Lowland (opera)
| Work data | |
|---|---|
| Title: | Lowlands |
| Original title: | Lowlands |
| Shape: | thoroughly composed |
| Original language: | German |
| Music: | Eugen d'Albert |
| Libretto : | Rudolf Lothar |
| Literary source: | “Terra baixa” by Àngel Guimerà |
| Premiere: | November 15, 1903 |
| Place of premiere: | Prague |
| Playing time: | approx. 2 ½ hours |
| Place and time of the action: | In the Spanish Pyrenees at the end of the 19th century |
| people | |
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Tiefland is a musical drama in a prelude and two acts by Eugen d'Albert . Rudolf Lothar wrote the libretto . The play of the same name (original title: "Terra baixa") by the Catalan poet Àngel Guimerà , who lived from 1845 to 1924, served as a model for this . The opera premiered on November 15, 1903 in the New German Theater in Prague under the direction of Leo Blech . Contributors were Irene Alföldi as "Marta", Erich Hunold as "Sebastiano" and Desider Aranyi as "Pedro".
action
foreplay
Image: High Alps in the Spanish Pyrenees
Pedro works for the rich landowner Sebastiano and looks after his cattle and sheep high up in the Pyrenees. It has been many months since he last saw a woman. Again and again he dreams of a beautiful woman who shares his loneliness with him. He also tells this to his friend Nando, who is also one of Sebastiano's shepherds and whom he meets up here every now and then. Pedro got the idea to throw a stone into the air. Let the essence of Pedro's fantasy appear from the direction the pebble is striking. The wish is immediately fulfilled, because from the valley up he sees his employer approaching, accompanied by the village elder Tommaso and a desirable young woman. It's Marta who works in Sebastiano's mill. When she was almost a child, Sebastiano “bought” her from a tramp, and when she matured into a woman he made her his lover. Because the whispering of the people in the village doesn't stop there, he has a crazy plan: Marta should pretend to marry the naive shepherd Pedro. Pedro is to receive the mill as a dowry. This clears the way for Sebastiano to marry the daughter of a rich farmer in order to be able to use her fortune to settle his accumulated debts.
Marta is anything but happy because she is a slave to Sebastiano. Angry, she makes her way back to the lowlands. Pedro, however, can hardly believe his luck. He believes God brought him a partner. He runs after her quickly.
first act
Image: Inside the mill
The maids Pepa, Antonia and Rosalia who work in the mill want to know from the mill servant Moruccio whether it is true that Marta should marry. However, Moruccio is angry because to this day he believed that he himself was the chosen one. When the young Nuri, who is friends with Marta, arrives, the three of them pounce on her and now learn that Marta is to be married to the naive shepherd Pedro today.
Marta enters the scene and sends the talkative maids outside. When she thinks about the marriage desired by her master, she is close to despair. On the one hand she despises Sebastiano, but on the other hand she fears that she will not get away from him.
Moruccio knows the real reasons why his employer is forcing Marta's marriage to Pedro and explains it to the community elder. At first he doesn't want to believe what he's hearing. He wants to interview Sebastiano himself when he gets the chance.
Marta makes one last attempt to dissuade Sebastiano from his plan. But he cannot be changed. He even tells her that he will continue to hold her as his mistress; because Pedro is a simpleton and is not in a position to please a woman anyway. On their wedding night he, Sebastiano, would come to her room. If she sees light there, she should go straight to him there.
While Marta and Pedro are going to church with the villagers, a scandal breaks out in the mill: Moruccio rebels against his master. When the latter resigns in anger, Moruccio gives vent to his soul by hurling the whole truth out of himself. Now the village elder also recognizes what is being played here. Nevertheless, he can no longer prevent the wedding from being carried out.
The newly wed couple has returned to the mill. Pedro shows his wife his first thaler, which he has earned himself, and describes how it happened. A wolf had invaded the herd and tore one of the sheep. But Pedro managed to kill the wild animal with his knife. Because he had risked his life, he received the taler from Sebastiano. Marta is impressed. Slowly her hatred of Pedro turns into sympathy. When she soon sees a light in her room, she ignores this sign and spends the night with Pedro in the living room.
