Idomeneo, Mozart is released J opener my participation in the eighteenth
Challenge with the first post of a series of five that have in common the year 1781
. Why this year rather than another? Because I wanted to devote a top ticket to the epic naval Suffren in India and the Battle of Yorktown, one of the turning of the War of Independence of the United States, two times of the year 1781. I had to find three other subjects on the year 1781 to set my goal for the Challenge. I wanted to explore other sections seventeen huitiméistes this occasion, for example in the field of science and the music.
Now I just read a file on the operas of Mozart
in the latest issue of the journal
Diapason (No. 587, January 20100). And that got me interested in
Idomeneo, rè di Creta (
Idomeneo, King of Crete ), an opera I'd never heard until then and which he found that the first was given in January 1781, then Mozart was twenty-five years (and two days for lovers of precision!).
Well, as said, I did not really remember the myth of Idomeneo, and I had to put his nose in a book to refresh my memory : A tragic story of a father forced to kill his son to keep a promise made to god in exchange for his help. However, I remembered that this opera was thrust into the spotlight when his performances at the Opera House in Berlin had been canceled because of threats, but I recognize that I had not researched the subject at the time, and therefore had not only kept some very superficial.
verification, the suspension of performances in September 2006, was decided after threats from religious fundamentalists, believing outrageous staging of this opera by Hans Neuenfels. This was indeed included in his staging the severed heads of Poseidon (the god of which the debtor is Idomeneo), Buddha, Mohammed and Jesus Christ.
I know nothing of this Hans Neuenfels, and I do not allow myself a lot of comments on his staging of this opera that I have not seen it. I'll just say that putting on the same plate of those severed heads of a god, two prophets, and an "alert" is a strange mixture of genres, and I difficult to understand the message if it is to kill gods get free, then beheaded all the gods, and not prophets.
I'm not fond of directors who insist on shoving all of the work, to make it contemporary or timeless, some are doing very well, others only lead to something artificial that is losing the essence of the original work. But on the other hand, I hold in deep detestation of the followers of all religions, and their threats of censorship.
But back to the opera itself. I do not pretend to make me an idea just by reading the score and libretto. So I leave to go to the discovery of this work, listening to a recording and some reading about of this opera, whose edition of the journal Diapason I mentioned above.
For what I read,
Idomeneo, control panel for the carnival in Munich, mark the hinge between the operas "youth" of Mozart and his series of masterpieces lumber: two operas "serious" Idomeneo
and The Abduction from the Seraglio
and three comedies, The Marriage of Figaro
,
Don Giovanni, Cosi fan tutte and
and Finally, the other two operas "serious," The Clemency of Titus
and The Magic Flute . It was also after
Idomeneo Mozart left Salzburg for Vienna, his father and the Archbishop for the emperor, perhaps the philosophy of the counter, but I let myself think that Mozart may have found an echo in this Idomeneo change its own situation. Mozart is freed from the walls of the family, shook off the yoke of this tyrant guard what was the archbishop, and took over the creation of opera, scrapping with the author of the book, Giambattista Varesco (failing to confront directly the Archbishop, Mozart takes away from his court chaplain?), not to allow themselves to impose its views. Opera
control, of course, but personal work! Mozart traces its own path, between the lines of opera seria in Italy and the French lyric tragedy, bringing a breath particular. Obviously it's tragic, dramatic, and therefore, sometimes a little pompous to me, who prefer lighter moods. But it's still already Mozart.
It will take me a few listens of this opera to discover the richness, subtlety, make me think more developed. Listen, also, to varying interpretations, to explore how different leaders, different singers, different orchestras are appropriate.
For now, I trusted the reviews found in magazines and on the net, for my first plays:
- the version edited by Nikolaus Harnoncourt, registered in 1980 Tedec, and j 't played in a repeat of 2005 Warner Classics;
- one under the direction of René Jacobs, Harmonia Mundi, 2009, HMC902036.38
I will let fall the curtain on this Idomeneo Mozart's raising another curtain to reveal the screen which projects the Barry Lyndon (1975) Stanley Kubrick. Indeed, if we use most often in the musical part of this film, the haunting Sarabande by Handel, it is the Walk this Idomoneo which accompanies the entrance of Redmond Barry in the big world.
* * * * *
Additional lighting: With Mozart, a journey through his operas of Claire Coleman and Fernando Ortega (Lethielleux editions, 2010, ISBN 978-2-249-62055-3).
* * * * *
For further ten huitiméiste, I note that this myth of Idomeneo also inspired:
- Idomeneo , tragedy in five acts and in verse Crebillon father (1705);
- Idomeneo , musical tragedy of Andre Campra a booklet Danchet Antoine (1712).
* * * * *
