Issuu

ALBAN BERG

WOZZECK

CONTENTS

SYNOPSIS P.

A SHARP EYE ON SOCIAL REALITY INTERVIEW WITH SIMON STONE

A PERFECT OPERA CHRISTIAN GERHAHER P.

WOZZECK ISN’T A CIGARETTE OLIVER LÁNG

THERE IS A SILENCE IN THE WORLD ANNA MITGUTSCH

IMPRINT

ALBAN BERG

WOZZECK OPERA in three acts (15 scenes) Text ALBAN BERG after GEORG BÜCHNER

ORCHESTRA 4 flutes, 4 oboes, 4 clarinets, 1 bass clarinet, 3 bassoons, 1 contrabassoon, 4 horns, 4 trumpets, 4 trombones, 1 contrabass tuba, 2 pairs of timpani, cymbals, bass drum, snare drum, rod, large tam-tam, small tam-tam, triangle, xylophone, celesta, harp, violin I, violin II, viola, cello, double bass STAGE ORCHESTRA several small drums; A military band: 1 piccolo, 2 flutes, 2 oboes, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, 2 horns, 2 trumpets, 3 trombones, 1 contrabass tuba, percussion A wine tavern band: 2 fiddles, 1 clarinet, 1 accordion, 1 guitar, 1 bombardon or bass tuba; a small piano A chamber orchestra in the instrumentation of Arnold Schönberg’s Kammersymphonie: 1 flute (also piccolo), 1 oboe, 1 English horn, 2 clarinets, 1 bass clarinet, 1 bassoon, 1 contrabassoon, 2 horns and a solo string quintet

AUTOGRAPH Score: Library of Congress, Washington Short score: Department of Music at the Austrian National Library WORLD PREMIÈRE 14 DEC 1925 State Opera Unter den Linden, Berlin PREMIÈRE AT THE HOUSE ON THE RING 30 MAR 1930 DURATION

1 H 30 M

NO INTERMISSION

CHRISTIAN GERHAHER

A PERFECT OPERA With any piece of vocal music which is not directly liturgical, there is the fundamental question of how far the original text has been diminished in the process of setting it. There is no such injustice here: in this regard, I would describe Wozzeck as a perfect example of a literary opera (conventional libretti are written to be set), because the composer very largely respected Büchner’s text, there are no radical cuts, and overall the text of the setting has remained extremely close to the dramatic fragment Woyzeck, particularly in the brevity and compression of meaning urgently needed for an opera. This is due, naturally, to the original, which demonstrated a phenomenal density of meaning in its verbal expression: each and every phrase is a uniquely striking individual element, beautiful in its awareness, witty. Occasionally, there is just so much packed into individual words – for example, the Captain’s “Whew!” in Act II in itself constitutes for me a superb and captivating sentence! And Berg has further intensified this meaningfulness acoustically through his music, and perhaps even outrun it.

As a consequence, Wozzeck – with its rich brevity, depth of meaning and at the same time formal musical completeness – is simply the perfect opera, and is, despite the darkness and tragedy of the material, a unique delight to the spirit. Whatever piece – performance or rehearsal – I may be coming from, every encounter with Wozzeck brings an incomparable sense of fulfilment, inner relaxation. The combination of the meaningfulness of Büchner’s sentences (not a single unnecessary word) and the sensuality of Berg’s music (not a single unnecessary note) takes me every time to a pinnacle in the history of music theatre (the only restriction to this praise could be that Alban Berg had as yet no access to a full edition, so that some scenes could not be set, and also made a few modifications to the text for reasons of taste). One important question is how far Berg’s notation for the vocal parts, which is very firm but at the same time immensely difficult to understand – there are claimed to be over 60 (!) different forms of notation – has to be implemented one-for-one, and if it is even consistent to the last detail. The timbre

A PERFECT OPERA

of the average operatic vocal production at the end of the 19th century probably left something to be desired in terms of its declamatory range, and an attempt was made to counter this with colouristic diversity, not least by Schönberg and his student Berg, but also, for example, in Humperdinck’s Königskinder, which was first set as a pure declamatory opera. At the latest after the turn of the century, there was a sense of need for a more varied approach to the vocal line, possibly involving less than total accuracy of pitch. This may also be the intent of Berg’s instruction to sing the intervals correctly but (where indicated) not to worry about the exact pitches. On the other hand, as Heinz Holliger often assured me (and firmly enough for me to simply pass it on) that for Berg, as perhaps the greatest tonal designer of the 20th century, no note would have been fortuitous or even excessive, and that each sequence of notes had its very own meaning in the overall structure. As a result, it is just not possible that this lucid and concise web of sounds could justifiably include pitches dependent on the passing inspiration and mood of a performer. Wozzeck is the story of a man who is the victim and inferior of everyone in every way. He is hierarchically inferior to the Captain, socially and intellectually inferior to the Doctor. He is inferior to Marie, sexually, and generally as a partner. He allows himself to be bullied by the first two and abused for dubious medical purposes, as he needs money to feed his family. And as a constantly dominated individual who is obviously regarded as unattractive or at least incompatible, he is blatantly spurned by Marie. The relationship between the

