Bluebeard’s Castle, the only opera the Hungarian composer ever wrote, is seen as one of the most important operatic works of the 20th century due to its ground-breaking music and dramaturgical approach.
Bartók transforms the Bluebeard story into a contemporary operatic thriller, one deeply mystical, suffused with symbolism, and marked by an uncommon psychological lucidity and emotional intensity. The work’s director, Themelis Glynatsis, notes: “ The Bluebeard folktale, one of the bloodiest stories in the Western canon, tells of an aristocrat who marries young women only to murder them when they defy his command forbidding them to explore his castle. The symbolist text written by Béla Balázs gave Bartók the opportunity to compose one of his most impressive scores, one that makes full use of the timbres offered up by an exceptionally large orchestra –including even the imposing tones of a church organ– to delineate each of the work’s images with incredible power. Behind each she finds a different world, untold riches, the glory and heroism of her husband – but also pain, tears, and blood. Wishing to learn more about her husband’s past, Judith opens the seven doors inside Bluebeard’s castle, one after the other.
A rare work of crisp concision, Bartók’s opera boasts just two characters – Bluebeard and his most recent wife, Judith. Projection design: Marios Gampierakis, Chrysoula Korovesiįeaturing: Tassos Apostolou, Violetta Loustaīluebeard’s Castle by the Hungarian composer Béla Bartók is based on the folktale La Barbe bleue by Charles Perrault, published in 1697. This production is made possible by a grant from the Stavros Niarchos Foundation (SNF) to enhance the GNO’s artistic outreach. The evening opens with Bartók’s brooding and bloody masterpiece, and closes with Puccini’s dark comedy – a light-hearted farce considered the most radiant and joyous work in the composer’s oeuvre. Two works that both premiered in the same year (1918), in Budapest and New York respectively. The Greek National Opera presents an anthology piece comprising two magnificent one-act operas: one dramatic – Bluebeard’s Castle in a new staging by Themelis Glynatsis the other comic – Gianni Schicchi directed by John Fulljames.
0 kommentar(er)
