Anger (opera)
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| Title: | Anger |
| Shape: | Opera in seven pictures and an epilogue |
| Original language: | German |
| Music: | Andrea Lorenzo Scartazzini |
| Libretto : | Christian Martin Fuchs |
| Premiere: | September 9, 2006 |
| Place of premiere: | Theater Erfurt |
| Playing time: | approx. 75 minutes |
| Place and time of the action: | Portugal in the 14th century |
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Wut is an opera in seven pictures and an epilogue by the Swiss composer Andrea Lorenzo Scartazzini . Christian Martin Fuchs' libretto is based on the historical love story of the Portuguese Prince Pedro ( Peter I ) and his lover Inês de Castro . The opera was premiered on September 9, 2006 in the Erfurt Theater.
action
Prehistory (history / legend)
Alfonso IV , King of Portugal (1291–1357, called: o Bravo, the Bold) forbids his son Pedro (1320–1367) to have an illegitimate relationship with Inês Pires de Castro (1325–1355), the lady in waiting and cousin of his first Wife, Princess Constanza de Penafiel. Pedro doesn't stick to it, on the contrary. He secretly marries his mistress and they have three children. This means that the young Kingdom of Portugal (which has been strictly associated with the Holy See since its foundation in 1143 and is always threatened by Spanish hegemony efforts) is denied another politically beneficial marriage of Pedro, the marriage is holy. Alfons orders (under pressure from the Portuguese grandees) Inês to be killed. The political murder of the not yet thirty-year-old woman takes place on January 7, 1355 at the (today so called) Fonte dos Amores, near Pedro's seat, the Quinta das Lagrimas on the outskirts of the royal city of Coimbra, while Pedro is on the hunt.
First picture
Alfons receives news of Inês' death from the murderers Coelho and Gonçalvez. His satisfaction is mixed with fear of the Eternal Fire. The world is collapsing for Pedro. The feeling of absolute emptiness plunges him into unknown doubt, into nothing. His recourse to the verses of Solomon is no comfort.
Original story (history / legend) - 1
Pedro starts a war against his father in the north of the country and is defeated. At the same time, Europe is plagued by the plague, natural disasters and superstition. The happy Middle Ages begin to waver. The murderers of Inês flee to the Kingdom of Castile under Alfonso's protection.
Second picture
Pedro wanders through the country, tearless, callous, on the verge of madness, and he encounters an undead, the broken one who bears the wounds of his world, war, plague and death - the masks of death in the Middle Ages.
Original story (history / legend) - 2
Alfons made his son Pedro co-regent to calm the conflict. But they live in two worlds: Alfons has retired to the Montemor castle, Pedro lives in the first royal city of Santarém. In 1457 the father dies.
Third picture
Loucido, Alfonso's confessor, reads to him Isaac's sacrifice from the Old Testament. Pedro takes over his task and turns the devotion into a criminal court. Faced with the bruised, a tortured body, to which the resurrection is no longer given, Alfons dies. The Anti-Savior crowns Pedro as the new King of Portugal.
Original story (history / legend) - 3
Through clever diplomacy, King Pedro I obtained the extradition of his wife's two murderers, Coelho and Gonçalvez. He has them tortured in front of his palace in Santarém. He answers their defiance with brute force. Coelho (in German: rabbit) he rips the heart out of his chest after having brought vinegar and onion (ingredients for a rabbit recipe). Gonçalvez's heart is removed through his back, a punishment that is said to be commensurate with the killer’s treachery. From then on Pedro learns the nicknames: o Cru / Cruel (the raw, cruel) and o Justiceiro (the righteous).
Fourth picture
The interrogator tortures the murderers Coelho and Gonçalvez. But Pedro has an additional mission for the two, which he treats like the two thieves at Jesus Christ's side and wants to use them as messengers to the afterlife. A quick, relatively merciful death is supposed to bring Coelho to hell in order to bring Pedro an encounter with his father. Gonçalvez is supposed to atone for excessive torment on earth, so he goes to heaven and can order news from Inês. Pedro can only master his insatiable pain by increasing his knowledge of Inês' death and her final emotions. In cold sadism, following Gonçalvez's instructions, he recreates Inês' murder of his daughter Judit. His bitterness-controlled ratio fails when the girl asks him about love.
Original story (history / legend) - 4
1360. Pedro has the body of Inês, buried in the Convento Santa Clara-a-Velha , excavated. The dead are clothed and decorated. In the Cathedral of Coimbra , he confirms his marriage ten years ago and has the dead Inês enthroned as Rainha de Portugal. The Spanish grandees kiss the hem of the skirt or the jeweled hand of the half-decayed corpse.
Fifth picture
Pedro cannot cope with the loss of his loved one. He wants to conquer death, which he suspects is a farewell for ever. He takes his people hostage in order to capture the beloved's laughter, which is still the last reverberation in the universe, in order to generate the presence of that woman from some source.
Original story (history / legend) - 5
Now the queen is transferred in a pompous funeral procession to the Cistercian abbey of Alcobaça , about 100 kilometers away . Contemporaries report that the torch-lit country road would have resembled the Milky Way at night. There are two magnificent sarcophagi waiting there. On the left of the altar that of Inês, on the right that of Pedro, the feet facing each other so that the two of them can see each other again first on Judgment Day.
orchestra
The orchestra consists of the following instruments:
- Woodwinds: two flutes (1st also shell horn , 2nd also piccolo ), two oboes , two clarinets (also bass clarinet ), bassoon , contrabassoon
- Brass: three horns, two trumpets , two trombones , tuba
- Timpani , percussion (two players)
- Harp, piano
- Strings: eight first violins, six second violins, four violas, three cellos, two double basses
Work history
The opera was premiered on September 9, 2006 in the Erfurt Theater under the musical direction of Dorian Keilhack . Directed by Aron Stiehl . The equipment came from Hank Irwin Kittel. The actors were Michael Leibundgut (Alfons), Richard Salter (Pedro), Denis Lakey (The Whacked Man), Máté Sólyom-Nagy (Loucido), Richard Carlucci (The Interrogator), Peter Umstadt (Coelho), Michael Tews (Gonçalvez), Alice Rath (Judit), Anke Schubert (Inês), Cornelia Nuernbergk (supervisor) a. a.
There was another series of performances in 2010 at the City Theater in Bern . Here too, Dorian Keilhack was the musical director. The production came from Dieter Kaegi.
literature
- Program booklet anger. Theater Erfurt, 2006/07 season
Web links
- Work information and reviews on the website of the composer Andrea Lorenzo Scartazzini
- Picture gallery on the website of the director Aron Stiehl
Individual evidence
- ^ Information on the works of the Bärenreiter-Verlag , accessed on March 17, 2016.
- ↑ Wut (WP 9.9.2006) at the Theater Erfurt ( Memento from March 4, 2016 in the Internet Archive ).
- ↑ Alfred Ziltener: tribute to a corpse. Review of the Bern performance. In: Opernwelt , November 2010, p. 46, accessed on March 17, 2016.