Bohuslav Martinu's "Julietta" at the Palais Garnier, Nov 22

[Daniel Kessler]

Martinu's "Julietta" at the Palais Garnier - Nov 22

This stunning production of a tricky piece has been the talk of the current
Paris season.  After seeing the sold-out performance on Saturday night, I
can understand why.  Much of the credit belongs to British director Richard
Jones, who has managed to create a stunning stage setting that solved many
of the problems inherent in this very problematic work.

Martinu is probably best known in the U.S. for his orchestral pieces,
ballets (he did one for Marta Graham) and his chamber works than for what
he created for the lyric stage.  He wrote 14 operas, five are full-length.
This 1938 opera may offer the best hope for one of his pieces to obtain
repertory status, given the right production and cast.  Some years ago I
saw his "Greek Passion, a work that follows "Julietta" by nearly a quarter
of a century.  I thought it was a weak piece.

Did you ever see or meet someone whose physical allure was so overpowering
that you were compelled to return to the very spot of the original
encounter in the hope of finding that person?  That, in a nutshell, is the
plot of this "surrealistic" opera.

When the young and impressionable Bohuslav Martinu arrived in Paris in 1923
as a pupil to study with Albert Roussell, the Dadist movement was in full
sway and shortly, the buzz around Paris was the surrealist movement among
writers, painters, and authors.  However, one could say that these
movements, Dada-Surrealism-Bauhaus, were somewhat intermeshed at the time.
Martinu's Czech or Bohemian compatriots were already installed in their
respective ateliers in Paris, such as Josef Simca and Frantisek Kupka.  A
couple of years after, the surrealist playwright, Georges Neveaux arrived
on the scene and set up shop in Paris' XV arrondisement.  It would be
Neveaux's surrealist play, "Julietta, ou La cle des songes (1930) that
would excite Martinu.

"Julietta" concerns Michel, a traveling book salesman, sung by American
tenor William Burden, who cuts a nice mannish figure but does not possess a
distinctive voice.  At a unnamed Mediterranean port city, Michel attempts
to find Julietta and wins over the respect of the locals.  She appears at
the end of the first act and claims she remembers him but her recollections
are fuzzy as are the memories of her fellow townsfolk, who seem to have
hardly memory of anything for any duration.  She is illusive, constantly
changing in moods, one minute passionate and the other displaying bouts of
froideur -- very much like another Czech heroine, Rusalka.  Julietta
promises to meet Michel in the forest in Act II, by a fountain (symbol of
maternity).

In the forest scene, the action heats their reunion.  Although the ghost of
Stravinsky and Roussell are evident, Martinu manages to convey a sense that
he is master of his own musical destiny with a palette of colors that
transport the listener into this fantasy world.

One of the excitements of the evening was to hear soprano Alexia Cousins in
the title role, one which she assumed in her debut at the Palais Garnier.
Her career is only four years off the boards from one of those vocal
concours du chant or vocal competition.  Some have likened Ms. Cousins to a
young Regine Crespin.  It may be that her voice was having trouble warming
up since to my ears, there was occasional stridency in the voice but when
she sang off-stage, the effect was one of total vocal allure, a la Crespin.
 Ms. Cousins cuts a svelte figure and the voice carries well.  So far, her
roles have been Melisande, Tatiana, Micaela, and Blanche de la Force.  A
Wagner concert under Myung-Young Chung bought forth the observation that
she was getting in over her head singing the two arias for Elisabeth in
"Tannhaeuser."  To this complaint, Ms. Cousins has reminded us that it is
she alone who is the best judge of what repertory is suited to her voice
and claims not be interested in reading what the critics are saying.

The basso cantate/basso buffo, Alain Vernhes, who appeared at the
Washington Opera in "Le Cid" and also heard him last January at the
Bastille as Sancho Panza, also sang in the performance.

My only other experience with a surrealistic opera was Poulenc's "Les
Mamelles de Tiresias" and like that work, the esthetic of "Julietta" is
basically fantasy, but non-heroic, frolicsome, mischievous and bit of an
eccentric carnival.

Gerd Albrecht was the conductor and the performance was nicely judged
except that the strings and the brass failed at one particular crucial
moment in the second act, which was unfortunate.

By Act III, we are in the "central bureau of dreams" where it is apparent
that this has all been the manifestation of what was going on in Michel's
mind but director Richard Jones managed to transport us to this special
world and I never felt "taken" or "cheated."

In the end, Michel hears Julietta's voice inviting him to pass through a
doorway into this permanent world of "dreams."  The entire set for all acts
is that of a giant accordian as seen from different angles.  It is truly a
marvel of stagecraft.  When Michel is shown that there is no one behind the
door, he chooses to begin all over again and so we find ourselves back at
the beginning in Act I.  End of opera!  Yes, it was a different ending from
what playwright Neveaux had provided but he accepted Martinu's change and
went along without complaint.

