Moses and Aron

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Work data
Title: Moses and Aron
Twelve-tone row for the composition of Moses and Aron (House of Music, Vienna)

Twelve-tone row for the composition of Moses and Aron ( House of Music , Vienna)

Original language: German
Music: Arnold Schoenberg
Libretto : Arnold Schoenberg
Premiere:
  • March 12, 1954 (concert version)
  • June 6, 1957 (scenic)
  • January 10, 2010 (completed version by Zoltán Kocsis )
Place of premiere:
  • Hamburg (concert version)
  • Zurich (scenic)
  • Budapest (concert version)
Playing time: approx. 96 minutes
Place and time of the action: Egypt and Sinai around 1200 BC Chr.
people
  • Moses (speaking role)
  • Aron ( tenor )
  • Girl ( soprano )
  • Youth (tenor)
  • Man ( baritone )
  • Ephraimit (baritone)
  • Priest ( bass )
  • Sick ( old )
  • Naked youth (tenor)
  • Man (speaker)
  • 6 solo voices (soprano, mezzo-soprano, alto, tenor, baritone, bass)
  • Voices from the thorn bush (soprano, boys, alto, tenor, baritone, bass)
  • The 70 Elders (Bass)
  • Beggars (alto, bass)
  • Some old men (tenor)
  • 12 tribal princes (tenor, bass)
  • 4 naked virgins (soprano, alto)
  • Other nude (tenor, bass)
  • Choir, dancers, extras of all kinds

Moses und Aron is an opera fragment by Arnold Schönberg based on a libretto by the composer. The plot is freely based on the second book of Moses . The work was composed dodecaphonically and is based on a single twelve-tone row . Schönberg wrote the text for the only scene of the third act , but no longer set it to music.

Composition history

Schönberg has been working with the Moses substance since 1923 . In 1925, in his Four Pieces for mixed choir, op. 27, in the second piece You shall not, you must for the first time take up the basic theme of the opera, the second commandment " You shall not make a picture ", on your own text:

You shouldn't make yourself a picture!
Because a picture restricts,
limits, grasps
what should remain unlimited and unimaginable.

In 1928 Schönberg began preparing the libretto . First he planned an oratorio . But since the publishing house Bote & Bock did not want to publish an oratorio, Schönberg decided to work the work as an opera. In the period from May 1930 to March 10, 1932 he composed the 1st and 2nd act. After his emigration to the USA in 1937, he took up the subject again and wrote down some musical ideas for the 3rd. Act. But then he gave up the project.

Moses and Aron was presented to the public for the first time in 1951, a few weeks before Schönberg's death. He agreed that the no longer composed third act is present from the only one scene, " is listed may merely spoken without music, if I [that] can not complete composition. "

The concert premiere of the entire fragment took place on March 12, 1954 in Hamburg (with the participation of the singers Helmut Krebs and Helmut Kretschmar , the symphony orchestra of the NWDR Hamburg under the musical direction of Hans Rosbaud and the choirs of the State University of Music Hamburg, the NWDR Cologne and the NWDR Hamburg), the scenic on June 6, 1957 in the Stadttheater Zurich . Although the opera was initially considered impossible to perform, the work was ultimately able to assert itself better than other stage works by Schönberg.

On January 16, 2010, a version completed by Zoltán Kocsis was premiered in concert with the Hungarian National Philharmonic in the Palace of Culture in Budapest .

Literary template

The plot is freely based on Exodus , especially chapters 3, 4, 7, and 32. The people of Israel, who immigrated to Egypt during the time of Joseph , are forced to work there. Moses, an Israelite but raised in the Egyptian royal court, slew an Egyptian slave overseer in anger over the oppression of his people. Since then he has lived in exile in the land of Midian with his father-in-law, the pagan priest Reguel, as shepherd until God calls him back to lead his people out of Egypt into the desert.

Schönberg ignores the dispute with the Pharaoh and Israel's exodus from Egypt and instead emphasizes the confrontation between the brothers Moses and Aron and their influence on the people of Israel.

