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n because one thought it not very good i did not know much about the repertoire of opera houses at the time but the idea that they were overloaded with new or even modernist work was patently absurd i was equally puzzled at the end of this performance of brett dean s new opera of one blood to hear loud booing from certain quarters of munich s nationaltheater when the composer librettist heather betts and i think director claus guth came onstage it was not a premiere so their appearance was slightly unexpected if welcome could people who had contentedly so it seemed sat through two acts of a new opera have felt so strongly about its music it could i suppose have been its libretto or even its staging that they felt they must bellow farmyard noises in an attempt to drown out applause if they had not liked the opera or had considerable criticisms of it fair enough but what was it that had led them to such a display it was neither a mindlessly reactionary nor a vigorously avant garde work it was well crafted well performed and well directed would not refraining from applause as i am sure many of us have done on occasion have been enough i am afraid reflection has left me none the wiser but the experience was unsettling and has continued to be not least from concern for those at the sharp end of that strange bullying response the phrase of one blood refers to a phrase mary stuart queen of scots used in a letter to her cousin and antagonist historical and here dramatic elizabeth i here elizabeth tudor we be both of one blood of one country and in one island in their communications and other sixteenth century sources lie the seeds of betts s libretto assembled and constructed after the manner of many a dramatic confrontation between the two betts is a visual artist an interesting case for a librettist in terms of scene setting for instance the opening and close of the work in contemporary or perhaps in guth s staging a future westminster abbey in whose henry vii lady chapel the two queens lie at opposite ends at the command of their mutual successor james vi and i who also commissioned their tombs that struck her when visiting as it might anyone but its visual element seems to have been especially important to the librettist dramaturgically focusing the action and the way it plays out thereby also influencing the staging as well as providing elements of a solution for the perennial problem of what to do in a drama concerning the entwined lives of two central figures who never met contriving an occasion on which they did is a common solution it is good to welcome an alternative to the fold in an intriguingly clinical white setting albeit beneath a hint of english perpendicular gothic which tilted at one point perhaps as a reflection of changing fortunes and or danger and so we see the two queens act separately in the beginning later appearing partly at the same time in their own halves of the stage with consort retinues i was puzzled before realising the word was intended musically rather than maritally so as to react one another s words and deeds coming tantalisingly close yet never quite meeting tellingly their union in duet as opposed to written dialogue takes place when both are offstage there are oddities to the libretto or at least features i did not understand the archaic eth third person singular is employed yet we hear will rather than wilt with thou it all serves its purpose well enough though and perhaps such inconsistencies if inconsistencies they be are simply reflections of a language that has always been in change titles were used not simply to convey but at certain points to add to the libretto including indication of place such as richmond palace holyrood or of course fotheringhay castle collaboration between husband and wife librettist their daughter one of mary s excellent consort seems to have been fruitfully close what comes first whether chronologically or aesthetically is ever a fraught question in any such relationship but there were no obvious signs of tension and many of complement likewise between them and guth the extraction of both tombs for cleaning and their return at the end an interesting element of the aforementioned framing rather than contrast or contradiction a low opening pedal electronic rather than acoustic i think sounds rheingold like yet unlike the musical beginning subsequent scraping noises like a dental implement writ large partaking of the drama and ushering in the bayerische staatsorchester here on excellent form under vladimir jurowski s wise invigorating direction two worlds then collided and coincided in more ways than one multidimensional yet bilateral dramatic conflict one might say this was further layered in the elizabethan scenes with harpsichordist mahan esfahani onstage few if any harpsichordists have done more for new music than esfahani here his role once again bridged divides between old and new his instrument inciting orchestral and electronic material and on at least one occasion if my ears did not deceive me prefigured in the purely electronic material of the very opening the dramatic possibilities of such time travel were manifold perhaps all the better for being left to us not necessarily to resolve but to ponder and thus to engage as active dramatic participants similarities with berg first a chord close to wozzeck then broader harmonic fields suggested themselves to my ears at the opening of the second act but i am not sure this was so much influence as my ears making sense of a new harmonic world with music i knew more fundamentally the expertise and artistry with which both acts of roughly equal length were planned and realised was striking still more so in the second perhaps a matter of my having become more at home with the work in that the role of the equally excellent chorus was apparent first liturgical in westminster abbey but changing its role like the greek chorus so as both to comment and participate in acclamation rebellion and more in what was perhaps an inevitable nod to or at least coincidence with donizetti coloratura featured in both queens lines but there was far more to them than that especially as brought so vividly and sympathetically to life by johanni von oostrum and vera lotte boecker amongst the rest of a very fine cast i might put in a word for michael butler s feckless darnley and pawel horodyski s executioner but this was emphatically an ensemble performance as well as one of warring queens designs and choreography were stylish and suggestive throughout maybe our hecklers disliked the black coals of ruin that occupied much of the second act stage before being swept away by restoration workers in the present future i am grasping at straws though who knows ultimately who cares applause from the premiere geoffroy schied posted by mark berry at 11 17 am email this blogthis share to x share to facebook share to pinterest labels bavarian state opera brett dean claus