The 62nd Aldeburgh Festival got off to an initially languorous but ultimately invigorating start with the world premiere of two chamber operas – that could hardly be more different to each other - by Sir Harrison Birtwistle. Semper Dowland semper dolens is a study in plaintive melancholy, with the seven Lachrimae of Dowland as reworked by Birtwistle interspersed with six Dowland songs, all on a similar theme. Little actually happens, but two dancers accompany the narrative and a video installation provides a close-up commentary on their thoughts and expressions as the music unfolds. Then we come to The Corridor, Birtwistle pur (but this time by no means dur). It is a dramatic reworking of the Orpheus and Euridice moment, a musical expansion of that split second in which Orpheus yields to temptation, looks back at Euridice and loses her for ever. The corridor of the title is either the physical space in which the event occurs, or a corridor of time and memory. Either way, the piece has dramatic punch and flair and is wonderfully cogent in performance. It sent the Festival audience out into the first night air on a decided high.
Semper Dowland semper dolens may or may not be Dowland's own epithet but his Seaven Teares Figured in Seaven Passionate Pavanes certainly make the point that life can be full of woe. In Birtwistle's arrangement there are seven instrumentalists, plus a harp, a solo tenor and two dancers. The instrumentalists play Birtwistle's light rearrangements of the Seaven Teares, after each of which Mark Padmore, in glorious voice on this occasion, sings a Dowland song to harp accompaniment. In keeping with the sombre mood, the key throughout is A minor: only once does Padmore cross the stage and move into A major. At first it is hard to detect that Birtwistle has done anything at all to the Dowland originals: the five string parts seem and sound authentic and original. But as the piece progresses, things start to happen: there is a gradual break-up of the constituent parts, with various woodwind instruments (ranging from piccolo to bass clarinet) emphasising and then distorting the melodic inner lines. The effect is hypnotic and fascinating: and the performance was of the highest musical standard. The string parts were light and airy, often staying within a pp to p dynamic: the shaping of each musical phrase a constant delight. Special praise goes to Helen Tunstall on the harp: she and Padmore felt the music as one, and each time they performed the conductor, Ryan Wigglesworth, put down his (metaphorical) baton and simply listened intently. There was some wonderful music-making here.
So why not a complete rave review? The weakness of the piece as a chamber opera, it seemed to me, is precisely what interested Birtwistle in Lachrimae in the first place – it is mono-dimensional. The music is exquisitely beautiful and the arrangement and re-orchestration delicate, subtle and highly effective. But there is no dramatic punch. Not even the two hard-working dancers, Helka Kaski and Thom Rackett, could give it any real sense of expressive urgency. So you reach the halfway point, the interval, wondering what the real point of the piece is. That seems to me, despite the ravishing of my senses, a flaw.
The Corridor, on the other hand, grips you from the moment it begins. The libretto, by David Harsent, takes the form of a dramatic dialogue between Man (Orpheus) and Woman (Euridice). The music desks of the six instrumentalists are spread the entire width of the stage, lit from overhead, with the corridor of the title running across the stage in front of them. Orpheus tries to coax Euridice out from darkness and into light, turns when he feels she is there (“because love brought me round”) and loses her for ever. Birtwistle conjures up some remarkably evocative orchestral phrases to accompany key moments of the narrative: the repeated “drawing me down” of the Woman is as wistful and memorable as is the percussive harp that accompanies the Man's angry outburst: “She was dead and gone. She was emptied out. Her bridesmaids threw their garlands in the stream that runs straight to Hades”. The operatic writing is dense, but always crystal clear and leading you on into the piece.
Birtwistle then works a theatrical trick, turning the part of the Woman into melodrama. She has extended spoken passages, commenting on what has happened and on how she feels, interspersed with obbligato passages by each solo instrumentalist playing the part of a Shade. The Man meanwhile retreats into song accompanied only by the harp, just as in the Dowland of the first part. So as Woman harangues the players (“What do you think he saw when he looked at her?”…”This perfect love, this perfect match, do you believe in it?”) their response is purely instrumental, from an angry outburst shared by two woodwind to some virtuoso string playing. Man meanwhile moves inexorably to the one word that expresses all the anguish that he feels, and in an extended scena for tenor and harp, voices that word – Euridice, breaking it down into its own constituent syllables in a final duet with Woman whose motif is “dance me down”. It is a powerful and arresting ending.
In a performance of blazing intensity, Elizabeth Atherton triumphed as Woman. Her sense of vocal attack was unfailing, her spoken passages absolutely outstanding, with every spoken word resounding throughout the packed Britten Studio. Her voice is warm, her vowel sounds well rounded, with only a slight falling-off in precision of diction in her middle to upper register. But what a performance. Atherton clearly believes wholeheartedly in the dramatic effectiveness of The Corridor and took us with her.
Dramatically speaking, Mark Padmore made less effect as Man, simply because of the way the role is treated. He matched Atherton beautifully and his singing was of tremendous quality throughout, but his part is not at the emotional heart of The Corridor and there is only so much that he can do. But for sheer musicality, there are few tenors who can rival him at present – and he gave a tremendous performance.
I am not a member of the Harrison Birtwistle fan club, and have been perplexed/disturbed/annoyed by some works of his I have seen in the past. I simply do not 'get' The Second Mrs Kong, for example. But on this occasion, a vintage Aldeburgh Festival opening, I was exhilarated and excited in equal measure. The Britten Studio is off to a fine start!
By Mike Reynolds
Related articles:
Festspielhaus Baden-Baden announces 2009-10 season
Rossini: Il barbiere di Siviglia at the Baden-Baden Festspielhaus
News: Robert Wilson presents Der Freischütz at Baden-Baden online
Der Rosenkavalier with Renee Fleming at the Festspielhaus Baden-Baden