The Exterminating Angel
| Opera dates | |
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| Title: | The Exterminating Angel |
| Shape: | Opera in three acts |
| Original language: | English |
| Music: | Thomas Adès |
| Libretto : | Tom Cairns and Thomas Adès |
| Literary source: | Luis Buñuel : El ángel exterminador |
| Premiere: | July 28, 2016 |
| Place of premiere: | House for Mozart , Salzburg |
| Playing time: | about 2 hours |
| Place and time of the action: | Villa in an unnamed city, 1960s |
| people | |
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The hosts your guests
Servants
Outside the house
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The Exterminating Angel is an opera in three acts by Thomas Adès (music) with a libretto by Tom Cairns and Thomas Adès based on the 1962 feature film El ángel exterminador by Luis Buñuel . It was premiered on July 28, 2016 as part of the Salzburg Festival in the Haus für Mozart .
action
The opera is set in the 1960s in the villa of Lucía and Edmundo de Nobile on Calle de la Providencia, an unnamed city reminiscent of Mexico City .
After attending the opera, the couple invited some distinguished guests, including the opera singer Leticia, to dinner. At first the evening begins - apart from the inexplicable flight of the service personnel - apparently normal. However, it soon turns out that no one is able to leave the house. The atmosphere, which was still cultivated at the beginning, gives way to more and more aggressive and barbaric behavior. An elderly gentleman dies and a young couple in love takes their own life. Even from the street, nobody can get to the trapped. A solution is only found when Leticia realizes that everyone is in the same position as on the first evening. The original processes are reconstructed and finally changed. The decisive factor is a visionary aria Leticia that she had not sung on the first evening.
first act
Prolog. While bells are ringing in the distance, some sheep are led into the garden of the villa.
Scene 1. anteroom. Edmundo and Lucía de Nobile invited guests to dinner in their villa after attending the opera. Before they arrive, the servants run away. The butler Julio tries in vain to prevent the servant Lucas from escaping. Even the threat of firing doesn't work.
Scene 2. Kitchen. The maids Meni and Camila and a few other employees are still looking for a way out when the twelve guests enter the house.
Scene 3. Instead of Lucas who is absent, Julio has to take care of taking off the guests' coats. They are introduced to each other: the elderly Señor Russell, the pianist Blanca Delcado and her husband, the conductor Alberto Roc, then Colonel Álvaro Gómez, Leonora Palma, the Duchess Silvia de Ávila and her brother Francisco, the researcher Count Raúl Yebenes, the doctor Carlos Conde as well as the engaged Eduardo and Beatriz. The guest of honor is the singer Leticia Maynar. Other servants flee. The guests arrive a second time and introduce themselves using the same words as the first time.
Scene 4. Dining room. After some small talk between the guests, Nobile presented them twice in a row with the singer Leticia, who had just sung the title role in Lucia di Lammermoor . The hostess announced that, contrary to custom, she had changed the order of the menu (ragoût aria). When Julio brings in the food, he falls with it. Edmundo and Lucía claim this is a deliberate joke and that it will start the entertainment program. Señor Russell doesn't think that's funny.
Scene 5. Lucía asks Julio not to release the trained bear yet, but to bring it into the garden with the lambs. Julio points out strange happenings to his employer. However, Lucía is distracted as she watches the cook Pablo sneak out of the house. When confronted, he replies that he has to look after his sick sister. Since the waiter Enrique and other employees use the same excuse, Lucía realizes that something cannot be right. However, she cannot hold back her people. Julio now has to serve too.
Scene 6. Salon. Beatriz and Eduardo are flirting as if they had just met. Blanca plays the piano. Leonora asks Conde to dance, who claims, however, that he cannot dance. Instead, she kisses him passionately. Silvia worries about her ailing brother Francisco, who is suffering from stomach ulcers. When Raúl asked about his relationship with Leonora, Conde implied that she was fatally ill and fell in love with him as his patient. Everyone praises Blanca's piano playing - a composition by Paradisi . Russell rejects the general wish to hear Leticias lecture, because she has sung enough today. Blanca and Silvia want to say goodbye. Blanca's husband Roc has already fallen asleep on the sofa, and Silvia, too, can ultimately not make up her mind to leave.
Scene 7. Cloakroom. Lucía and Álvaro are surprised that, despite the advanced time, nobody has left. The two have a secret relationship and kiss.
