Simplicius

Freely based on a 17th century novel, the operetta "Simplicius" is from 1887 and was a failure when it came out. The libretto is confusing with real and fake von Grübbens all over the place in the medieval setting. The hermit, Baron Wendolin von Grübben has killed his brother in a battle and has brought up his son Simplicius (a mixture of a slightly unholy fool after Parsifal and Til Eulenspiegel of the merry pranks by the other Strauss, Richard.) as a wild boy in the forest. The latter is unaware of his noble heritage and is kidnapped by soldiers, to the confusion of everyone. He is also unaware that Arnim von Grübben who he encounters in the soldiers' camp is his brother and there are romantic and other complications. Needless to say, all ends happily.

Yes, there are plenty of waltzes, polkas and marches, trademarks of the composer. Much is quite beguiling (though I am not a Strauss fan.) but, as a whole it doesn't make the greatest sense dramatically.

The singing is good with Piotr Beczala, as Arnim, a standout. The production is not bad but I fail to see the point of some aspects of it such as the huge symbols of the soldiers' boots and the hanged men (both set designs.) above the tree towards the end as well as the giant inverted "thimbles" that Arnim and his lady-love Hildegarde step across. I also don't know why many of the dancers in the big Donauweibchen-Waltzer (Danube Women Waltzes) are dancing in modern long underwear. But these are small points.

Franz Welzer-Möst conducts "Möst" ably and, considering that the DVD was done from a live performance, the usual minor disasters such as something falling from the top of the stage at one point, didn't cause any major problems.

7 and 1/2 out of 10.

Opera and operetta has always been a lifelong passion for me. Simplicius is not one of Strauss' best, it has characteristically fantastic music but a silly story(The Gypsy Baron and especially Die Fledermaus are much stronger operettas), but even when Strauss is not at his best his music is still worth a lesson. This production is not an amazing one and is not going to be for everyone, but I do think it is better than the rating here(though if anybody dislikes it, I can definitely understand).

I have to admit that I wasn't a fan of the production values or staging. Granted I have definitely seen much worse, but the staging did have touches that I, and quite possibly quite a few other people, didn't see the point of- though admittedly there are some entertaining moments as well and the choreography is quite good- and while there are certainly some imaginative moments for an operetta production for my tastes they were too expressionistic and I would have preferred something more sumptuous. Martin Zyssert sings very well, but in terms of his interpretation I too think that he could have done with more childlike mischief.

On the plus side, there is nothing to fault musically. The orchestral playing has the lushness and lilting style needed for Strauss' "The Waltz King" waltz-like rhythms and scoring, while the chorus are animated and well balanced vocally and Franz Welser-Most keeping things moving along very nicely. The singing is just great. The three standouts were Martina Janckova, Piotr Beczala and Liliana Nikiteanu. Janckova has a voice that is at home in both opera and operetta, and more than holds her own on stage. I have always been a fan of Beczala's honeyed tone and great musicality and phrasing, and all of those are here as well as an appealing and unforced stage presence. Nikiteanu as ever is a commanding actress and sings with her usual creamy richness.

That is not to dispute Michael Volle, Elizabeth Magnussen and Oliver Widmer either. Volle is very good vocally and dramatically, though I do think he has been better elsewhere and in heavier roles than here. Magnussen sings with a beauty of tone and is very charming, while Widmer shows a warm sonorous baritone voice if perhaps not quite embodying his role. Overall, a decent production that will divide its audience I think. 7/10 Bethany Cox

This is a recording of a performance of "Simplicius" at the Zurich Opera House in 1999. Whatever reservations one may feel about it, its release is much to be welcomed. Johann Strauss is recognised to be one of the greatest operetta composers, yet the majority of his operettas have never been recorded. I was delighted to have a chance to make the acquaintance of one of the less well-known.

"Simplicius" (1887) resembles in many respects "Der Zigeunerbaron" (1885). Its score is of a similarly high standard (though without the Magyar colour). Most of the music is unlikely to be familiar even to Strauss enthusiasts however. That said, anyone who knows the "Donauweibchen" Waltz will recognise a number of melodies.