two is clearly a total disaster. When you see the bed they share in our production, you can hardly imagine that the inhibited and ashamed Wozzeck could ever lie there beside Marie. Rushing from pillar to post, when the man does return home, he will rather settle in an armchair to sleep briefly, before returning to his erratic life. But this way of life as a flight from his solution, in fear of the breakdown of the illusion of an apparently financially, socially, sexually and amorously orderly existence, itself increasingly runs into trouble in the form of the decreasing options for maintaining it. The Doctor subjects him to a diet of beans with numerous side-effects (hyperuricemia, hallucinations) which becomes increasingly unbearable (“pissed in the street like a dog”), the Captain’s narcissistic sadism (“Oh, he’s stupid, unbearably stupid”) becomes increasingly intolerable, and finally there is the Drum Major, who humiliates him mentally and physically … The decisive factor, however, is Marie’s blatant affair with the Drum Major as a consequence of marrying below herself, which in turn is the result of her socially precarious situation (first dialogue with Margret). Why does Wozzeck keep up this non-relationship for so long? Perhaps he is looking for a substitute meaning of life. He never knows how to deal with the present, his current situation, but handing over the money he’s just earned could be a satisfactory daily goal (above a C major chord lasting for several bars) – a substitute for a life without the opportunity for development. A relationship with other women would be hardly any different for him, he would be the infe-

OLIVER LÁNG

WOZZECK ISN’T A CIGARETTE THE BIRTH OF THE OPERA Someone entering the Kammerspiele in Rotenturmstrasse in Vienna’s first district today might not suspect that they are treading on musical history. It was here in 1914 that Alban Berg saw a performance of Georg Büchner’s Woyzeck with Albert Steinrück in the title role. Berg was so impressed by what he had seen that he immediately thought of setting the piece, as he wrote to his friend and colleague Anton Webern years later: “I had such an incredible impression that I immediately decided (even after hearing it for the second time) to set it to music. It’s not just the fate of these poor people who are exploited and tormented by everybody that moves me, so much as the incredible mood of the individual scenes.” Their joint teacher, Arnold Schönberg, was less convinced of the idea of a composition, feeling that it was “impossible to make something good of it”. But although he was occasionally shaken by Schönberg, Berg held to the idea with astonishing consistency. Today, we know that what the young composer saw at what was known then as the Residenzbühne was

far from the “real” Büchner. Büchner had left only fragments of Woyzeck, without a set sequence of scenes, and partly in differing layers and versions. The author Emil Franzos arranged, changed and published the piece in what he felt was the appropriate shape. A further revision by Paul Landau resulted in the text that Berg used as the basis for his libretto. The son of a medical doctor, Büchner was a doctor of philosophy and the sciences who was equally interested in the scientific and social aspects of the world around him. As a representative of revolutionary ideas (see the example of his writings on page 80 below), he was wanted by the police and had to flee. As a result, his Woyzeck should be read as both a social protest and a treatment of scientific issues which were hotly debated at the time. The 1837 dramatic fragment is based on at least three different criminal cases, all centred on the murder of a lover. In 1817 the journeyman tobacco processor Daniel Schmolling was the perpetrator, in 1821 it was the source of the title, Johann Christian Woyzeck, and

WOZZECK ISN’T A CIGARETTE

in 1830 the journeyman linen weaver Johann Diess; at least one other similar case is suspected. Georg Büchner took individual aspects of the cases, not seeking historical truth or documentary narrative, but rather questions of the competency, psychological disposition and social and political environment of the perpetrators. Johann Christian Woyzeck’s crime was the best known of the cases at the time. He was a former soldier who had fallen on hard times, was alienated from society and tormented by hallucinations, and killed his lover of many years out of jealousy, stabbing her seven times. The deed was followed by an unusually long trial which centred on the question whether Woyzeck was legally responsible or not. According to Woyzeck, voices had driven him to commit the murder. Ultimately, several expert opinions confirmed his competency, and with it his guilt. He was executed three years after the deed, on 27 August, 1724, although the case was never completely settled. There were repeated claims that the expert opinions finding him legally responsible were not objective, and that the experts wanted to force his execution. The accusation was that it had less been an honest evaluation of a condition than the desire to make an example as a deterrent, and impose the most severe punishment possible on someone distasteful to “polite society”. In Büchner’s piece, the focus shifted from the deed to the psychological and ultimately social analysis. His early death prevented him from completing the play. Parts of the text appeared for the first time some 40 years later, in 1875 (misspelt as Wozzeck) in the Neue Freie

Presse, followed by an edition of what was assumed to be his complete works. For this, Karl Emil Franzos had produced a version of the drama from the different (and hard to read) drafts which accorded with the 19th century concept of a complete, linear drama. This “complete” version is nothing more than a construction, which was also dominated by Franzos’s dramaturgical tastes. Franzos described the process of compilation as follows: “I endeavoured to arrange the two elements, the grotesque and the tragic, so that the second element was not overshadowed in its effect by the first.” He was certainly ready to add elements to the action arbitrarily, such as Wozzeck’s death or suicide. While subsequently severely criticized for his high-handed approach, we must give Franzos credit for recognizing the importance of the text and making the effort to present it to the broadest possible audience in a form which he felt would have public appeal. Another aspect is that even Büchner’s brother ignored Woyzeck in 1850 in the course of producing an edition of the complete works. Another edition of the text by Paul Landau, based on Franzos’s work, followed in 1909, which particularly involved rearranging the scenes. The piece was premièred in this version in Munich in 1913, and Alban Berg used this as the basis for his libretto. Although Berg decided to set the piece in 1914 directly after seeing the play, and noted some initial ideas in the same year, the gestation of the opera was relatively long. Berg chose scenes from the play for the libretto, which he wrote himself, and rearranged and shortened them. “The work on the text (…)