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Record companies, artists and publicists are invited to submit CDs to be considered for review. Send to: Jerry Bowles, Editor, Sequenza 21, 340 W. 57th Street, 12B, New York, NY 10019

Wednesday, March 30, 2005
Penn Sounds: Schickele Finishes Mozart

Talk about procrastination, in 1779 Mozart left his uncommissioned opera Zaide without an introduction or finale. He was 23 years old and turned to other, paying, work, according to Orchestra 2001 artistic director, James Freeman. The original libretto was considered too serious, and Mozart was given a comic libretto that then became The Abduction from the Seraglio, which is the theme of Zaide.

Now, after some 225 years, Orchestra 2001 has commissioned new music by Peter Schickele to serve as the introduction, and has borrowed a 1782 aria written for a benefit concert to serve as finale. An original English-language libretto by Mark Lord emphasizes the soap opera and comic absurdities of the story: A sentimental "Turkish" sultan pardons a pair of young lovers and an older slave who try to escape from his service when he discovers that the lovers are really brother and sister and the older slave is their father.

Schickele noted at the concert that he made the new music a tribute to the composer, but can we tell and does it matter? Schickele has submerged his inner PDQ Bach in favor of pan-Mozartean music played straight, yet still with small motifs that made those in the know chuckle knowingly a few times.

The bulk of the material is spoken dialogue in English, interspersed with orchestral phrases and sung arias in German. This style calls for expressive acting technique from the singers for the narrative parts, and the costumed singers ran the risk of upstaging themselves in their colloquial dialogue, performed by Tamara Matthews, soprano, Timothy Oliver, tenor, Scott McCoy, tenor, Randall Scarlata, baritone, and particularly Markus Beam, baritone, who made the most, and the most entertainment, of a small part.

It made me long for Bernstein's Candide or any of the equally improbable Gilbert and Sulllivan operettas. Perhaps Schickele can try his hand at turning the story into an oratorio of his own. (Reposted from Penn Sounds 3/30/05)
posted by Deborah Kravetz 3/30/2005



 
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