Accordingly, the main characters are shown differently than in the biblical story. The biblical Moses himself works a number of miracles. The Moses in the opera, on the other hand, insists that God is inconceivable. He therefore rejects miracles, signs, parables and images of gods as a representation of the unrepresentable. Aron's miracles are presented in the Bible as services to Moses. In the opera they become an act of disobedience to the divine law and to Moses.

The fact that the figures are only based freely on the biblical figures is also expressed by the changed spelling of the name Aron (instead of, in Luther: Aaron ). Another theory is that Schönberg - a well-known Triskaidekaphobiker - shortened the name “Aaron” by one letter in order to prevent the title of his opera from consisting of 13 letters.

action

first act

First scene: "Moses' calling"

In the first scene, Moses worships the God of the Fathers in front of the burning bush . The voice of God sounds, first in the form of a vocalise . After the invocation of Moses:

One, Eternal, Omnipresent,
Invisible and Inconceivable God!

answers the voice of God and tells him to free his people from false gods and from bondage. As an outward sign, Moses is said to perform miracles. Moses refuses at first because he is not eloquent and no one will believe him. "My tongue is awkward, I can think, but not talk." Then the voice from the thorn bush places his brother Aron at his side. This should be the "mouth" of Moses and speak for him. The scene ends with the promise of a place where the people of Israel “will be one with the Eternal and be an example to all peoples”.

Second scene: "Moses meets Aron in the desert"

Aron finds Moses in the desert. The brothers quarrel. Moses insists that the idea of ​​God is neither imaginable nor man-influenced, and that no man can force God to act through sacrifice or prayer. However, Aron wants to use the message and the miraculous help of the new God to free the chosen people of Israel from the bondage of Pharaoh.

Third scene: "Moses and Aaron proclaim the message of God to the people"

The third scene is more of a folk scene, while Moses and Aron only appear as characters in the fourth scene, which has no title. A young man, a man and a girl saw that Aron was looking for Moses in the desert, and that a divine revelation had apparently appeared. The people of Israel are appalled that Moses could return, as inhuman punishments were imposed on the people for his murder of an Egyptian vicar. A priest points out that even among the old gods there was always one or the other who could help. A dispute breaks out among the people - some want to worship the new God and hope for deliverance through him. Others want to do their slave labor to avoid more severe punishment.

Fourth scene:

The people expect from Moses and Aaron a pictorial representation of the new God. But these can only explain that the new God is incomprehensible because it is omnipresent. The people therefore vehemently reject the new God.

While Moses despairs at the fact that he cannot describe the new God in words, Aron takes the staff to convince the people through miracles of the omnipotence of God. He turns Moses' staff into a serpent, as a parable for the transformation of divine law into human wisdom.

The people are enthusiastic about the miracle, but the priest objects that the divine law alone does not have the power to free the people from pharaonic bondage. Aron then makes Moses' hand leper and then heals it again. He explains the miracle as a parable for the old discouragement and the new courage of the people of Israel. The people let themselves be inspired by the miracle to the demand "Everything for freedom - into the desert". Here the priest objects that there is no food in the desert. Moses answers: “In the desert the purity of the spirit will nourish you.” - For him the barreness of the desert is the destiny of the people of Israel.

Aron, however, wants to convince the people through a miracle. He turns water from the Nile into blood - the blood of the Israelites - in a jug and then back into water to show that Pharaoh will have nothing but the water of the Nile, in which he will drown. He promises that God will lead the people to the land where milk and honey flow. The people are finally convinced by the blood miracle and sing a hymn to the impending exodus from Egypt and into the promised land.

Second act

"Interlude":

Act 2 is set on a plain in front of the Mount of Revelation . Moses has been on the mountain for forty days and the people are waiting to return. A six-part choir expresses the people's doubts and impatience.

First scene: "Aaron and the seventy elders in front of the Mount of Revelation"

While Moses awaits the revelation, lawlessness and violence have broken out among the people. The elders grumble that they have had to wait in vain for Moses for 40 days. The people are upset. Aron tries in vain to appease the elders.

