ICSM Online Journal > Reviews

Zemlinsky, Eine florentinische Tragödie and Der Zwerg
Frankfurt Opera; first night 15 April 2007 and in repertoire

Reviewed by Michael Eagleton
posted 1 August 2007

Zemlinsky’s two one-act operas were not conceived as a double bill – they were written five years apart – but as a pair they complement each other well. For their new staging in Frankfurt Udo Samel and his designer Tobias Hoheisel certainly found both contrast and commonality, and not always where expected.

Historically, Alma Mahler hovers in the background of both works. In this Eine florentinische Tragödie she actually made an appearance, in the form of Bianca, who is surprised entertaining her lover Guido Bardi when husband Simone arrives home unexpectedly. When Alma attended the first Vienna performance of the piece, she was said to be less than enthused at the parallels with her own infidelities. But in a letter in reply, Zemlinsky explained where the tragedy of the piece lay: ‘one life has to be sacrificed to save two others’. But here Bianca, portrayed as cold and calculating by Claudia Mahnke in a full-bodied soprano, stabbed her husband to leave him and her lover lifeless as the curtain fell. This is not what Zemlinsky’s music tells us, and neither did we need the nude figures of Aphrodite or Eros to illustrate what had been happening in Hoheisel’s wood-panelled Secessionist dungeon before the curtain rose – the music is graphic enough.

Robert Hayward was a stentorian if rather monochrome Simone, and Carsten Süß a little stretched in the tenor role of Guido Bardi, but the tension in the sadistic game that is played out between the two was palpable, and Paul Daniel in the pit, after an untidy start to the swirling prelude, kept the screw tightening impressively.

Immediately on their first meeting, in 1900, Alma noted in her dairy her impressions of Zemlinsky’s appearance, and continued to taunt him as their affair continued; much has been made of the composition of Der Zwerg as a kind of catharsis. But for the second part of the evening, surprisingly, Samel went out of his way to avoid any biographical reference. This was one of the simplest stagings the piece has seen since its post-War rehabilitation, made possible through the contrast of the dapper figure of Peter Bronder as the Dwarf alongside one of the tallest basses in the business, Florian Plock, as Don Estoban, and the imposing Sonja Mühleck as Ghita.

Maintaining the same overall shape, and with the same well laden table to one side, this tragedy was played out in another fin-de-siècle interior, this time a light and airy mirrored hall (echoes of Klimt’s postcards). Preparations for the birthday party included the hasty covering of the mirrors with table clothes in preparation for the dwarf – to no avail, as it was his reflection in the upturned table which brought about his moment of truth.

Plock as Don Estoban lacked vocal heft – little wonder the Infanta and her playmates were able to run rings round him. When the formal party began, and they all reappeared à la Velasquez (who had a thing about dwarfs himself), even a naturally effusive singer as Juanita Lascarro as the Infanta seemed a little reserved, but this left Bronder’s Dwarf centre stage – one of the best things that this versatile singer has done – just a hint of anguish taking the edge off a steely heroic tenor. Even Alma would have been moved.

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