The bride choice
| Work data | |
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| Original title: | The bride choice |
| Original language: | German |
| Music: | Ferruccio Busoni |
| Libretto : | Ferruccio Busoni based on the story from The Serapion Brothers by ETA Hoffmann |
| Premiere: | April 13, 1912 |
| Place of premiere: | City Theater Hamburg |
| Playing time: | approx. 3:30 hours |
| Place and time of the action: | in bourgeois Berlin around 1820 |
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The bride choice is a musically fantastic comedy in three acts and an episode by Ferruccio Busoni .
Creation and conception
Busoni wrote the text from 1906 to 1909 and the score from March 1909 to October . The libretto adheres almost verbatim to the prose presentation by ETA Hoffmann .
The choice of bride is deliberately designed to be unrealistic. The contrast of unreal and real moments of the plot is in line with Busoni's ideal of opera as
"Apparent world ... which reflects life either in a magic mirror or in a laughing mirror."
of essential importance. His critical attitude to the well-composed musical drama by Richard Wagner manifests itself in the frequent use of closed musical forms: symphonic pieces such as preludes and interludes , vocal forms such as song, duet etc. and various march and dance-like elements such as minuet , gallop , march , Waltz or polka .
Instrumentation
3 flutes (3rd also picc ), 2 oboes , English horn , 2 clarinets , basset clarinet , 2 bassoons , contrabassoon , 4 horns , 3 trumpets , 3 trombones , tuba , timpani , percussion ( glockenspiel with keyboard , bass drum , snare drum, cymbals , Triangle , tam-tam , xylophone ), celesta , harp , strings .
Incidental music on the scene: flute, 2 oboes, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, 2 horns, 2 trumpets, cornet , timpani, percussion (2 players: cymbals, triangle, drum, bass drum, bell, glockenspiel), harpsichord or square piano , celesta , Organ .
action
1st act
After a concert in the tents in Berlin's Tiergarten , the young painter Edmund is allowed to accompany the wealthy Voswinkel and his daughter Albertine, who has long been enthusiastic about Edmund's pictures, home. As they disappear into the darkness, the goldsmith, Edmund's mysterious guardian spirit, appears.
Change of scene: Spandauer Strasse with the town hall and an adjacent old tower. That night Leonhard Thusmann prophesied that at eleven o'clock the figure of the girl who was the happiest bride in Berlin would appear at the window of the tower. Albertine, whom her father had promised Thusmann for a long time, appears fantastically lit in the tower window.
In a dimly lit wine tavern, Leonhard tries to dissuade Thusman, who is in love, in order to free Albertine. Manasse interferes and the two old men get into an argument. They outdo each other with magic and Thusman flees.
2nd act
In a room in his house, Voswinkel looks with satisfaction at the portrait he painted by Edmund. Thusman rushes in and reports that he saw Albertine dancing with a young man and that he himself, surrounded by countless mirrors, had to dance until he passed out. Voswinkel suspects the fantasy of a drunk behind the story. Manasse appears as a courtier for his nephew, the rich Baron Bensch, but Thusman has the older rights.
In another room in Voswinkel's house, Edmund is busy portraying Albertine. Thusman appears and Albertine finds out that her father had promised him it.
3rd act
The scorned Thusman wants to drown himself in frog spawn in the Berlin zoo by moonlight . Leonhard stops him.
In the evening, Voswinkel sits confused at home in the room in which Thusman told the story of his dance in the middle of the mirror. He showed the young painter the door and sent him back his portrait. Leonhard makes him a suggestion as to how he should determine Albertine's future husband: the picture of the bride should be placed in one of three boxes and the three suitors should each choose a box. Whoever chooses the box with Albertine's picture wins her as a bride.
Albertine is appalled by the father's decision to leave the choice of her future husband to chance. She sinks into a dream-like state in which Leonhard promises her that he will make sure that Edmund, whom she loves, wins the game. In a vision he shows her Edmund in front of the altarpiece of a church, surrounded by organ sounds and choir singing. He tries to explain Albertine by saying that Edmund will wander again and again from reality into a world that is foreign to her because of his genius.
In the aftermath, Voswinkel greets the three suitors in the hall of his house the next morning and introduces them to Albertine, who is adorned with nuptial decorations. Thusman and Bensch, who had no luck choosing the box, were compensated by Leonhard with gifts, but Edmund got Albertine as his wife.
literature
- Piper's Enzyklopädie des Musiktheater , Volume 1 (Abbatini - Donizetti), pp. 473-474, Verlag R. Piper GmbH & Co. KG. Munich 1986, ISBN 3-492-02411-4
Remarks
- ↑ from " From the Future of Opera " (1913)