Second scene:

The people are upset. It wants to murder Moses in order to be able to serve the old gods again and to be able to follow the old laws. When they try to kill the elders, Aron gives in and creates a golden calf through a spell .

Third scene: "The Golden Calf and Aron's Altar"

The Israelites bring animal sacrifices to the calf. The healing of a sick person by the calf triggers religious euphoria among the people. In their enthusiasm, the Israelites make ever greater offerings. Beggars sacrifice their last rags and their last food. A group of old men kill themselves in honor of the calf.

The twelve princes of the tribes of Israel choose the calf as a symbol of their state rule. The young man then tries to destroy the calf. The twelve tribal chiefs kill him.

A group of four naked virgins offer themselves to the priests of the calf as temple whores and blood sacrifices. The four virgins are killed and their blood sacrificed. The people fall into a frenzy of suicide and sex at the victim and eventually fall asleep exhausted.

Fourth scene:

Moses returns from the Mount of Revelation with the tablets of the Law . To the words of Moses

Go away, you image of the inability to capture the limitless in a picture!

the golden calf perishes. The people woke up disillusioned and ashamed from the erotic-religious frenzy.

Fifth scene: "Moses and Aron"

Moses confronts Aron. Aron justifies himself with the fact that the tables of the law are only pictures and words that cannot express the whole of the thought. He also acted out of love for the people. The people could not grasp the idea of ​​God intellectually, but only with the heart:

A people can only feel.
No people can believe what they don't feel.
So make yourself understandable to the people in a manner appropriate to them.

Moses contradicts:

Should I falsify the thought? "

He smashes the tablets of the law. In the background the people pull behind a pillar of fire and cloud. Aron cheers:

The Almighty gives the people a sign through me. "

He leads the people away. Moses remains desperate. He realizes that his conception of God is only an illusion and that God cannot be grasped by humans. Desperately he calls:

O word, you word that I miss! "

Schoenberg Moses.png

Third act (fragment)

Only scene

Aron is led in front of Moses in chains. He accuses him of having falsified the divine thought through images and miracles. He explains to him once again his idea of ​​a single God who cannot be represented in pictures and words.

Some warriors now want to execute Aron, but Moses orders his release with the words:

Live if you can.

Released, Aron falls dead to the ground. Moses urged the people to stay in the desert forever. There it is unchallenged and invincible.

Discography (selection)

film records

literature

  • Arnold Schönberg: Moses and Aron. Piano reduction, B. Schott's Sons, Mainz, o.Jg.
  • Paul Griffith, Gerd Uekermann: Analysis in the supplement to the recording under Solti, 1985
  • Christian Martin Schmidt : Schönberg's opera Moses and Aron. Analysis of the diastematic, formal and music-dramatic composition . B. Schott's Sons, Mainz 1988, ISBN 3-7957-1796-5
  • Klaus Schulz (ed.): Moses and Aron, opera by Arnold Schönberg . Program for the new production, Munich, 1982
  • Karl H. Wörner: God's Word and Magic, the opera "Moses and Aron" by Arnold Schönberg . Lambert Schneider Publishing House, Heidelberg 1959
  • Jan Assmann : The thorn bush scene in Schönberg's opera Moses and Aron , in: ders., Exodus. The Old World Revolution. Munich 2015. pp. 163–167.

Web links

Commons : Moses and Aron  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Paul Griffith and Gerd Uekermann, in: Supplement to Moses and Aron under Solti, p. 29.
  2. ^ Text by Arnold Schönberg, quoted from Gerd Uekermann, in: Supplement to Moses and Aron under Solti, Decca 1985, p. 29.
  3. ↑ Complete quote from Schönberg in Gerd Uekermann, in: Supplement to the recording under Solti, Decca 1985, p. 37.
  4. ↑ Tages-Anzeiger: The sound that is no longer missing - Schönberg Opera completes [1]
  5. ↑ Stefan Strecker: The God of Arnold Schönberg: Views through the opera Moses and Aron, page 126 online
  6. ^ A b Christian Martin Schmidt: Schönberg's opera Moses and Aron . Schott 1988, p. 129.