Scene 8. Salon. The other guests sit lazily in the drawing room. Edmundo announces that they are welcome to stay: Rooms have been prepared. Although some of the guests have appointments, all of them stay and go to sleep in the salon. Eduardo and Beatriz spend their first night together in the closet ( Berceuse ).
Second act
The next morning the guests gradually wake up and the nobiles have to prepare breakfast. Silvia announces that she slept even worse than she did on the derailed night train to Nice. Conde examines Russell, who suffered from breathlessness and passed out during the night. He notes that the old man will be dead ("... bald") in a few hours. Julio explains to his boss that there are problems with breakfast because the suppliers didn't come. When Lucía suggests that the ladies freshen up in the boudoir , the men bet that none of them will leave the room. In fact, the women stop, confused. Nobody has an explanation - but one remembers similar oddities from the previous night. Blanca worries about her children and is surprised when Silvia, who also has a young son, wants to stay. She relies entirely on his private tutor, Padre Sansón. Finally, Julio serves the leftovers from dinner and coffee. Francisco complains that he brought tea spoons instead of coffee spoons (spoon aria). However, Julio can't manage to go back to get the correct spoons. Blanca bursts into tears and Conde sums up that no one has been able to leave the room since last night.
Blanca sits down at the piano again and begins to sing desperately ("Over the sea, where is the way?"). Conde sees no way to help Russell because he has no medicine with him. He absolutely needs to be taken out of the house. The coffee has also run out in the meantime and general panic is spreading. The doctor suggests a "clinical analysis" to overcome the inability to make decisions. Everyone blames each other. Leticia slaps Raúl in the face. Suddenly Russell wakes up and announces that he is so happy that he will not see the "annihilation" again. Beatrice definitely does not want to die in this company, but prefers a lonelier death together with Eduardo. Like three witches, Silvia, Blanca and Leticia envision a cliff over a river over which an eagle flies ( Witches' trio: “When I lifted the lid”). Russell dies and is dragged aside by Conde and Álvaro. Eduardo and Beatriz watch this with shock before turning back to their love.
Third act
Scene 1. Outside the house. Police have cordoned off the house. The people on the street feel helpless. They want to help the prisoners, but cannot get in.
Scene 2. Salon. Julio and Raúl manage to break open a water pipe to quench their general thirst. Conde warns against drinking too much at once. Blanca fears that her suffering will only be unnecessarily prolonged. There is also nothing left to eat and the signs of madness are beginning to show. Blanca compulsively combs half of her hair. Francisco accuses the others of hiding his stomach pills. He has apparently started an incestuous relationship with his sister Silvia, for which Raúl confronts him. When Edmundo tries to mediate, he is blamed for the situation. Leonora is in so much pain that she begs the doctor to kill her. He must promise her that he will go on a pilgrimage with her to Lourdes if they should escape. Francisco can no longer stand the smells: Blanca smells like a hyena, and the smell of Russell's corpse is the worst. He exclaims that he hates everyone and collapses. Leonora gets mentally deranged. She feels that she is being watched and that she sees a hand wandering around. In a maddened state, she injures Blanca's hand with a knife. The others overwhelm and calm them.
Scene 3. Lullaby. Eduardo and Beatriz have lost track of time in their closet. They decide to go to death together.
Scene 4. Leticia thinks Roc was trying to rape her. However, Raúl thinks it was the colonel. There is a fight. The lambs and the bear from the garden appear in the drawing room.
Scene 5. Outside the house. The villa was placed in quarantine on the pretext of contamination . Furthermore nobody can get in. Padre Sansón brings Silvia's son Yoli over. The crowd demands that the boy go into the house. However, he is incapable of doing this, and inexplicably stops and calls desperately for his mother.
Scene 6. In the meantime, the prisoners have slaughtered the lambs in the house and are roasting them on a campfire made from furnishings. Leonora tells of a vision she had the night before the opera. In it, a voice admonished her not to forget the keys. She relates this to Kabbalah , in which objects that open the door to the unknown are called "keys," and believes that a ritual is the solution. When the first attempt fails, she says that it would take the blood of an innocent man. The bodies of Eduardo and Beatriz are found in the cupboard. He comes to another argument between Francisco and Raúl. The latter throws out the former's pill box. Silvia sings a lullaby to her little son Yoli while she caresses the remains of one of the lambs ( Berceuse macabre: “It's very late now”). The trained bear appears in the drawing room. Leonora believes that the host, Nobile, would have to be sacrificed in order to free the others. Although the Conde and Gómez warn against it, the others agree. Edmundo finally agrees to make the sacrifice. Leticia has a different idea: She noticed that at this very moment everyone is in the same position as at the beginning of their problems. Everyone tries to remember and recreate the situation: Blanca was sitting at the piano and playing Paradisi. However, the fact that Leticia subsequently renounced her lecture could have been the cause. This time she sings a visionary aria (“Zion, do you ask of my peace”). In fact, it is now possible for them to leave the house. On the street, the guests meet the waiting crowd, and Silvia can hug her son. Everyone sings a solemn requiem ( Solemn high requiem: “Set me free from eternal death”).
