The silent woman

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Work data
Original title: The silent woman
Maria Cebotari, Richard Strauss, Karl Böhm a. a. at the premiere in Dresden in 1935

Maria Cebotari , Richard Strauss , Karl Böhm a . a. at the premiere in Dresden in 1935

Original language: German
Music: Richard Strauss
Libretto : Stefan Zweig
Literary source: Ben Jonson: Epicoene, or The Silent Woman
Premiere: June 24, 1935
Place of premiere: Dresden, State Opera
Playing time: about 3 hours
Place and time of the action: Sir Morosus's room in a suburb of London, circa 1780
people
  • Sir Morosus ( bass )
  • His housekeeper ( old )
  • The barber ( baritone )
  • Henry Morosus ( tenor )
  • Aminta, his wife ( soprano )
  • Isotta (soprano)
  • Carlotta ( mezzo-soprano )
  • Morbio (baritone)
  • Vanuzzi (bass)
  • Farfallo (bass)

Die Schweigsame Frau is a comic opera in three acts (Opus 80; TrV 265) by Richard Strauss . It is his eleventh opera . The libretto is by Stefan Zweig after Ben Jonson's comedy Epicoene or The Silent Woman .

action

First elevator

For years, Captain Morosus, whose hearing was severely damaged after an explosion, has lived very withdrawn with his housekeeper. However, the chatter of this strikingly talkative woman really gets on his nerves. His barber advises him to put the old woman out and take a quiet young woman. Suddenly his nephew Henry, believed to be lost, appears. He is welcomed happily and is allowed to stay with him with his wife Aminta and a few friends. However, it turns out that the friends are an opera troupe whose rehearsals transform the once quiet house into a theater. Since Henry does not want to leave his wife Aminta, the prima donna of the troupe (Morosus: "... an ear-flapper!") And the opera in general, the captain throws the troop out of his house and disinherits Henry too. He now wants to look after an heir himself and instructs his barber to find him a wife. However, he turns to Henry with an idea: the uncle should be given a quiet and silent wife who will turn into a fury after the wedding and make the old captain's life hell until he drops his sails.

second elevator

The opera troupe begins their farce. The very next day the barber showed the captain three marriage candidates, a peasant tramp, a snooty educated young lady and Aminta as the modest, shy "Timidia", who immediately won the heart of Morosus. The barber immediately appoints a pastor and a notary, who also come from the drama troupe, and the wedding ceremony takes place. Immediately afterwards, neighbors and sailors come into the house to congratulate and spark a feast. The husband collapses, exhausted. Now Aminta steps into action. Although she is touched by the affection that Morosus shows her, she turns into a stubborn, scratchy and nagging woman. Then Henry appears as a savior in need. He calms Aminta down and promises his uncle to do everything possible to get rid of his stubborn wife quickly, whereupon they both reconcile and the uncle, relieved, goes to rest. Henry takes Aminta, who feels sorry for the old man, in his arms.

third elevator

The next day, Aminta does it even better with Morosus. She hires craftsmen who keep making noise. She has also hired a pianist and a singing teacher to practice with her. The captain is completely stunned. Finally, a “Lord Chief Justice” and “two lawyers” come to discuss the upcoming divorce. However, they reject any grounds for divorce that are presented. A witness appears - Henry - who pretends to be Aminta's lover. This reason is also rejected because Aminta's innocence and past life were not a condition for the marriage. Morosus is on the verge of a nervous breakdown. Now it seems time for Henry and Aminta to clean things up. Everyone drops their masks, and Aminta asks the captain's forgiveness. After the captain has breathed himself briefly, he is overcome with a liberating laugh. Overjoyed, he now approves Henry's connection with Aminta, gives Aminta his blessing and reinstates Henry as heir. He is satisfied with himself and the world and has found the longed-for peace inside. The opera closes with a monologue by Morosus: "How beautiful the music is, but how beautiful only when it is over!"

Work history

Poetry and composition

After Hugo von Hofmannsthal's death , Strauss believed that he had reached the end of his operatic career. He did not expect to be able to find another lyricist of the same level again. Even when the connection with Stefan Zweig was made, Strauss initially doubted it. However, he spontaneously made friends with Zweig's proposal to set Ben Jonson's comedy Epicoene, or The Silent Woman from 1609 to music as an opera text. Composition began in 1932, and in January 1933 Zweig presented the last part of his libretto, which Strauss described as "the best libretto for an opera comique since Figaro" and which he set to music without any requests for changes. The composition was basically finished in October 1934, although Strauss added a potpourri overture in January 1935 .

