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Joseph Martin
KRAUS (1756-1792) Amphitryon - Schauspielmusik · Incidental
Music (1787)
Chantal
Santon (soprano)
Georg Poplutz (tenor)
Bonner Kammerchor
l’arte del mondo/Werner Ehrhardt
rec. live, Tage alter Musik in Herne, Kulturzentrum, 8-9
November 2007 PHOENIX
EDITION PHCD111 [77:49]
The
play Amphitryon is based on the myth surrounding
the conception and birth of the Greek hero Heracles. In
the play, Zeus descends from the heavens to consort with
Queen Alcmene of Thebes, to this end adopting the guise
of her husband Amphitryon, who at the time is returning,
victorious from battle against the Thaphians. Molière adapted
the classical comedic version of this tale, complete with
mistaken identities and the common subject of matrimonial
faithfulness, and further elaborating the piece with secondary
characters and making it more relevant for satire against
the court of Louis XIV. King Gustav III was responsible
for prolonging the revival of such works in Sweden in the
18th century, and as court composer, Joseph
Martin Kraus was duly set to work creating a comédie-ballet.
The first performance was at the Swedish court in 1787,
over 100 years after the play itself was written.
Kraus’s
music consists of four interludes and a divertimento for
ballet. The opening of the first interlude is one of those
insinuating, strangely electric and mystery laden passages,
the mood of which put me in mind of the opening of Franz
Berwald’s much later Sinfonie sérieuse. The mood
is that of the ‘Calme de la nuit’, after which things start
to warm up quite quickly. A student of Kraus, Per Frigel,
wrote at the time: “(his work) is where everything playful,
naïve, fiery and pleasing is to be found that can be composed.
One marvelled to see that Kraus’ genius was not limited
to the tragic and chromatic but was also a master of the
joyful and the brilliant.”
There
are indeed a great number of ‘brilliant’ set pieces, admirably
performed by the soloists and orchestra on this fine recording.
With the exception of one chorus, Chantal Santon carries
the first interlude entirely alone, with as a highlight
the aria Alcmène, jouis du Bonheur. Only the lowest
extremes of range of this provide one or two understandable
problems: I for one had the feeling Kraus might have been
having some fun at his soprano’s expense in this aria.
Georg Poplutz finally has a look-in with Géneral des
Thebains halfway through the third interlude. His is
a suitably eloquent tenor voice, matching well with the
feel of the ensemble and eschewing any kind of over-dramatised
approach. The chorus is dainty and superbly transparent
throughout, with fine phrasing and dynamics, heard to good
effect but all too briefly in Que ce jour est heureux
pour nous, but making its mark at plenty of moments
elsewhere.
Fans
of Kraus will delight in having such a feast of new material,
but my feeling is that the constraints of writing for a
court theatre piece led him to tread carefully, going for
quality and integrity over anything from which too much
originality might baffle a court audience. There are some
nice harmonic ‘hooks’ which make one sit up and take notice,
such as the rising sequence in the Entrée du Héraut,
but it is in the final set of eight Divertissement ballet
numbers that some of the more original effects are reserved.
These come in the form of some unusual orchestration and
some opportunities for Kraus to show off some breathtaking
compositional virtuosity in terms of melodic wit and surprising
turns of phrase and cadence. The second of these rivals
Beethoven in its portrayal of a storm, the third swings
like a true dance number for any age, and some of the slower
numbers such as the Andante grazioso have some of
those lovely harmonic progressions which gives us more
of the Kraus who keeps bringing us back for more.
L’arte
del mondo was formed by Werner Ehrhardt in 2004, and has
rapidly made its mark on the historically informed performing
scene, presenting work from the Baroque through to early
Romanticism. They certainly make a grand showing on this
release, and I have little criticism to make of any aspect
of this recording. As a live release there is nothing to
be feared in terms of intrusive audience noise, but if
I am to be really picky then I would have to say that this
recording is in some ways almost ‘too nice’. I would have
expected perhaps a little more raunchiness in the playing,
perhaps some greater sense of danger or rough-edgedness.
Perhaps this is a side-effect of the live recording, or
is maybe something rather more alien to the Swiss idiom
of Kraus than I might have anticipated, considering the
French influences which crop up in some of the dance forms.
In any case, the playing and singing on this disc is of
the utmost refinement, and the production deserving of
every accolade. Conductor and players draw out all of the
elegant quality inherent in this music, and have provided
us with what Bertil van Boer describes in the excellent
booklet notes, “a grand Gustavian entertainment.”
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