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Ron Dough
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« Reply #60 on: 10:58:33, 10-09-2008 » |
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Yes, hh; the influence of French operatic tradition is there, but Pélleas certainly has its dramatic moments of action: its whole plot revolves around conflicts, which are the kicking off point for all drama: Socrate on the other hand, is more of a cantata, and wasn't conceived for staging at all. Their influence may be constituent parts of the hybrid, but neither is really a direct antecedent, surely?
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harmonyharmony
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« Reply #61 on: 11:52:45, 10-09-2008 » |
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All drama? That's rather ethnocentric don't you think?  I'm not saying that Messiaen's conception isn't original, just not completely unique. Didn't he compare the separate scenes to windows of stained glass? I do like that comparison. And there are conflicts in the opera, but they are all internalised and slowed down. |
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'is this all we can do?' anonymous student of the University of Berkeley, California quoted in H. Draper, 'The new student revolt' (New York: Grove Press, 1965) http://www.myspace.com/itensemble |
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Ruth Elleson
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« Reply #62 on: 12:01:54, 10-09-2008 » |
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One curious thing I noticed on Sunday was that the audience, sparse though it was, was overwhelmingly male. On the front row, for example, I counted only two women among the 20+ men, and looking around the Arena and the seating areas of the Hall, this ratio was seemingly quite consistent. The Arena is normally quite male-dominated anyway (rather like these forums) but it's not usually any more extreme a ratio than 3:2 (at a guess). Would anybody like to speculate on why this was? The overwhelmingly male cast? The subject matter? The "geek" appeal of the piece in question ( )? I could draw a parallel with Parsifal which, as I have remarked in the past, seems similarly to strike more of a chord with men than women, attracting male-weighted audiences, while other entirely or largely "male" operas ( Billy Budd, Meistersinger) don't seem to skew the audience as radically. Thoughts please... |
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Oft hat ein Seufzer, deiner Harf' entflossen,
Ein süßer, heiliger Akkord von dir
Den Himmel beßrer Zeiten mir erschlossen,
Du holde Kunst, ich danke dir dafür!
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Ron Dough
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« Reply #63 on: 12:16:28, 10-09-2008 » |
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All drama? That's rather ethnocentric don't you think? No, hh; I don't think it's ethnocentric in the least. The essence of drama is the exposition of a conflict, and the path to its eventual resolution. The nature of the conflict may vary: a conflict between characters, or between characters (singular or plural) and their surroundings, desires, duty or destiny. In most cases, combined permutations of at least a couple of the afore-mentioned would be normal: I'm not aware of any form of drama (as opposed to ritual or dance, for example) from any area or era that doesn't stem from this basic concept. The comparison to stained-glass windows does make sense, though: the conflicts are so slowed down that they're all but frozen in time, and the scenes more closely related to tableaux rather than standard dramatic practice. |
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George Garnett
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« Reply #64 on: 12:16:53, 10-09-2008 » |
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One curious thing I noticed on Sunday was that the audience, sparse though it was, was overwhelmingly male.
Gosh, thanks Ruth. I don't think I've ever been called overwhelmingly male before. It puts a spring in a chap's step.  |
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Ruth Elleson
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« Reply #65 on: 12:19:52, 10-09-2008 » |
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Oft hat ein Seufzer, deiner Harf' entflossen,
Ein süßer, heiliger Akkord von dir
Den Himmel beßrer Zeiten mir erschlossen,
Du holde Kunst, ich danke dir dafür!
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martle
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« Reply #66 on: 12:21:09, 10-09-2008 » |
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I don't think I've ever been called overwhelmingly male before. It puts a spring in a chap's step. You can even live with the 'sparse' bit in light of that, can't you George. By the way, you're having an even better day than you think: kleines c has referred to you as 'legendary' over at TOP on the SFoA thread there.  |
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Green. Always green.
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Ruth Elleson
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« Reply #67 on: 12:23:17, 10-09-2008 » |
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By the way, you're having an even better day than you think: kleines c has referred to you as 'legendary' over at TOP on the SFoS thread there. SFo where, martle? Skegness? Sc u n thorpe? Surbiton? CURSES. You edited your typo while I was posting... |
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Oft hat ein Seufzer, deiner Harf' entflossen,
Ein süßer, heiliger Akkord von dir
Den Himmel beßrer Zeiten mir erschlossen,
Du holde Kunst, ich danke dir dafür!
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martle
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« Reply #68 on: 12:23:58, 10-09-2008 » |
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Now corrected, Ruth.  |
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Green. Always green.
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Ruth Elleson
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« Reply #69 on: 12:26:55, 10-09-2008 » |
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Erm, yes, sorry martle  Where were we? Ah yes. |
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Oft hat ein Seufzer, deiner Harf' entflossen,
Ein süßer, heiliger Akkord von dir
Den Himmel beßrer Zeiten mir erschlossen,
Du holde Kunst, ich danke dir dafür!
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time_is_now
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« Reply #70 on: 14:38:09, 10-09-2008 » |
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SFo where, martle?
Sc u n thorpe? ... which raises the question of why the forum software doesn't render the real title as St Francis of A**isi. |
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The city is a process which always veers away from the form envisaged and desired, ... whose revenge upon its architects and planners undoes every dream of mastery. It is [also] one of the sites where Dasein is assigned the impossible task of putting right what can never be put right. - Rob Lapsley
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richard barrett
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« Reply #71 on: 15:56:17, 10-09-2008 » |
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Messiaen in fact explicitly mentions Nō theatre in the context of St François, especially the high woodwind music that announces the Angel. I do hope that made it to the interval talk as well!
Those bits sound more like Gagaku to me. |
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Bryn
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« Reply #73 on: 18:28:30, 11-09-2008 » |
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Richard, you have followed up re. the 17 disc set he is sampling, I hope? The piano works comprise the Peter Hill set, but the Organ works are played by Willem Tanke, and are not in the same league at all, I feel. Then there's the vocal works. Austbo's accompaniment is fair enough, but Ingrid Kappelle would not be my first choice for these works. Now if stormin' Norman had gone for the Warner Messiaen Edition ...
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richard barrett
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« Reply #74 on: 18:59:04, 11-09-2008 » |
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... I don't think he would have written anything different! I mean I really don't care whether Norman Lebrecht likes Messiaen's music or not. What I object to is this kind of bilge: His sexual frustration found expression in the Turangalila Symphony, which is stacked with Indian sounds, jittery rhythms and a vast range of percussive instruments including vibraphones and ondes Martenot, a French invention that can sound like anything from heavenly angels to a dustcart reversing in a cul-de-sac. |
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