layout
Music numbers
The Metropolitan Opera video broadcast was divided into the following scenes and musical numbers:
- prolog
first act
- Scene 1 - anteroom
- Scene 2 - kitchen
- Scene 3 - First entry of guests
- Second entry of guests (second entry of guests)
- Scene 4 - dining room
- Nobile's first toast (Nobile's first toast)
- Nobile's second toast (Nobile's toast second)
- Scene 5
- Scene 6 - Salon
- "Brava Blanca"
- Scene 7 - Cloakroom
- Scene 8 - Salon
- Berceuse
Second act
- Interlude (Interlude)
- Scene 1 - Salon
- "Last night after the party"
- Spoon aria (Spoons aria)
- Piano Interlude (piano interlude)
- The attack of the Doctor (The doctor's fit)
- Hexene Trio (Witches' trio)
- The clock strikes two (The clock strikes two)
Third act
- Scene 1 - Outside the house
- Scene 2 - Salon
- Obsessive compulsive ballet
- The storm breaks out (The storm breaks)
- Francisco's tantrum (Francisco's tantrum)
- Interlude (Interlude)
- Scene 3: Lullaby (Lullaby)
- Scene 4
- Interlude - The sheep and the Bear (Interlude - The sheep and the bear)
- Scene 5 - Outside the house
- Scene 6
- Berceuse macabre
- Hexene invocation (Witches' incantation)
- Leticia's Song (Leticia's song)
- Celebratory high Requiem (Solemn high Requiem)
orchestra
The opera demands a large orchestra with some unusual instruments, including the Ondes Martenot known from the works of Olivier Messiaen , bells, extensive percussion , a solo guitar and eight miniature violins.
The full line-up provides for the following instruments:
- Woodwinds : three flutes (the second also piccolo and bass flute, 3. piccolo and alto flute), three oboes (3 also English horn ), three clarinets (3rd and bass clarinet ), three bassoons (3rd also Contraforte or contrabassoon with deep A )
- Brass : four horns (all optional Wagner tuba ), three trumpets , three trombones , tuba
-
Timpani (and rototoms )
- Percussion (four players): carillon , xylophone , tubular bells , six antique cymbals , small steel drum , four saucepans, four tuned gongs , two bell plates , bass bell, newspaper, small bell tower , metal wind chimes , castanets , castanets (attached), maracas (small and large), metal maracas, double güiro (high and low), cabasa , small whip , door slam (or large whip), small anvil , small wooden block, small ratchet , tambourine , small bongo , slit drum (low), tavola , washboard , lions roar , two large stones, two Spring coils, triangle , small cow bell , clash cymbals , two hanging pool (small and large), hi-hat , two sizzle cymbal, tom-tom , snare drum , Quint , kick drum , bass drum with pool
- four players outside the scene for eight church bells or bass handbells
- eight to ten players for mass drums (military drums, small portable large drums or quints)
- Upright piano (6 ' grand piano )
- harp
- guitar
- Ondes Martenot
- Strings : twelve violins 1, ten violins 2, eight violas , six cellos , six double basses (eight violins or the first two panels of both departments also 1 / 32 -Violinen)
libretto
Although the opera libretto closely follows the film, it contains some dramaturgical deviations. In particular, the inserted arias and ensemble pieces - similar to those in the Passions of Johann Sebastian Bach - comment on the plot and offer deeper access to the characters' emotions. The action is, as it were, stopped at these points.
As in the film, there is no rational explanation for what happened in the opera. According to Raúl's answer to a corresponding question from Álvaro, one has to be satisfied with the statement “There is no explanation”.