Second act
Image as in the first act
The next day, Pedro is haunted by tormenting thoughts. Somehow, he can't get rid of the feeling of being betrayed. He wants to find out what the relationship is between Sebastiano and his wife. Nuri tries to calm him down. But when Marta sees them, something like jealousy rises in her. Furious, she chases Nuri out of the room. Desperate Pedro hurries after her.
Marta pours her heart out to the village elder. She also tells him from her youth that she grew up without a father, her mother was blind and how fate led her to Sebastiano. During the night, she was certain that Pedro had not been "bought" by Sebastiano, but that he genuinely loved her. She too is now drawn to him. Old Tommaso advises her not to carry any more secrets with her in front of her husband, but to tell him the full truth. This is the only way to get him to trust her again.
Pedro returns and gives Marta the cold shoulder. When he announced that he was going straight up to the highlands, Marta begged him either to stay with her or to kill her. In his anger he cuts her with his knife. But suddenly he feels that Marta loves him. They sink into each other's arms and decide to go to the mountains together. When they are about to leave, Sebastiano intervenes and desires Marta again. The old crook has since found out that Tommaso has informed the father of his bride about his machinations and his relationship with Marta, so that nothing more will come of the planned wedding. At least he wants to keep Marta as a playmate. Pedro wants to protect his wife. Sebastiano's anger takes hold and he hits him furiously. A life-and-death struggle ensues. Here Sebastiano draws the short straw. He is strangled by Pedro as he once strangled the terrible wolf.
Marta and Pedro no longer hold anything in the lowlands. Together they move up into the mountains.
music
The work contains many melodic ideas that are brilliantly orchestrated. The highlights include:
- Dawn on the Berghalde in foreplay
- The interlude with which the opera leads on to the first act without a break
- From the story of Nuri Lang, I already knew that it belongs to our master in the first act
- Story of Pedro A wolf came that night , also in the first act
- Narration of Marta I don't know who my father was in the second act
- Duet Marta-Pedro We want to go up to the mountains in the second act
- Dance song of Sebastiano Hüll in the mantilla you more firmly in the second act
However, there are only a few choir scenes.
Edits
Eugen d'Albert has personally two Welte-Mignon - piano rolls recorded with motifs from the lowlands:
- Ballad in F minor from the opera Tiefland (Wolf Tale), role number 416 (recorded in May 1905)
- Scenes from the opera Tiefland: Pedro's entry into the mill, Nuri's singing, Spanish dance song , role number 2961 (recorded around 1914)
filming
Leni Riefenstahl began in the early 1940s to film motifs from the opera using part of d'Albert's music, albeit not in the original, but edited by Giuseppe Becce . However, war conditions prevented completion. It could only take place after the end of the war. On December 21, 1953, the film was shown in the cinema for the first time. The lexicon of international film says: Visually and musically sometimes atmospheric, but extremely boring with coiffed pathos. One of the many shortcomings: the director, writer and producer Leni Riefenstahl is out of place in the female lead. Other roles were cast with Bernhard Minetti , Franz Eichberger, Luis Rainer , Maria Koppenhöfer and Aribert Wäscher . You can find more information about the film in the article Tiefland (film) .
literature
- Eugen d'Albert, Rudolf Lothar: Lowland. Libretto. Bote & Bock, Berlin 1921 ( urn : nbn: de: hebis: 30-1097274 ).
- Max Chop : Eugen d'Albert. Tiefland , published by Philipp Reclam jun., No. 5287, Leipzig 1910
- Charlotte Pangels: Eugen d'Albert: wonder pianist and composer . Zurich: Atlantis 1981
Web links
- Lowlands : Sheet music and audio files in the International Music Score Library Project
- Plot and libretto of Tiefland (Opera) on Opera-Guide landing page due to URL change currently not available
Individual evidence
- ↑ Erich Hunold at Operissimo on the basis of the Great Singer Lexicon
- ^ [1] Catalog of the WELTE-MIGNON reproduction rolls