tritone for punctuation in the low strings, winds and percussion.  While Turandot recites the riddles impersonally (as she apparently has done many times prior), the unknown Prince addresses her directly with each response.  On hearing his correct answer to the first riddle, she snaps back, “Sì, la speranza che delude sempre.” (Yes, the hope that always deludes”).  I can’t help but be reminded how far we have come from Des Grieux’s suave, elegant flirtation with Manon Lescaut (1893), “Cortesa damigella, il prego mio accettate” (“Gentle young lady, please allow me…”). When Turandot actually addresses the unknown Prince, it is essentially with trash talk, “Su, straniero, ti sbianchi di paura. E ti senti perduto.” (“Come on, stranger, you are white with fear.  And you feel lost.”)

Of dramatic necessity, the Prince’s hesitation before answering the final riddle is lengthier than those of the preceding two.  No one, including those among us who know the outcome, can resist the visceral thrill of the chromatic ascent culminating in the E-Flat Major apotheosis as the royal Court’s sages validate the unknown Prince’s response.

But Turandot is a bad loser, to the point of trying to break the rules, vainly pleading with her father in vaguely seductive tones and defying the Prince in several pages of exquisite music often overlooked in the surrounding hit parade.  The Emperor allows her no relief; the masses defend the right of the Prince to her hand.  In response to her final threat (“Mi vuole riluttante, fremente?” – “Would you have me reluctant, trembling?”), set to the third of the scene’s musical climaxes, the Prince is given by Puccini the formidable task of returning yet one more high C:  “No, no, Principessa altera, ti voglio tutt’ardente d’amor!”  (“No, proud princess, I want you burning with love!”) No wonder the chorus exults in his triumph, “Coraggioso, audace!”

An unbreachable impasse:  She will not love him; he will only have her if she is inflamed with love.  In C Major, no less.  The Prince’s solution is to pose his own riddle, though it is a non sequitur; if she can discover his name before sunrise, he will agree to die.  This Vorspeise of “Nessun dorma” (“No one sleeps”) is among Puccini’s final coups de theatre; he would never, to my mind, write another moment so subtle, so apt and so moving.

The first scene of Act 3, Puccini’s final musical and dramatic statement, in spite of much beautiful music, - note for instance the neglected aria for Liù, “Tanto amore segreto” (“Such secret love”) – is flawed, at least to my mind.  The instrumental writing is awkward to play; more gravely, resolving the dramatic conflict eludes him, especially the confrontation between Turandot and Liù.  The depiction of the onstage torture and murder of Liù did not play to his strong compositional suits (In Act 2 of Tosca, Cavaradossi is tortured offstage).   By the time Scene 1 concludes, we are left with an unsympathetic heroine in the Princess and a Prince who has verbally abused a defenseless slave girl.  Even the ministers, while they express remorse over Liu’s death, have already betrayed their hostility towards women in general, their mendacity and their cowardice in the sequence following Nessun dorma.  A most inopportune time for Puccini to pass on.

To my taste, this is not the first time Puccini fell short in his last acts, particularly as he matured. Tosca (1900), Madama Butterfly (1904)(at least until Butterfly’s entrance), La Fanciulla del West (1910) and La Rondine (1917) all suffer, to one degree or another, from some inertia either musically and dramatically in their final scenes.

Left to reconcile the unreconcilable upon Puccini’s death (November 29, 1924) was Franco Alfano, not the first choice of the publisher; Ricordi would have preferred Umberto Giordano, composer of Andrea Chenier (1896), for the execution of the crucial last scenes.  I, like many, used to look down on Alfano’s efforts; now I cut him considerably more slack.  Left in the dramatic abyss, he cuts through the conflict by having the Prince force a kiss on Turandot’s lips, after which she improbably collapses, in tears and in love.  Volumes have been written about this unsatisfying sequence, but would Puccini’s long sought-after last great tune have solved the dramatic problem any better, even if it might have been more musically persuasive?  

Some of Alfano’s ideas do come off as, for lack of a better word, cheesy.  The hummed melismae of the chorus set to half diminished 7^th chords would hardly have been Puccini’s solution, though they are characteristic of post-Puccini musical vocabulary (see works of Riccardo Zandonai, 1883-1944).  The orchestration is frankly awkward.  Better perhaps had he emulated Puccini’s penchant for parallel triads one last time, maybe even invoking his favorite G-Flat Major (“Ch’ella mi creda” from Fanciulla, “Amare sol per te m’era il morire” from Tosca, “Io so, che alle sue pene, from Butterfly) to afford the unknown Prince a chance for sympathetic entreaty.   Nonetheless, Turandot’s aria “Del primo pianto,” (“Of my first kiss”) does contain a touching turn of phrase that, while it never makes us forget Puccini, rises above the preceding pages.  What does work, quite well to these ears, is the subsequent transformation of the 2^nd act riddle motive after Calaf makes known his identity, “La mia gloria è il tuo bacio” (“Your kiss is my glory”).  Alfano returns to safer ground in the transition to the final scene, by which time perhaps the audience no longer expects a rational dramatic ending – it is, after all, but a fable (albeit perhaps with a thyroid problem) – and is quite content to enjoy a final rendering of “Nessun dorma,” sung by the chorus.  At the time of its first performances (not at the premiere itself, when Toscanini famously put down his baton after Liù’s death), it must have been palpably thrilling and effective, even before the tune itself became, with a little help from the legendary tenor, Luciano Pavarotti (1935-2007), the most recognizable phrase in the repertoire; the Beethoven 5th of Italian opera.

It still moves us to goosebumps, even to tears.  Preparing and performing Turandot on Corbett stage has been memorable for all of us involved; indeed, it has been transformative.  Thank you for sharing this evening with us, for joining us in our celebration and homage to one of the greatest composers of the lyric theatre, Giacomo Puccini (1858-1924) in his ultimate masterwork.

- Mark Gibson, Director of Orchestral Studies