EINEM Der Prozess (Gruber)

Record and Artist Details

Composer or Director: Gottfried von Einem

Genre:

Opera

Label: Capriccio

Media Format: CD or Download

Media Runtime: 104

Mastering:

DDD

Catalogue Number: C5358

C5358. EINEM Der Prozess (Gruber)

Tracks:

Composition Artist Credit
(Der) Prozess, '(The) Trial' Gottfried von Einem, Composer
Alexander Hüttner, Man; Young Person, Tenor
Anke Vondung, Frau Grubach, Mezzo soprano
Daniel Gutmann, Man; Young Person
Gottfried von Einem, Composer
H K Gruber, Conductor
Ilse Eerens, Leni; Court Usher's Wife; Humpbacked Girl, Soprano
Jochen Schmeckenbecher, Priest; Factory Owner; Passerby, Baritone
Johannes Kammler, Court Usher; Lawyer, Baritone
Jörg Scneider, Titorelli, Tenor
Lars Woldt, Magistrate; Flogger, Bass
Martin Kiener, Man; Young Person
Matthäus Schmidlechner, Student; Vice-President, Tenor
Michael Laurenz, Josef K, Tenor
Tilmann Ronnebeck, Chief Clerk; Uncle Albert, Bass
Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra
Literaturoper is what German writers (not uncritically) named a growing school of 20th-century composers who set librettos taken from compressed but hardly altered literary classics. The latter – written by authors from Büchner to Friedrich Dürrenmatt via Kafka – were the mainstay of Gottfried von Einem’s output for the stage.

In Der Prozess, an early 1950s opera after Kafka’s bleak, slightly surreal novel (The Trial in English), the composer provides an object lesson in how to set a potentially intractable subject. Not only does very little ‘happen’ in the novel (until the anti hero’s literally last-minute unseen execution) but the text – although written in the third person – is a stream of consciousness and dialogue from a single central character.

Unfazed by this challenge, von Einem set to work with a whole list of unbeatable standbys of musical theatre. These put to flight the less than dramatic prospect of chains of recitative in his trademark almost neo atonal style. Tempos and orchestration were consistently varied so that a number opera emerged around the central character Josef K’s continuous encounters. The few female characters (five in a cast list of well over 20) were made the most of to contrast with an unchanging succession of male voices. And, without ever being naturalistic, music of contrasting moods and styles (even dance music) was dropped into the basically gloomy and dark setting – Prague Noir takes on overtones of New York which could approach, say, Bernstein’s almost contemporary music for West Side Story. The piece overall was very much the von Einem who sounds like a less acerbic Mahler or a more tonal Berg. All these factors helped to ease or at least obscure one remaining problem of the piece – there was a little (actually quite a lot) too much of Josef K and he had very little interesting to sing per se, even if his role was not exactly easy. But that concentration on one was the essential heart of Kafka’s novel.

The new recording comes from concert performances at last year’s Salzburg Festival celebrating the composer’s centenary. It’s led with great gusto and accuracy by one of his leading pupils. Gruber is predictably unafraid of the more modern elements and (in an accompanying note) compares his old master’s approach to that of John Adams. The singing cast is strong and accurate too.

The collector in you may be intrigued by Orfeo’s takeover of the 1953 world-premiere broadcast led by Karl Böhm, with Max Lorenz and Lisa della Casa leading the cast. It’s well rehearsed and fluent but the VPO sound just a little afraid of the noisier climaxes and syncopations. Gruber now, obviously with superior sound, provides a better document of von Einem’s score.

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