The unfamiliarity of the music means that attention tends to focus more on the plot and staging, and this "Simplicius" is an example of that rather unhappy modern sub-genre: opera-house operetta - i.e., operetta performed by people more accustomed to opera. The result is predictable. As a performance of the musical score, it is very proficient; as a staging of operetta, it is uncomfortable.

To draw a sharp dividing line between opera and operetta would be impossible, yet they are not the same. Operetta - even of the more substantial type - requires its own production-style. It is self-consciously artificial; it stands half-outside itself; it does not take its own plots seriously. To succeed on stage, therefore, operetta calls for comedy acting skills. Some opera singers possess these; most do not (and why should they?).

This fact is very much apparent here. Soprano Martina Jankova (Tilly) seems absolutely at home in operetta, captures the right tone, and is a pleasure to watch (as well as to hear). She comes from the Czech Republic, where the performance tradition of operetta may survive rather better than in western Europe. Piotr Beczala (Arnim), a tenor from Poland, also has the operetta touch. At the other extreme, Michael Volle could hardly appear more earnest if he were appearing in Wagner's "Götterdammerung". That said, he possibly gets away with it, as the hermit is a comparatively serious character. More problematic is the role of Melchior, the astrologer, which cries out for a comedian. Oliver Widmer tries his best, but it surely isn't his line. The title role in "Simplicius" is tricky: he is meant to be a young man who has been brought up in isolation from normal society (almost a 'feral child'). Martin Zysset conveys his childlike innocence but fails to realise that childlike mischief is also a component of the character. Many of the jokes in the dialogue pass unnoticed by the audience, as the actors fail to point them.

If casting is patchy, the staging is often downright off-putting. I deduce that one major difficulty about "Simplicius" - in the eyes of director David Pountney - was its light-hearted attitude to war. It is set in Moravia during the Thirty Years' War - a ghastly conflict - but its most catchy number is a jolly march whose words suggest that, if you haven't taken part in a cavalry charge, you've never lived. Arnim sings a song equally cheerful about exchanging his university studies for military service. Although other songs deride the notion that war is merry adventure, German-language operetta of the 1880s undeniably does include militaristic and nationalistic sentiment (and these are not all instantly given an ironic twist, as in the contemporary works of Gilbert and Sullivan). Pountney is very anxious to underline the fact that this sort of thing is not acceptable nowadays. Hence the chorus of soldiers is ragged and dirty. A troupe of Swedish dancing girls in Act III is replaced by a group of exhausted juvenile prisoners-of-war (though, incongruously, they sing the same comic ditty). At the end of Act II, when everyone proclaims 'God with us for Kaiser and Fatherland!', we are simultaneously confronted with the ugly face of war: a giant mask with flattened nose and bloody teeth. The principal feature of the set in Act III is a gibbet with a dozen rotting corpses.

The general trend of this production is thus to emphasise the gloomier aspects of the libretto. The opening scenes are so gloomy indeed that Simplicius' first waltz song sounds completely out of place. Like a perverse Mary Poppins, our director works on the assumption that opera-house audiences require a spoonful of medicine to help the sugar go down. The musical gaiety of operetta is only permissible in the opera-house, it seems, if balanced by some visual misery. The prevailing colours are grey and rust-red, and the lighting is subdued. Having purged the piece of much of its irresponsible lightness of heart, Pountney struggles to restore some vitality to it by injecting a dose of surrealism: enormous military boots are a feature. (The General stands in one throughout the second act). There is a good deal of fussy stage business with ropes and cylindrical platforms (the characters step from one to another). All of this extraneous embellishment is suggestive of a director without much faith in his material.

Indeed, Viktor Leon's libretto seems to be largely forgotten in the last quarter-hour, when the impetus of the plot (never very strong admittedly) is entirely dissipated. We have already had two numbers in succession without any dramatic relevance, but the director still sees fit to interpolate the entire "Donauweibchen" waltz: a number of seventeenth-century ladies and gentlemen dance about in a rain-storm and strip to their underwear (all underneath those rotting corpses).

The applause at the end is no more than polite. And no wonder. Fortunately, on repeated viewing, Strauss's splendid music comes to the fore, as the listener assimilates it. Lacking the genuine spirit of operetta in so many respects, this is indeed a production much better heard than seen.