Despite the final release of the guests, the end remains uncertain. The bells that sound here, as they did at the beginning of the work, seem to usher in martial law , which was already indicated musically in the interlude after the first act. The lack of a final double line in Adès' score could indicate an endless cycle. The strangling angel may also turn to the audience next.
music
The “Ragoût aria” by the hostess Lucía at the beginning of the opera, like Ravel's La Valse, indicates the collapse of the social order. The score contains a multitude of allusions to past musical styles. Blanca's piano variations and her song “Over the sea” are reminiscent of the Baroque style. The Guardian critic recognized stylistic elements in the music from “ Wagner to Mussorgsky , Bartók , Nielsen , Ravel , Shostakovich and Nancarrow ; from the chanson of the 12th century to the chaconne and choral polyphony, through flamenco and Stravinsky , forward in melody and backward in dissonance ”.
The love scenes between Beatrice and Eduardo, whose duet has been compared to a "double love death", are timeless. The depictions of the relationship between Francisco and his sister and Leonora's voluptuous dependence on her doctor Carlos Conde offer meditative points of calm. Outside these places the music is in constant flux. The individual notes merge in glissandi . This is intensified by the use of the Ondes Martenot , which according to the playing instructions should "swallow the orchestra" at one point. According to Adès, this instrument is used as a symbol for the "strangling angel". It always sounds "when a person says something that contributes to the situation of immobility" ("whenever a figure says something that contributes to the situation of immobility"). Examples of this are the often repeated word “enchanted” during the double greeting at the beginning or Lucía's announcement that the entertainment program has started (“tonight's entertainment has begun”). The use of the instrument gives the latter an ironic undertone. During the cadenza of Blanca's aria, the angel's “voice” is said to be “not controlled by human will”.
Leticia's visionary aria “Zion, do you ask of my peace”, based on the words of the Sephardic philosopher and poet Jehuda ha-Levi from the beginning of the 12th century, introduces the end of the strangling angel. The Ondes Martenot and the deep brass ( Wagner tubas and trombones ) mute here.
The motif of the thundering drums playing in the interlude after the first act is based on a Holy Week ritual from Buñuel's hometown.
The role of opera singer Leticia sung by Audrey Luna in the world premiere production extends up to a '' '. This is the highest documented vocal tone in the history of the Metropolitan Opera . It can be heard right at the beginning of their performance at the reception of the guests and its surreal repetition.
Work history
Thomas Adès' third opera The Exterminating Angel was commissioned and as a co-production of the Salzburg Festival , the Royal Opera House Covent Garden in London, the Metropolitan Opera New York and the Kongelige Opera Copenhagen. The libretto is based on the surrealist film Der Würgeengel by Luis Buñuel from 1962. The composer and director of the world premiere production, Tom Cairns , arranged the libretto based on the script. Adès had the idea of writing an opera adaptation of this film even before he began working on his predecessor, The Tempest . Negotiations about the required rights began in 2001, but could not be fully resolved until 2011. Cairns began working on the libretto in 2009. The composition was commissioned in 2011 and work on the score and libretto was completed in 2015.
The authors reduced the number of main characters from 21 to 15 as well as the lines of text in the script in order to give the characters the necessary time to perform the originally spoken texts. Still, in the end, they were surprised at how close their draft was to the script. For the added arias and ensemble movements, the authors used Buñuel's poems from the 1920s. Edward Venn published a detailed comparison of the film and the opera in 2017. In his article, he also examined the importance of the repetitions in the work.
The world premiere took place at the start of the Salzburg Festival on July 28, 2016 in the Haus für Mozart . The composer himself directed the Salzburg Bach Choir and the ORF Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra . Tom Cairns directed, Hildegard Bechtler designed the stage and costumes, Jon Clark was responsible for the lighting design, Tal Yarden for the projections and Amir Hosseinpour for the choreography. It sang Charles Workman (Edmundo de Nobile), Amanda Echalaz (Lucía de Nobile), Audrey Luna (Leticia Maynar), Anne Sofie von Otter (Leonora Palma), Sally Matthews (Silvia de Ávila), Iestyn Davies (Francisco de Ávila) Christine Rice (Blanca Delcado), Thomas Allen (Alberto Roc), Sophie Bevan (Beatriz), Ed Lyon (Eduardo), Frédéric Antoun (Raúl Yebenes), David Adam Moore (Colonel Álvaro Gómez), Sten Byriel (Señor Russell), John Tomlinson (Doktor Carlos Conde), Morgan Moody (Julio), John Irvin (Lucas), Franz Gürtelschmied (Enrique), Rafael Fingerlos (Pablo), Frances Pappas (Meni), Anna Maria Dur (Camila) and Cheyne Davidson (Padre Sansón) .
