#elektra opera

[monotonous-minutia]

Elektra (Met 2016) reactions

haven’t done one of these in a while so i thought as long as I’m watching it... (picture quality gets kinda blurry about halfway through bc my internet is having issues)

okay not only do I heartily dislike silent pantomimes, these people have been just...working in utter silence for a solid two minutes and I’m getting tired of it

FINALLY the music starts

quite the entrance

don’t you just love it when people talk about you as if you’re not there

she freaking nailed this

that awkward moment when your sister catches you practicing your murder dance

ah yes, the old Rapunzel treatment

conveniently, no one is mentioning the sister who was MURDERED by the dad you so idolize (the Greek mythology nerd in me would like to mention that this is my least-favorite chapter of the House of Atreus chronicles)

someone’s ovaries are screaming... also for the record Chrysothemis is one of my favorite characters in all of mythology

Elektra is such a creep honestly 

he has such a presence

tfw you come back home to kill your mom but your sister feels the need to use you as her therapist

dun dun dunn

after all that talk about needing two sets of hands she’s just gonna let him go do it by himself

oopsie

welp

sorry sis you’re a bit behind the times

...an interesting sentiment for this moment

she said while she was sitting down

so you’re just gonna walk past your other sister...okay...we all know who the favorite is around here...

[hpoelzig]

VOX SATANAE EPISODE #400, PARTS 1 & 2

Magister Gene Lavergne honored me by having me on as his guest co-host for the mammoth 400th episode of his classical music podcast, Vox Satanae. Our discussion explores dark emotional narratives as found in two operas, three symphonies and a film score which in part was derived from a concert work.

We begin with excerpts from Richard Strauss’ ELEKTRA, in which the lead character’s drive for vengeance brought Strauss to the heights of dissonance and cacophony found in his works. This is followed by Bartók’s BLUEBEARD’S CASTLE, in which the brooding, murderous Bluebeard welcomes his inquisitive new wife Judith to explore his domains—both architectural and psychological. We conclude the first part with the final minutes of the Adagio from Bruckner’s Symphony No. 9 in which a dissonant “crisis chord” shatters the movement and leads to a consolation that is often used to conclude the work, even though there has been an excellent speculative version of the finale that ultimately brings the long-sought and well-deserved transfiguration desired by the composer.

The second part begins with Mahler’s 10th Symphony, as completed by Deryck Cooke, which in part concretizes the composer’s struggle to deal with conflicts in his marriage as he worked to move past the farewells he offered in both Das Lied von der Erde and his 9th Symphony. It too contains a powerful “crisis chord” in both the opening and finale movements. We move on to Bernard Herrmann’s 1936 composition, a Sinfonietta for strings, parts of which he employed when scoring Hitchcock’s PSYCHO in 1960. We listen to the version of the Sinfonietta from 1975 as well as a suite of cues from the film score. We end with the Symphony No. 3 by Aaron Copland in a recent recording by Leonard Slatkin and the Detroit Symphony Orchestra which performs the originally published version that includes parts of the finale which had been cut at Leonard Bernstein’s instigation. Interestingly, Herrmann was part of Copland’s American composers group around the time he wrote his Sinfonietta, which seems inspired by works of Schoenberg and Berg, who were disciples of Mahler. Copland’s final symphony was a summation of his compositional prowess and one can hear some Mahler influences—again a powerful “crisis chord” halts the fourth movement before moving on to a triumphant peroration which intertwines the Fanfare for the Common Man, which initiates and permeates the finale, with the main theme from the first movement.

Our listening journey brings us through very dark emotional landscapes to the final grandeur that Copland so deftly captures in what is a splendid and monumental symphony. I trust you might spend some time listening to our discussion and being as moved as we are by these extraordinary compositions.

—Peter H. Gilmore

Vox Satanae Episode 400 Part 1

Vox Satanae Episode 400 Part 2