Page 260 - Vinkler, Jonatan, in Jernej Weiss. ur. 2014. Musica et Artes: ob osemdesetletnici Primoža Kureta. Koper: Založba Univerze na Primorskem.
P. 260
musica et artes
the play as scenes one, two, three, and four of Act Three. The finale is entire-
ly the composer’s.
Such objective data aside, the dramatic/musical interpretation of Büch-
ner’s lines shows Berg’s faithfulness to the psychological outlining of each
character and, moreover, his sympathy towards the protagonist: »There is a
little of myself in the character, to the extent that I spent the war years dependent
upon people I hated, to whom I was chained, sick, captive, resigned, humiliat-
ed in fact.« 2 Wozzeck’s relationship with Marie and the conflict between the
main characters are filled with tension both real and imaginary towards the
tragic denouement, which reflects a given social reality, but also the “abyss”
(the reason for the quotation marks will become clear below) of a character
haunted by passions and hallucinations. The baritone Franz Wozzeck always
sings atonally, whereas his opposite number, the tenor Andres (his fellow sol-
dier) strives to bring him back down to earth, to rid him of his Expressionist
visions by intoning (quasi-tonally) popular hunting ballads. Maria falls with-
in the same pragmatic zone: frightened by her lover’s deviations, she tries to
awaken the paternal instinct in him or else takes refuge in a familiar every-
day world of lullabies, military marches (quasi-tonal once again), and fascina-
tion for the Drum Major. Her musical discourse attains its expressive peak in
her last solo, in Scene One of Act Three, when, overcome with remorse at hav-
ing betrayed Franz, she reads the story of Mary Magdalene from the Bible, to
a melody that situates her, emotionally, close to the register of (Verdi’s) Des-
demona. The other characters each throw bridges between worlds: grotesque
and egotistical, the Captain, the Doctor and the Drum Major intervene in
the dramatic action, they catalyse it, they comment on it; the two Drunken
Apprentices, Margret and the Child represent small snatches of reality; the
Madman is prophetic (the same as all theatrical madmen), and his brief ap-
pearance unleashes the psychical mechanism of murder (in the middle of the
tavern scene of Act Two).
What are the purely musical means whereby Berg retells Büchner’s play
and, ultimately, albeit with great fidelity, projects it into a different dimen-
sion? I would place them in four categories: the structure drawn from the
world of instrumental forms and transplanted to the opera, an absolute nov-
elty in the history of music; the musical themes, which act as Wagnerian leit-
motivs; the musical language, which flexibly and imperceptibly crosses the
boundary between tonal and atonal; and the types of vocal and orchestral
song.
2 Mosco Carner, Alban Berg (Paris: Ed. Jean-Claude Lattès, 1979), 43.
258
the play as scenes one, two, three, and four of Act Three. The finale is entire-
ly the composer’s.
Such objective data aside, the dramatic/musical interpretation of Büch-
ner’s lines shows Berg’s faithfulness to the psychological outlining of each
character and, moreover, his sympathy towards the protagonist: »There is a
little of myself in the character, to the extent that I spent the war years dependent
upon people I hated, to whom I was chained, sick, captive, resigned, humiliat-
ed in fact.« 2 Wozzeck’s relationship with Marie and the conflict between the
main characters are filled with tension both real and imaginary towards the
tragic denouement, which reflects a given social reality, but also the “abyss”
(the reason for the quotation marks will become clear below) of a character
haunted by passions and hallucinations. The baritone Franz Wozzeck always
sings atonally, whereas his opposite number, the tenor Andres (his fellow sol-
dier) strives to bring him back down to earth, to rid him of his Expressionist
visions by intoning (quasi-tonally) popular hunting ballads. Maria falls with-
in the same pragmatic zone: frightened by her lover’s deviations, she tries to
awaken the paternal instinct in him or else takes refuge in a familiar every-
day world of lullabies, military marches (quasi-tonal once again), and fascina-
tion for the Drum Major. Her musical discourse attains its expressive peak in
her last solo, in Scene One of Act Three, when, overcome with remorse at hav-
ing betrayed Franz, she reads the story of Mary Magdalene from the Bible, to
a melody that situates her, emotionally, close to the register of (Verdi’s) Des-
demona. The other characters each throw bridges between worlds: grotesque
and egotistical, the Captain, the Doctor and the Drum Major intervene in
the dramatic action, they catalyse it, they comment on it; the two Drunken
Apprentices, Margret and the Child represent small snatches of reality; the
Madman is prophetic (the same as all theatrical madmen), and his brief ap-
pearance unleashes the psychical mechanism of murder (in the middle of the
tavern scene of Act Two).
What are the purely musical means whereby Berg retells Büchner’s play
and, ultimately, albeit with great fidelity, projects it into a different dimen-
sion? I would place them in four categories: the structure drawn from the
world of instrumental forms and transplanted to the opera, an absolute nov-
elty in the history of music; the musical themes, which act as Wagnerian leit-
motivs; the musical language, which flexibly and imperceptibly crosses the
boundary between tonal and atonal; and the types of vocal and orchestral
song.
2 Mosco Carner, Alban Berg (Paris: Ed. Jean-Claude Lattès, 1979), 43.
258
