El Blog de Tritó » Opera

New operas, old problems, by Javier Pérez Senz

Javier Pérez Senz — Wed, 15 Jun 2011 13:10:42 +0000

Appearances are deceptive. After the world premiere of Jo, Dalí, an opera by the octogenarian and fortunately still busy Catalan composer Xavier Benguerel (Barcelona, 1931), with a libretto by Jaime Salom, held on 8 June at the Teatro de la Zarzuela in Madrid, with stage production by Xavier Albertí and music direction by Miquel Ortega, now it is the turn of the Spanish premiere, on 25 June, of LByron, Un estiu sense estiu (A year without a summer), at the Gran Teatre del Liceu, an opera by another, much younger Catalan composer, Agustí Charles (Manresa, 1960), with a libretto by Marc Rosich. The world premiere took place last March in Darmstadt at the Staatstheather, co-producer of the production that will be staged at the temple of opera in the Ramblas, with the stage and musical direction by Alfonso Romero Mora and Martin Lukas Meister, respectively.

At first glance, two premieres in succession suggest that contemporary Catalan opera composition is in a particularly sweet moment. But this is not the case.

Benguerel’s work has been premiered ten years after the date of its composition, so the closeness to the premiere of Charles’s work is purely coincidental. In fact, the list of composers who are waiting to premiere works in Spanish opera houses is growing steadily longer because, unless things change, premieres will continue to take place in dribs and drabs.

The list of composers who are waiting to premiere works in Spanish opera houses is growing steadily longer because, unless things change, premieres will continue to take place in dribs and drabs.

No matter how much they say that opera is in fashion, what is actually in fashion are the same old titles, the so-called great repertoire, as if the masterpieces of the twentieth century – in a fascinating range of styles that includes, citing only the most representative, Richard Strauss, Benjamin Britten, Leo Janacek, Dmitri Shostakovich, Bela Bartok, Sergei Prokofiev, Olivier Messiaen and Ligeti Györg – did not also constitute a large repertoire.

Like it or not, opera is still alive. With 500 years of tradition, and hundreds of authors around the world still producing operas. Composers such as Hans Werner Henze, Helmuth Lacheman, Tan Dun, Philippe Boesmans, George Benjamin, Olga Neuwirth, Harrison Birtwistle, and a long list of others that can include, without any reservations, Spanish musicians such as Cristóbal Halffter, José María Sánchez-Verdú, Enric Palomar and Hèctor Parra.

I only know of two ways of finishing with contemporary opera. One is, of course, by not programming it, a politically incorrect option, but cherished by this plague of political managers who only talk about culture with a calculator in the hand. And they’re not bothered: as today’s opera is not in favour with the public, it is unlikely that there will a demonstration demanding more premieres.

The other way to settle the matter, much more perverse, is to do the bare minimum: badly produce new works in unsuitable venues,. The argument is always the same: a lack of resources, poor attendances, they don’t sell a thing and the halls are almost empty. So, in the end they hire mediocre, run-of-the-mill orchestras, voices and conductors. Bad news, because there’s nothing that does more damage to a new score that a bad premiere: it kills dead any possibility of further shows.

To alleviate these shortcomings, small and medium-scale productions were invented, an initiative that can only give good results when the emphasis is really placed on quality performances. New opera must be presented on the same level as the old titles in the repertoire. If not, we’d better wait in silence for better times to come.

The Magic Opal by Isaac Albéniz

Arnau Farré — Thu, 14 Apr 2011 10:10:27 +0000

Josep Pla was of the opinion that music should be systematically understandable: “if necessary, to the point of sheer vulgarity, mud and bricks and that’s it.” The operetta genre lends itself more freely to this description than others, or to put it in a more pedantic and euphemistic way, this excess of comprehensibility.

Using an eccentric libretto that situates the action on the coast of Greece (a circumstance that determines the names of some characters but has no influence on the music, unless it’s the abundance of Phrygian cadences) Isaac Albéniz complies effectively with the customs of Victorian operetta.

Now, in a magnificent edition by Borja Mariño, this work is newly available and we have the opportunity to approach it with a full and thorough knowledge of the facts. Forget any condescension towards the genre, though: it is more than likely that “The Magic Opal” has moments of ambivalent simplicity in store for us, unbearable and delicious at the same time.

Listen to an excerpt from The Magic Opal >

Hypermusic Prologue at the Gran Teatro del Liceu

Leticia Martin — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 13:15:56 +0000

Hypermusic Prologue is, for the moment, Hèctor Parra’s most ambitious project, one of the great achievements of European contemporary music in this century. The opera libretto was written by the prestigious theoretical physicist Lisa Randall and has been published by Tritó in a clear show of support for this work by Parra and the new contemporary music.

It is new style of opera, a unique project for intercommunication between science, music and art. In this work the traditional form of opera is explored to generate a form of dramatic expression suited to the 21st century, its ideas and creative processes, including recent research into physics and its parallelisms with music and art.

Hypermusic Prologue, for soprano, baritone, ten instruments and electronics, was composed in 2008 and 2009. It was commissioned by the Ensemble Intercontemporain, the Institut de Recherche et Coordination Acoustique/Musique (IRCAM), the Centre Pompidou, and the Department of Culture of the Catalan Government (Generalitat). It was premiered in Paris on 14 June 2009 as part of the programming of the Festival Agora.

