Janáček: Z Mrtvého Domu (From the House of the Dead) – You Need to See this Opera

From the House of the Dead is a dark opera—dark music, dark story, dark set—and a powerful drama. It’s hard to make it sound like must-see opera, but you really must see it. In this production, the three acts are played without intermission, and the ~100 minutes go by fast.  As expected from Janáček, there isn’t much lyricism nor are there melodies per se. The music is direct and driving, and it enhances every scene and every line of dialog.

Věc Makropulos – Salzburg 2011 (Part 3: Give Me Alchemy or Give Me Death)

In the course of Věc Makropulos, we learn that Emilia is in fact rather bored with living so long, constantly reinventing herself, and finding a new life and lover. She sings in her final aria that the relative brevity of life is what gives human existence its joys and meaning. Never-ending life seems to blur and ultimately render meaningless the differences between good and evil, happiness and sadness, and even life and death.

Věc Makropulos – Salzburg 2011 (Interlude: Der Festspielhaus Maus)

This is clearly a Regieoper production, with a lot of symbolism depicting the aspects of a long life: repetition, waiting, etc. 

One regie bit that seemed pretty clear to me occurs 29 minutes into Act 3. As Emilia sings, "For me, life has stopped. I can go no further...the terrible loneliness,” a dormouse runs across the front of the stage. In German, this is a Siebenschläfer (Seven Sleepers); like our Punxsutawney Phil, he is a weather harbinger. 

Věc Makropulos – Salzburg 2011 (Part 2: Everything Old is New Again)

This Salzburg production, staged by Christoph Marthaler, definitely falls into the Regieoper category. There is a lot of sub-textual action on the sidelines, especially in acts 2 & 3.  The action doesn’t literally mirror the plot, but abstractly represents Emilia’s long life.  

Věc Makropulos – Salzburg 2011 (Part 1: The 337-year-old Diva)

I worked in a record store (remember record stores?) during the time Charles Mackerras recorded all the Janáček operas for Decca. Frankly, at that time what I heard did not do much for me.

Janáček ’s music has one foot in the 19th and the other in the 20th century; it’s sometimes hard to figure out what he is up to. One characteristic of Janáček ’s vocal music is his focus on replicating Czech speech patterns.  This is a good word-setting policy in general (IMHO as a part-time composer), and if you speak Czech, I am sure it makes the text easier to follow.