Scandal about the premiere

The premiere in Dresden turned out to be difficult. Strauss was the last living, internationally recognized musical figurehead in Germany. That is why Strauss was able to get the opera to be performed despite its (meanwhile emigrated) Jewish lyricist. It was supposed to be a cultural-political demonstration, even Hitler had promised to attend the premiere. But when Strauss insisted that instead of “Opera after Ben Jonson” Zweig's name be printed on the posters and evening slips, the Nazi giants boycotted the performance. After the Gestapo, who supervised Strauss as chairman of the Reichsmusikkammer , intercepted a completely unabashed letter that he had written to Zweig in his delight at the successful premiere, the composer finally fell out of favor. The piece disappeared from the repertoire of the Dresden Opera after only three repetitions and was not performed anywhere else in Germany. Strauss had to resign from the chairmanship of the Reich Chamber of Music “for health reasons”.

Despite the poet's emigration and despite his (cautious) criticism of the composer's behavior, Strauss' connection with Zweig did not break completely. The late works Peace Day and Capriccio are based on a libretto or an idea by Zweig.

Performance history

The premiere on June 24, 1935 - conducted by Karl Böhm , staged by Josef Gielen and with Maria Cebotari and Kurt Böhme in the main roles, Erna Sack as Isotta - was a great success with the audience. After it was deposed by the Nazis, only performances in Graz (1936) and Zurich (1942) took place in German-speaking countries until 1945; the work was also shown in Prague and Milan.

In 1946, Dresden tried to rehabilitate the opera with a performance in the Small House; Berlin, Munich and Wiesbaden followed. A performance at the Salzburg Festival in 1959 attracted a lot of attention ; World premiere conductor Karl Böhm presented a version of the opera shortened by approx. 45 minutes with an excellent cast (see discography). But except in Vienna - where the opera has been staged several times over the years, for the first time on March 1, 1968, with Silvio Varviso , Hans Hotter and Mimi Coertse - in Munich and Dresden the piece was still missing from the schedules of the larger houses. In view of the success that can be achieved with “classic” game operas and operettas, the reluctance to use more modern alternatives such as the silent woman seems difficult to understand. Even in small houses (a few years ago at Opera Long Beach, for example) the work always proved to be effective on the stage.

layout

Orchestral line-up

3 flutes (3rd also piccolo), 2 oboes, English horn, D clarinet, 2 clarinets, bass clarinet, 3 bassoons (3rd also contrabassoon), 4 horns, trumpets, 3 trombones, bass tuba, timpani, percussion, 4 bells, harp , Celesta, harpsichord, organ, strings

Duration (unabridged): approx. 3 hours (first act approx. 55 minutes, second act approx. 70 minutes, third act approx. 50 minutes)

music

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The criticism is often disparaging about the "sounding bas-relief" (Schreiber) of the silent woman. Strauss, too, freely admitted that composing was no longer as easy as it used to be. The work occupies a special position in Strauss's oeuvre in that the figure of Henry is one of the few "sympathetic" tenor roles in Strauss (although, as is so often the case with the Strauss tenors, vocally in some cases extremely demanding) . Furthermore, the work is structured by a multitude of more or less self-contained “numbers”, probably also due to the musical genre of the “comic opera”. B. the barber's two canzons in act 1 and 2, the large sextet in act 2, several aria-like solo parts for Aminta and Henry and ensembles as well as the grand burlesque finale of act 1.

The composer's delight over the finally found libretto, which was worth setting to music, made him overlook one or the other length of the text. Nevertheless: Strauss provided the Schweigsame Frau with an overabundance of musical ideas, with noisy ensembles, with partly ingenious, partly downright flat sound painting, an anarchistic finale of the first act, a captivatingly beautiful ending to the middle act and a forgiving, lyrical ending to the third act. A light comedy tone and a great aria alternate, Strauss cheerfully quotes himself and a dozen other composers, he copies Rossini, lets his protagonists sing Monteverdi and underlay some passages with music by old English composers. Music connoisseurs in particular will enjoy the opera with great pleasure because of the many musical allusions.

Vocal score

  • Richard Strauss: The silent woman. Piano reduction with text by Felix Wolfes , Berlin: Fürstner o. J. [approx. 1935].

Discography

literature

Web links

Commons : The silent woman  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files