Alban BERG (1885-1935)
Wozzeck, Opera in 3 Acts (1914-1922)
Christopher Maltman (Wozzeck), Eva-Maria Westbroek (Marie), Frank van Aken (Drum Major), Sir Willard White (Doctor)
Netherlands Philharmonic Orchestra, Chorus of Dutch National Opera, New Amsterdam Children's Choir/Marc Albrecht, Stage Direction Krzysztof Warlikowski
Recorded live Dutch National Opera, Amsterdam, 23 March and 6 April 2017
Sound Format PCM Stereo, DTS HD MA 5.0 Surround; Picture Format 16:9, 1080i; Region free: Subtitles English, French, German, Japanese, Korean
Reviewed in surround
NAXOS NBD0081V Blu-ray [107 mins]
As always, approaching an operatic production, however good, and this one is very good indeed, one needs to be prepared. The only way I know to prepare is to watch the production because there is nothing in the enclosed notes to alert one to what Krzysztof Warlikowski has decided as his directorial take on this 20th century masterwork. The only warning is the cover photograph of Christopher Maltman, as Wozzeck, with his hands in a fish tank. The Blu-ray disc has no bonuses so there is no opportunity to hear the stage director explaining his konzept and besides, by and large directors don't do explanations, they just expect the audience to work it out for themselves. It does not take an Einstein to see there is a circular argument here. I have a friend who attends as many performances of each opera as he can afford (cheap seats only therefore). I think he has a point.
The process of comprehension may be aided in this production by the presence of a 7 and a half minute tableau on stage before the music starts. Two children, 11? 12 years old? .. in ball gown and evening dress enter front of curtain and dance together in silence. The curtain opens onto a deserted space save for one other child, who turns out to be Wozzeck and Marie's child, who is apparently at the controls of a portable cassette stereo on a cafe-style table. Other child-couples enter dressed for competition with numbers on the 'gentlemen's' backs. They dance to some piano music and as the music fades the boys go for Wozzeck and Marie's son. After some hostile jostling he starts some more modern dance music on the player. This time the couples jive. The boy tries to join in but retreats, defeated, to a barber's chair stage left, to watch. Wozzeck enters and the dancers all sit. When Wozzeck starts to sweep up the dance floor they start pestering and taunting him. A text overlay on screen explains that what follows is based on actual events. The Captain enters and sits in another barber's chair and, finally, Berg's score starts. Relax opera-lovers, regietheater is alive and well in Amsterdam as almost everywhere else.
I said above that all this may aid understanding. I have watched this disc three times and whilst the rest of the production can be seen as konsequent, I still have not managed to grasp this opening. It's value lay in alerting me that this was not the staging Berg would have expected. Warlikowski chooses to remove the plot from the barracks near a forest and place it in an urban environment of the early to mid 20th Century complete with a barber's shop with a very important fish tank, a dance hall and a bit of urban squalor. He has obviously studied the background and manages to include, amid many sharp insights, a hint of the original Woyzeck as a Leipzig wig-maker. Had I paid the necessary large number of Euros to attend, unprepared, the Dutch National Opera I would have left me more than a little bewildered at the end of the evening. Like my friend I would need to attend at least twice.
The remainder of the action can be summarised in outline: Wozzeck's scene with the Captain plays out in the barber's shop as does that with Andres; the following three scenes, Marie and Wozzeck, Wozzeck and the Doctor and finally in Act 1, Marie and the Drum Major are as Berg intended but the setting is more urban. Act 2 Scene 1 has the boy dressed as were the dancers at the start but otherwise the scene and the next two play out as one might expect. The ballroom idea recurs in the so-called "Tavern Scene" and that setting continues to the end of the Act with the fight . Act 3 needs a little adjusted understanding because Wozzeck's final scene with Marie and her subsequent murder is not in a forest near a lake but around the fish tank from the barber's shop, enabling Wozzeck to "lose" the knife in the water and Marie to crawl away to expire at the back of the stage. The "low tavern" is just that but Wozzeck has to return to the barbershop fish tank to search for the knife and then contrives to slash his wrists in the tank and crawl away to die, making for the disturbance seen by the Doctor and Captain. After that the most mystifying actions, apart from the mime-dancer-prologue, are those of Wozzeck and Marie's son, who instead of playing hip-hop with a hobby-horse, slowly takes apart an anatomical model torso, dropping the various organs in the fish tank as he goes, before finally following the other children to view his mother's corpse. Oddly, these directorial indulgences work theatrically though without making the slightest sense to me. Several years ago the Welsh National Opera set the entire story in a baked bean factory and had Wozzeck drowning in a vat of the product: that too was a theatrical success. With a passing reminder of the Tännhauser, or was it Siegfried?, at Bayreuth that included a large stuffed crocodile, I will move on!
If settings of this seminal work often take some effort to understand, the same could be said of Berg's score, which is structured to the Nth degree into a three act music drama that needs repeated listening. Act 1 is "Exposition - 5 Character Studies" - interestingly Wozzeck is not one of them; Act 2 is "Dénouement - Symphony in 5 movements"; and Act 3 is "Catastrophe - Six Inventions". Every stage of the drama is meticulously worked into a wide variety of musical forms all subsumed to Berg's flexible view of serialism. It is a reflection of his genius that this grimly academic process results in a score full of drama and emotion with enormous impact. The Netherlands Philharmonic under Marc Albrecht play with accuracy and enthusiasm whilst the starry cast and the choruses sing and dance their roles with absolute conviction. The death of Marie comes as a shock even when you know it is coming. Neither protagonist dies easily, increasing the tension of this scene. Eva Marie Westbrook sings her difficult role with full-throated lyricism treating it as if it were full of memorable tunes, which it isn't. Christopher Maltman gives a masterly portrayal of the increasingly deranged Wozzeck. Sir Willard White is an ice-cold doctor unconcerned with his patient's welfare but entirely focused on his reputation as a leading researcher. The Captain, the Drum Major and Andres are given forceful characterisations and one cannot overlook the entirely silent, but remarkable performance of Marie and Wozzeck's son by Jacob Jutte, an outstanding effort by one so young.
After some repeated viewing I am very enthusiastic about this splendid performance. It is superbly acted, played and sung and the director's concept does mostly make sense - except maybe the opening mime and the closing anatomical model. The recording has great impact and all the disc production boxes are ticked. The notes about Berg's original scenario and the background to the work are sufficient. Visually this Blu-ray is up the usual high standard we expect.
Dave Billinge
Previous review (DVD):
Stephen Barber