Further information and tickets.

Premiere of Hypermusic Prologue, by Hèctor Parra

Marcel Soleda — Thu, 11 Jun 2009 15:43:17 +0000

Sunday 14 June saw the premiere of “Hypermusic Prologue, a projective opera in seven planes” at the Centre Pompidou in Paris, a work by the composer Hèctor Parra with a libretto by the well-known professor of theoretical physics from Harvard University, Lisa Randall.

Hypermusic Prologue was commissioned by the Ensemble Intercontemporain, the Institut de Recherche et Coordination Acoustique/Musique (IRCAM), the Centre Pompidou itself, and the Department of Culture of the Catalan Government.

The same production will be presented at the Gran Teatre del Liceu in Barcelona on 27 and 28 de November.

Information about its premiere on the Catalan Television…

Hèctor Parra in the newspaper El País

Marcel Soleda — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 13:59:51 +0000

The journalist Javier Pérez Senz has interviewed Hèctor Parra in the Babelia section of El País (6 June). The composer discussed his projective opera “Hypermusic Prologue“, his complex creative process, and his relationship with the American theoretical physicist Lisa Randall. He also mentioned how proud he feels to have been able to work on such a project with the Ensemble Intercontemporain.

“What I aim for as a creator is to move the listeners, stir their spirits and open up their imaginations to new sound energies in the awareness that, in a nutshell, composing is searching for oneself”.

A face-to-face encounter with the composer that preluded the première, which took place on 14 June at the Centre Pompidou in the French capital.

Link to the interview.

Opera 2.0 (2nd part)

Marcel Soleda — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 10:18:39 +0000

The second part of the preparations for the premiere of Hypermusic Prologue, a new type of opera. This video focuses on the set design and the scenery, by the set designer Paul Desveaux and the artist Matthew Ritchie.

Opera 2.0 (1st part)

Leticia Martin — Thu, 28 May 2009 12:25:42 +0000

Hypermusic Prologue, the opera by Hèctor Parra with a libretto by Lisa Randall, will be premiered in Paris on 14 June at the Centre Pompidou. During the two weeks leading up to this premiere we have been able to take a closer look at the Ensemble Intercontemporain’s work on its development and production, through the rehearsals and other videos with previous information.

Thanks to Youtube we can personally experience the birth of an opera in the 21st century.

Hypermusic Prologue and Hèctor Parra in Accents

Leticia Martin — Wed, 06 May 2009 13:13:44 +0000

Issue no. 38 of the review Accents published by the Ensemble Intercontemporain is dedicated to Hèctor Parra’s Hypermusic Prologue.

Hypermusic Prologue is a unique project for intercommunication between science, music and art. It explores the traditional opera form in order to generate a type of dramatic expression for the 21st century, its ideas and creative processes, including recent research into physics and its parallelisms in music and art.

The main character, a composer and scientist, experiences deep tension between his “earthly love” and his “passion for knowledge”. This tension is built up dramatically through the contradictions between his life with his lover, limited in space and time, and his conviction that there is a much bigger world waiting to be explored.

This opera represents an opportunity to foster the search for more expressive forms for the drama and the musical possibilities. Its object is to find aesthetic structural connections through sound between that most abstract of the arts – music – and the highest concepts of theoretical physics, as researched by Lisa Randall and others. We hope the result will be a novel and fascinating creative experience.

The review is free and can be downloaded here.

El Gato con Botas (Puss in Boots), reduction for piano

Leticia Martin — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 14:36:40 +0000

El gato con Botas, an opera by Xavier Montsalvatge with a libretto by Nestor Luján based on the story by C. Perrault, has been newly published as a reduced version for piano and voice.

This opera, composed by the Catalan composer in 1948, is one of the liveliest examples of contemporary Spanish opera and has been staged on several occasions – the latest was a co-production by the Teatro Real and the Liceu – both in its original version and as the adaptation made in 1996 by Albert Guinovart for chamber ensemble.

Puss in Boots (El gato con botas) by Xavier Montsalvatge returns to Oviedo

Leticia Martin — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 16:11:34 +0000

Puss in Boots by Xavier Montsalvatge returns to the Teatro Philharmonic de Oviedo on the 9 and 10 January in a production realised in 2005 by the Teatro Real de Madrid and co-produced by the Gran Teatro del Liceu, the Asociación Bilbaína de Amigos de la Ópera and the Asociación Asturiana de Amigos de la Ópera. On this occasion it is the version for small orchestra which the composer Albert Guinovart was commissioned to arrange by Tritó Ediciones.

Emilio Sagi’s staging counts on costumes and a set design by Agatha Ruiz de la Prada, which give special colour and impact to the story, winning the hearts of both children and adults. Vicente Alberola is the music director and the main roles will be played by Raquel Lojendio (the Cat), David Menéndez (the Miller), María Luz Martínez (the Princess), Isidro Anaya (the King) and Miguel Angel Zapater (the Ogre).

This score by Xavier Montsalvatge presents the traditional tale by Perrault in the personal style and with the surprising musicality that always characterises this composer’s works.