guth heather betts johanni von oostrum lotte betts dean michael butler munich opera festival of one blood pawel horodyski vera lotte boecker vladimir jurowski monday 29 june 2026 munich opera festival 1 borgioni monteverdi continuo ensemble heumann la morte d orfeo 28 june 2026 prinzregententheater excerpts from stefano landi la morte d orfeo monteverdi l orfeo giovanni maria trabaci durezze et ligature jacopo peri euridice luigi rossi orfeo interspersed with lorenzo allegri primo ballo della notte d amore monteverdi seventh book of madrigals tempro la cetra biagio marini per ogni sorte di strumento musicale op 22 no 21 sonata sopra fuggi dolente core alessando piccinini intavolaturo di liuto toccata sigismondo d india le musiche cara mia cetra andrea falconiero il primo libro delle canzone battaglia de barabaso yerno de satanas giovanni legrenzi la cetra sonata monteverdi l incoronazione di poppea oblivion soave mauro borgioni baritone monteverdi continuo ensemble friederike heumann concept director viola and lira de gamba founded to enable historically informed performances of the three surviving operas of monteverdi munich s monteverdi continuo ensemble both celebrated its thirtieth anniversary and commemorated the life of one of its founding members lutenist fred jacobs in a baroque concert contribution to the city s annual opera festival gambist friederike heumann devised a programme around the idea of the death of orpheus in a sense creating a small ish concert opera in two acts rejecting the happy end of so many retellings and exploring not only death but above all the power of music through assembled texts revealing four protagonists orpheus his lyre in turn variously represented by harp lira de gamba and chitarrone a narrator and the ferryman charon at the heart of la morte d orfeo stood excerpts from three seventeenth century orphic operas by monteverdi stefano landi and luigi rossi as well as one from the oldest surviving opera of all jacopo peri s euridice written and first performed in 1600 it made for a fascinating evening poised somewhere between concert and pasticcio my only real cavil being the lack of titles to enable closer following and comprehension of the words yet so vividly communicative were the performances by baritone mauro borgioni who has sung monteverdi s orfeo and ulisse in several productions and the ensemble as a whole that the loss was mitigated tribute in its way to the power not only of music but that of its mysterious alchemy in song and in what we have come to know as opera in the beginning was an overture well not quite but music that served well in its new guise lorenzo allegri s primo ballo della notte d amore an ersatz sinfonia reflecting in its gathering momentum the interchange between lands north and south of the alps that has contributed so much to the genre and perhaps to allegri s life and work too as a composer and lutenist at the medici court in florence sometimes referred to as lorenzino tedesco dance we were reminded in body as in spirit has informed dramma per musica from the outset the array of music genres and indeed styles that proceeded to feed into the whole reminded us opera has from the outset and arguably from before that outset always found itself pulled between various poles words and music descriptive and prescriptive even proscriptive text and performance and so much else sigismondo d india s older more madrigalian harmony for instance registered in such richly expressive fashion that no one could seriously draw a straight line from any point a to any other point b indeed if anything the later seventeenth music could sometimes sound conventional even restricted in various modes of expression compared to what came earlier monteverdi of course yet far from only him peri s euridice stood probably from coincidentally at the centrepoint of the first act voice and chitarrone michael freimuth opening a window on the world to be joined by their musical confreres an ensuing sinfonia from monteverdi immediately recalled to us why we consider his orfeo to be the first operatic masterpiece it remains hors concours even without words but here the rewards in understanding through so many paths to and from his work and those of landi and rossi were manifold monteverdi s rosa del ciel was heart rending rossi s later lament was more ornate in what we have come rightly or wrongly to consider more baroque style echoed in fuller orchestral response landi s it al sacro consiglio was perhaps more generic a setting yet still interesting to hear in such context the battaglia from andrea falconiero s primo libro delle canzone gently reminded us that opera is and always has been theatre too two of the ensemble having slipped out returning with their instruments in a dialogue that here began if only began to approach some of our notions of music theatre orpheus and his instrument having travelled to hades other humans and their musicking could join in musical sympathy for the second shorter act a rossi passacaglia proved a splendidly apt and contrasting curtain raiser in later more orchestral style yes but also more importantly in dramatic mood landi s narration volge orfeo gli occhi showed his artistry to more individually expressive effect at least to my twenty first century ears than the previous excerpt from his 1619 tragicommedia pastorale here perhaps conditioned by what had gone before i found his simpler writing more allied to the later century and arguably in better company harp lyre music in both halves by giovanni maria trabaci soothed the soul and furthered the action for orpheus s farewell rossi and of course borgioni rose magnificently to the occasion no one could have entertained any doubt about what was happening and about to happen a trio instrumental treatment of the lullaby oblivion soave from l incoronazione di poppea cornetist gebhard david s line rocking atop and against its continuo worked its magic in winning new guise prior to a splendidly theatrical change of mood for charon caronte s beva beva secure l onda this was landi in festive mode its strophic form nicely varied in borgioni s ornamentation and of course the ensemble response as an encore the thwarted happy ending returned again emblematic of a key theme in the history of the genre borgioni and the players treated us to a solo rendition of the closing chorus of l orfeo vanne orfeo felice a pieno orpheus reborn once again where should we be without him posted by mark berry at 11 30 am email this blogthis share to x share to facebook share to pinterest labels andrea falconiero friederike heumann jacopo peri l orfeo lorenzo allegri luigi rossi mauro borgioni monteverdi monteverdi continuo ensemble munich opera festival sigismondo d india stefano landi older posts home subscribe to posts atom about me mark berry view my complete profile search this blog total pageviews blog archive 2026 49 july 7 broken branches sulayman shibe 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