The production received excellent reviews and was named Best World Premiere at the 2017 International Opera Awards .
In April and May 2017 the production was shown at the Royal Opera House, in October and November of the same year at the Metropolitan Opera and in April and May 2018 at the Kongelige Opera.
Recordings
- November 18, 2017 - Thomas Adès (conductor), Tom Cairns (staging), Hildegard Bechtler (stage and costumes), Jon Clark (lighting design), Tal Yarden (projections), Amir Hosseinpour (choreography), choir and orchestra of the Metropolitan Opera .
Joseph Kaiser (Edmundo de Nobile), Amanda Echalaz (Lucía de Nobile), Audrey Luna (Leticia Maynar), Alice Coote (Leonora Palma), Sally Matthews (Silvia de Ávila), Iestyn Davies (Francisco de Ávila), Christine Rice (Blanca Delcado), Rodney Gilfry (Alberto Roc), Sophie Bevan (Beatriz), David Portillo (Eduardo), Frédéric Antoun (Raúl Yebenes), David Adam Moore (Colonel Álvaro Gómez), Kevin Burdette (Señor Russell), John Tomlinson (Doctor Carlos Conde), Christian Van Horn (Julio), John Irvin (Lucas), Ian Koziara (Enrique), Paul Corona (Pablo), Mary Dunleavy (Meni), Catherine Cook (Camila), Andrea Coleman and Marc Persing (two servants), Jeff Mattsey (Padre Sansón), Lucas Mann (Yoli), Cynthia Millar (Ondes Martenot).
Live from the Metropolitan Opera New York.
Video stream on the Metropolitan Opera website.
literature
- Edward Venn: Thomas Adès's The Exterminating Angel. In: Tempo. Volume 71, Issue 280, April 2017. Cambridge University Press, 2017, pp. 21-46, ISSN 0040-2982 ( doi: 10.1017 / S0040298217000067 ).
Web links
- Program of the Metropolitan Opera, season 2017/2018 (PDF) ( Memento from October 30, 2017 in the Internet Archive )
- Several articles about the opera on the Royal Opera House Covent Garden website , London
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b Program of the Metropolitan Opera, season 2017/2018 (PDF) ( Memento of October 30, 2017 in the Internet Archive ).
- ↑ a b The Exterminating Angel. In: Thomas Adès Brochure October 2017 (PDF). Faber Music, p. 5.
- ↑ a b In Focus. In: Program of the Metropolitan Opera, 2017/2018 season (PDF) ( Memento from October 30, 2017 in the Internet Archive ), pp. 38–38A.
- ↑ a b Video of the opera on the Metropolitan Opera website , accessed September 26, 2019.
- ↑ Alex Ross: An Explosive Opera of "The Exterminating Angel". Review of the world premiere in Salzburg 2016. In: The New Yorker , August 15, 2016, accessed on September 30, 2019.
- ↑ a b c d e f g h i Gavin Plumley: Program Note. In: Program of the Metropolitan Opera, 2017/2018 season (PDF) ( Memento from October 30, 2017 in the Internet Archive ), pp. 38B – 38D.
- ^ Fiona Maddocks: The Exterminating Angel review - a turning point for Adès, and opera. Review of the world premiere in Salzburg 2016. In: The Guardian , July 31, 2016, accessed on September 30, 2019.
- ↑ Kate Hopkins: Opera Essentials: Thomas Adès's The Exterminating Angel on the Royal Opera House website , accessed September 30, 2019.
- ^ Zachary Woolfe: At the Met Opera, a Note So High, It's Never Been Sung Before. Review of the 2017 New York performance. In: The New York Times , November 7, 2017, accessed September 30, 2019.
- ↑ a b Meret Forster : Review - Salzburg Festival - "The Exterminating Angel" by Thomas Adès contribution from July 28, 2016 on BR-Klassik , accessed on September 29, 2019.
- ^ A b Edward Venn: Thomas Adès's The Exterminating Angel. In: Tempo. Volume 71, Issue 280, April 2017. Cambridge University Press, 2017, pp. 21-46, ISSN 0040-2982 ( doi: 10.1017 / S0040298217000067 ).
- ↑ a b Thomas Adès The Exterminating Angel in the program of the Salzburg Festival , accessed on September 30, 2019.
- ↑ Marijan Zlobec: The Exterminating Angel by Thomas Adès wins Opera Award , accessed on September 30, 2019.
- ↑ Work information on the website of the composer Thomas Adès , accessed on September 29, 2019.