"Julietta" was sung in a French translation.  I would have preferred it in
Czech.  When Julietta bids Michel "adieux" that's nice, but "Dobre Noc" can
be quite nice too!

In life, it was said that Martinu was a remote figure, somewhat withdrawn.
Perhaps that is why he was so successful in being able to transport us to
his world of dreams.

-------
P.S.  By the way,  there is a French film of "Julietta," (not the opera)  made by Marcel
Carne, starring Gerard Philippe as Michel and Suzanne Cloutier as Julietta.
 Oh, la la!
 

[Trev(UK)]

So who sang Michel??? As major a role if not more so than the heroine. Paul Nilon was great in this role for Opera North a few years ago in a magical production which was taken to Prague. I actually made a couple of costumes for this Paris production and only today 26/11/02, after much badgering from me, have they deigned to pay me-that`s TWO MONTHS after I sent the invoice!!!

Trev(UK)

"Daniel Kessler" <dkes...@pop.cybernex.net> wrote in message news:3DE376E4...@pop.cybernex.net...

[Claude Michel]

I have the live recording of this performance on digital CD

 

Claude

 

Regards from Paris

"Daniel Kessler" <dkes...@pop.cybernex.net> a écrit dans le message de news: 3DE376E4...@pop.cybernex.net...

[Daniel Kessler]

I heard that they were broadcasting the performance in Paris, prior to
the one that I saw.

I do you will go to see it. I think the "run" of performances is about
over now, maybe only one left.

I hope that other opera companies will pick up the challenge and do this
wonderful opera. Surely, after the play back in the 20's which caused a
near riot, then the 1938 opera by Martinu and afterwards, the film by
Marcel Carne, surely "Julietta" has entered the realm of legend.

I only wish I could have seen the David Poutney production for Opera
North that was a co-production with another European house, in Belgium,
I believe but in some ways, according to pictures of that production, it
was "too literal" to suit the piece.

The nice thing about the Richard Jones production was the marvelous set,
which was a giant accordian. Now, in the Martinu score, there are quite
a few solitary bars of music for that wonderful instrument, one so
capable of setting the mood of nostalgia that it was just right for the
piece (particularly for music set in a minor key).

In the first act, the according was seen, in more less "upside down
position" in terms of one trying to play the instrument (keyboard on the
right -- RIGHT? -- and on the other side of the instrument, those
"buttons" (on the left) that one uses to play base keys and chords.

Anyway, in the first scene, the instrunment was nearly proscenium in
heght and was slowly, slowly, protruding about 1/3 of the way across the
stage. As the bellows unfolded.....we could see "windows" and doors,
with the basso cantante, Alain Verhenes (sp?) sitting at the window in
an exhance with the young Arab boy.

The second act set in the forest, we had a different view of the
accordian with the "button" side down at stage level by the lip of the
stage. The bellows had been "cut" away with the sides of the bellow
showing. From there, we could "peek" into the forest which had stylized
trees and they entire set was bathed in the most fetching "blue light."
When the sound of the French horn is heard, a gentlemen in black tie and
tails appeared in the back of the forest, walked slowely to the center
back stage, lifted up his instrument and played the haunting solo music
that is to set the stage for the magic of the forest scene. After
bringing down his horn, he walked tastefully across the stage and out of
sight. He did this a couple of times as the horn music reoccurred.
Ditto, with the the piano solo that followed....we saw a woman seated at
a grand piano that slowly progressed from left to right ---across the
back of the stage while she played.. until she disappeared and the piano
music stopped. Very surrealistic!

In the last act, we had the accordian keyboard at the lip of the stage
(instead of the buttons) and the instruments with bellows stretched up
into infinity at the top of the procenium. There was a point above the
keyboard where there is some black device (the name I do not know) where
it was made as a "door" which led inside the instrument -- that "door"
was the "realm of dreams" from which all of the stage players made their
exit after appearing earlier from the wings and walking zombie style
into the black "button" doorway, each person spaced about 3 meters from
each other. These people were menat to be those who inhabited the world
of dreams, that Mediterranean village durign their waking hours, now
proceedint to a world a part from Michel. From off-stage we heard
Julietta calling to Michel to tell him to come to her (inside the world
of dreams) but the very bureaucratic French from an office-like bureau
perch above the "black door" that "it's closing time" at the world of
dreams and he must leave now. The bureaucratic offficial even arranges
to have an attendant open the door to show Michel that no one is there.
The very door from the "zombies" have disappeared by now.

Michel decides to stick around and the entire opera begins again and we
find ourselves back in "Act I."

This Richard Jones concept was truly one of the most brilliant
theatrical conception's I've seen in 45 years of opera-going. Jones was
right not to have "real" sets because the piece teeters between reality
and fantasy. If you have real sets, the audience is going to feel
"cheated" when they arrive in the last act and discover that this is all
a hoax! Jones kept us constantly in suspense and totally engaged.

The whole production was sheer "magic time," which is what, I believe,
opera production should be about.