Weill Der Silbersee
View record and artist detailsRecord and Artist Details
Composer or Director: Kurt (Julian) Weill
Genre:
Opera
Label: Capriccio
Magazine Review Date: 8/1990
Media Format: CD or Download
Media Runtime: 107
Mastering:
DDD
Catalogue Number: 60 011-2
Tracks:
| Composition | Artist Credit |
|---|---|
| (Der) Silbersee |
Kurt (Julian) Weill, Composer
Cologne Pro Musica Cologne Radio Symphony Orchestra Eva Tamassy, Frau von Luber, Mezzo soprano Frederic Mayer, Lottery Agent, Tenor Hans Korte, Olim, Baritone Hildegard Heichele, Fennimore, Soprano Jan Latham-König, Conductor Kurt (Julian) Weill, Composer Udo Holdorf, Baron Laur, Tenor Wolfgang Schmidt, Severin, Tenor |
Author:
There can be few works of art more intimately and poignantly bound up with twentieth-century political events than Der Silbersee. True, scores that comment on tyranny, outrage or holocaust roll from composers' pens with steady regularity, but they usually make their point by reflecting on past events. In Der Silbersee we hear the angry voice of protest on the eve of tragic events. The opera was premiered, simultaneously in Leipzig, Magdeburg and Erfurt, on February 18th, 1933, a matter of days before the Reichstag fire and the Nazi seizure of power. A month later, Weill was in exile in Paris, the subject of anti-Semitic abuse. Georg Kaiser, his librettist, fell into disgrace, was forbidden to write, and eventually emigrated.
It is not a work that minces its words. Expressed as a barely-concealed allegory—a 'winter's tale' is how the authors describe it, in both the literal and metaphorical sense—the scene is unmistakably contemporary Germany, bleakly portrayed as a country torn apart by inequality, unemployment, poverty and famine. The two protagonists, Severin and Olim, stand respectively for the hopeless unemployed and the ruling Socialist party, whose antagonism eventually gives way to unity after both have been ousted by an upstart rival (personified in the sinister Frau von Luber). Seeking oblivion in the waters of the Silver Lake, they discover that the surface has miraculously frozen over, leading them on a path to an unknown future. It is a depressing image, but not a pessimistic one; the year, after all, was 1933, not 1939.
Although technically a Singspiel, truly in the tradition of Die Zauberflote and Der Freischutz, the proportion of music to original dialogue is relatively low. In this concert version, Kaiser's text has been pruned back hard, yet the opera still packs its punches, and not a note of Weill's score has been denied us. Back in 1985, reviewing the release of Silverlake (a truly emasculated Broadway adaptation of the work), I lamented the absence of a corresponding record of the infinitely more powerfulDer Silbersee. Here it is at last.
The result is very good indeed. From the first bar of the overture the vitality of Jan Latham- Konig's direction is evident, and rarely does he allow the pace to slacken. For a cast we have singers, not actors: Weill's musical demands are heavy, and the problem of finding principals who can both sing and act are at least partly relieved by the compression of the dialogue. In the event, even the spoken portions of the work have been directed with a firm hand, and connections between speech and music are mostly well achieved. Hildegard Heichele is impressive in the heroine role of Fennimore—the only character who breathes hope into the story—and she sings the famous Ballad of Caesar's Death, the most politically sensitive number in the opera, with fiery passion and real courage. Everyone around her assists in keeping the atmosphere electric, from Hans Korte as the confused, institutionalized Olim, Wolfgang Schmidt as an angry Severin and Eva Tamassy as the dastardly Frau von Luber, right down to Frederic Mayer as the brash Lottery Agent, who deserves special mention for his splendidly avaricious Act I aria—''interest, and compound interest!''
As always in this Capriccio series of Weill reconstructions, the documentation is superb, progressing from a historically sensitive introductory essay by Josef Heinzelmann and extracts from letters to or by Weill via a selection of photographs to an excellent English translation of the libretto by our own LS. The recording is deliberately coarse in texture and entirely appropriate. This is a thrilling release, beautiful as well as moving in its black humour; definitely not to be missed.'
It is not a work that minces its words. Expressed as a barely-concealed allegory—a 'winter's tale' is how the authors describe it, in both the literal and metaphorical sense—the scene is unmistakably contemporary Germany, bleakly portrayed as a country torn apart by inequality, unemployment, poverty and famine. The two protagonists, Severin and Olim, stand respectively for the hopeless unemployed and the ruling Socialist party, whose antagonism eventually gives way to unity after both have been ousted by an upstart rival (personified in the sinister Frau von Luber). Seeking oblivion in the waters of the Silver Lake, they discover that the surface has miraculously frozen over, leading them on a path to an unknown future. It is a depressing image, but not a pessimistic one; the year, after all, was 1933, not 1939.
Although technically a Singspiel, truly in the tradition of Die Zauberflote and Der Freischutz, the proportion of music to original dialogue is relatively low. In this concert version, Kaiser's text has been pruned back hard, yet the opera still packs its punches, and not a note of Weill's score has been denied us. Back in 1985, reviewing the release of Silverlake (a truly emasculated Broadway adaptation of the work), I lamented the absence of a corresponding record of the infinitely more powerful
The result is very good indeed. From the first bar of the overture the vitality of Jan Latham- Konig's direction is evident, and rarely does he allow the pace to slacken. For a cast we have singers, not actors: Weill's musical demands are heavy, and the problem of finding principals who can both sing and act are at least partly relieved by the compression of the dialogue. In the event, even the spoken portions of the work have been directed with a firm hand, and connections between speech and music are mostly well achieved. Hildegard Heichele is impressive in the heroine role of Fennimore—the only character who breathes hope into the story—and she sings the famous Ballad of Caesar's Death, the most politically sensitive number in the opera, with fiery passion and real courage. Everyone around her assists in keeping the atmosphere electric, from Hans Korte as the confused, institutionalized Olim, Wolfgang Schmidt as an angry Severin and Eva Tamassy as the dastardly Frau von Luber, right down to Frederic Mayer as the brash Lottery Agent, who deserves special mention for his splendidly avaricious Act I aria—''interest, and compound interest!''
As always in this Capriccio series of Weill reconstructions, the documentation is superb, progressing from a historically sensitive introductory essay by Josef Heinzelmann and extracts from letters to or by Weill via a selection of photographs to an excellent English translation of the libretto by our own LS. The recording is deliberately coarse in texture and entirely appropriate. This is a thrilling release, beautiful as well as moving in its black humour; definitely not to be missed.'
Weill Der Silbersee
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