 
Ariadne auf Naxos
Così fan tutte
Don Carlo, Falstaff
Die Fledermaus
Concert 2001
Narrated Music
Shir Ha Shirim
Notes
Paumgartner
Musically insured
who am i...?
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Richard Strauss
Ariadne auf Naxos
To Forget And Yet Remain Faithful
Jossi Wieler, who directs Ariadne auf Naxos at this year's Salzburg Festival,
refers to Ariadne's state of depression, her psychological trauma, as
"something very much of today", a "kind of neurotic isolation".
Between the worlds of Ariadne and Zerbinetta there is no communication,
a bridge from one to the other seems impossible; and when Ariadne meets
Bacchus both are scarred by injuries from the past and project these onto
each other. Ariadne, the abandoned, is symbol of man's loneliness. Robert
Maschka on Ariadne auf Naxos, a further co-production by Richard Strauss
and Hugo von Hofmannsthal after they had worked together on Der Rosenkavalier.
If you want to live you must forget
"Transformation is what gives life to living. It is the true mystery
of the creative spirit. Inflexibility means rigidity and death. If one
wants to live, one must transcend oneself, one must change, one must forget.
And still all human dignity is related to permanence, to not forgetting,
to fidelity. We have here one of the greatest paradoxes at the centre
of human existence." These words, spoken by Hugo von Hofmannsthal
in 1912 when Ariadne was first produced in the original version that was
closely related to Molière's comedy Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme, form
a succinct summary of the main theme that dominates the whole work.
In Ariadne auf Naxos the opposition between change and permanence is represented
in the music-theatre terms of dramatic interplay whose musical fascination
lies in the virtuoso intermingling of heroic seria opera and supposed
commedia dell'arte.
In the light of the main theme, the purpose of this interchanging is to
reflect the permanent changes of perspective. Thus the unusual and the
extraordinary are the typical characteristics of the mythical events surrounding
Ariadne, whom Theseus has abondoned. It is through the pain of loss which
she endures and which has driven her close to death and self-annihilation,
that Ariadne becomes capable of new love. Nevertheless, Ariadne's metamorphosis
takes place completely involuntarily. It is only because of a misunderstanding
that it becomes possible for her to open herself up to something new.
And so she continues to mistakenly believe that Bacchus, arrived on Naxos,
is the god who will help her to forget and will lead her into death. Because,
however, in the fateful encounter between Ariadne and Bacchus the central
conflict in the work - the tension between fidelity and forgetting - seems
to be elevated onto the mythical-heroic level, the relevance of the proceedings
for the ordinary human being is in danger of becoming lost. In the pseudo-improvisational
ad-libbing of the "unfaithful Zerbinetta and her four lovers",
on the other hand, the work comes down to earth in the realistic, everyday
story of - as the librettist put it - "exchanging one lover for another".
Of course, this involves a change of emphasis. For the idea of having
been permanently influenced by earlier experience is foreign to Zerbinetta.
And so she lines up one love adventure after another in the pure delight
of seeing herself transformed, born anew as it were, through each new
love affair.
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| Gérard Uféras, Comic Opera, Berlin, 1993 |
Similar in not understanding
It is obvious, then, that Ariadne and Zerbinetta will have nothing in common to talk about. Accordingly, Hofmannsthal sees the ironic point in the work in the fact that these two "worlds of the soul" only come together by virtue of their common characteristic of "not understanding". And these two spheres are just as clearly distinguished from each other in the composition of the work, where the back and forth between comic and more elevated forms produces a mixtum compositum that is fully intentional. There is only one occasion where buffoonery and loftiness intermingle and that is in the prelude to the opera. There, "in the house of the richest man in Vienna", Zerbinetta becomes the consoler of the young composer who is scarcely able to get over the fact that, on the order of his patron, his first operatic work, Ariadne, is to go on stage in a mutilated form, viz. "staffed" by the buffo actors. For an instant, the young man frees himself from the pose of the lonely, misunderstood genius and turns to Zerbinetta only to become the victim of her charms. However, when seen in the context of its historical development, this synthesis of opposing spheres, anticipated in the prelude, is in fact a step in the composition of the work. For the prelude developed from the revision of Ariadne which was completed in 1916 after the original version, because of its hybrid mix of spoken comedy and opera, had proved unsuitabale for the repertoire.
Richard Strauss
Ariadne auf Naxos
sung in German
Conductor Christoph von Dohnányi
Director and Dramaturgy Jossi Wieler and Sergio Morabio
Stage-sets and costume designs Anna Viebrock
Lighting design David Finn
The Major-domo André Jung
A Music Master John Bröcheler
The Composer Susan Graham
The Tenor/Bacchus Jon Villars
A Dancing Master Jeffrey Francis
A Wig Maker Markus Eiche
Zerbinetta Natalie Dessay
Prima Donna/Ariadne Deborah Polaski
Harlequin Russell Braun
Scaramouche Heinz Göhrig
Truffaldino Franz-Josef Selig
Brighella Gert Henning-Jensen
Naiad Diana Damrau
Dryad Alice Coote
Echo Martina Janková
Vienna Philharmonic
Grosses Festspielhaus
New production: 18 August 2001
21, 24, 27 (the opera starts at 7.30 p.m.) and 31 August (2.30 p.m.)
Tickets at ATS 2,800, 3,600 and 4,600 are available from the ticket office
of The Salzburg Festival for Ariadne auf Naxos on 21, 27 and 31 August,
2001.
Telephone: 0662/8045-579
Telefax: 0662/8045-760
E-mail: info@salzburgfestival.at
Advance booking in the Schüttkasten from 1 July, Mon-Sat 9.30 a.m. to 5 p.m., and from 22 July daily from 9.30 a.m.to 6.30 p.m.