Programme booklet »Les Contes d'Hoffmann«

CONTENTS

P.

4

SYNOPSIS P.

9

TO FIND THE INVISIBLE THREAD ANDREI ȘERBAN IN AN INTERVIEW P.

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A MULTI-TALENT BY THE NAME OF AMADEUS ULRICH MÜLLER P.

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E.T.A. HOFFMANN – IN REALITY AND ON THE STAGE ULRICH MÜLLER

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THREE WOMEN E.T.A. HOFFMANN P.

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ON EXPRESSING EMOTIONS ROTRAUD A. PERNER P.

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LES CONTES D’HOFFMANN IN THE REPERTOIRE OSWALD PANAGL P.

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IMPRINT

JACQUES OFFENBACH

LES CONTES D’HOFFMANN OPÉRA FANTASTIQUE in a prologue,

three acts and an epilogue Libretto JULES PAUL BARBIER

ORCHESTRA

2 flutes / 1 piccolo 2 oboes / 1 cor anglais 2 clarinets / 2 bassoons 4 horns / 2 trumpets 3 trombones / 1 harp percussion violin I / violin II viola / violoncello double bass flute / harp / bell

STAGE MUSIC

WORLD PREMIÈRE 10 FEB 1881 Opéra-Comique, Salle Favart (Paris) AUSTRIAN PREMIÈRE 7 DEC 1881 Ringtheater in Vienna PREMIÈRE AT THE HOUSE ON THE RING 11 NOV 1901 Vienna Court Opera DURATION

3 H 30 MIN

INCL. 2 INTERMISSIONS

LES CONTES DʼHOFFMANN

SYNOPSIS PROLOGUE The poet Hoffmann sits at his writing table. Spirits of wine and beer arrive and then vanish. Hoffmann’s Muse appears, swearing to protect him from the dangers of love. She will transform herself into Nicklausse, a young student, to guide Hoffmann. Councillor Lindorf intercepts Andrès, who is employed by Stella, a lovely opera singer appearing this evening in Don Giovanni. Lindorf bribes Andrès to get a letter from Stella to Hoffmann. The letter is a declaration of love for the poet, and includes the key to her dressing room. Lindorf may be old and pitiful looking, but he has power and money. He intends tonight to steal Stella from Hoffmann.

In Luther’s tavern, waiters prepare the tables for the arrival of Hoffmann, a regular client. Boisterous students invade the tavern, demand wine, curse Luther, toast Stella, and wait impatiently for Hoffmann. He arrives with Nicklausse. Hoffmann seems tormented, gloomy; still, the students insist he sings a funny song about Kleinzack the dwarf. As Hoffmann describes the grotesque creature, his mind wanders and he describes a beautiful woman instead. The students bring him out of his reverie. Waiters light the punch. Hoffmann spots Lindorf and sees in him the eternal antagonist who ruins his luck in everything, especially love. Their curiosity roused, the students demand that Hoffmann tell them the name of his mistress. There are three, he answers: Olympia, a young woman; Antonia, an artist; and Giulietta, a courtesan.

The students decide not to return to the opera – they prefer to smoke their pipes and to listen to Hoffmann’s tales of his three loves.

Previous pages:

SCENE

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SYNOPSIS

ACT 1 OLYMPIA Physics is Spalanzani’s passion, and this eccentric inventor has constructed a perfect automaton with such gen­ uinely human traits that he passes it off as his daughter, Olympia. Tonight he will present Olympia to society. He’s counting on his latest creation to help him recoup 500 ducats that he lost when his banker, Elias, failed. The first guest arrives early; it’s Hoffmann, his student, who has been admiring Olympia from afar. Left alone for a moment with her, Hoffmann gets one glimpse of Olympia and falls in love. Nicklausse warns him off, comparing his new love with a doll with enamel eyes. Is this a presentiment? Coppélius enters, introducing himself as a friend to Spalanzani. In fact, he has come to reclaim the eyes he constructed for Olympia unless Spalanzani can pay him off.

In the meantime, Coppélius tries to sell Hoffmann his strange inventions – barometers, hygrometers and pairs of lovely eyes.

Nicklausse is skeptical, but Hoffmann eagerly buys some magic glasses that make his dreams of Olympia appear real. Spalanzani returns and is alarmed to find Coppélius waiting. Coppélius wants a share of the profits, and Spalanzani sends him away with a bad check drawn on the bankrupt Elias. As he leaves, Coppélius advises Spalanzani to marry Olympia off to Hoffmann. Cochenille, a servant, announces the guests have arrived.

The guests marvel over the enchanting Olympia, who sings as Cochenille accompanies her on the harp. Her exquisite song is interrupted at times by strange mechanical noises, but Hoffmann, dazzled by his magic glasses, listens rapturously. Left alone with Olympia, Hoffmann declares his love and believes he is loved in return. But at their first embrace, Olympia runs away. Nicklausse bursts in with some disturbing rumors about Olympia that are circulating at the party. Hoffmann ignores the warning and runs off in search of his beloved. Coppélius promises to avenge himself on Spalanzani, who tried to swindle him with a worthless check. The guests return. Hoffmann waltzes with Olympia, who quickens the pace to such a frenzy that she seems to have gone quite mad. Hoffmann falls and breaks his magic glasses; Olympia must be taken away. Coppélius is waiting for her. He smashes the doll to pieces. Hoffmann realises his folly: he was in love with an automaton.

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SYNOPSIS

ACT 2 ANTONIA A young woman sings a nostalgic song about her lost love. Antonia Crespel dreams of becoming a famous diva like her mother, who is now dead. But Antonia doesn’t know that she has inherited her mother’s fatal illness as well as her glorious voice. To save his daughter’s life, Crespel must keep Antonia from excitement and exertion. He forbids her to sing and prohibits all relations with her lover Hoffmann. Crespel instructs the old, deaf servant Frantz not to open the door to anyone. Frantz is happy to be alone to sing away his frustrations. Hoffmann bursts in looking for Antonia, who rushes in at the sound of his voice. The two declare their love and promise to marry. Hoffmann begs her to sing. She happily obliges him, but at the end of the song she nearly faints.

Crespel returns. Antonia runs away; Hoffmann hides. Frantz announces the arrival of Dr. Miracle, the family physician.

Crespel denounces Miracle, calling him a murderer who will destroy his daughter as he destroyed her mother. Dr. Miracle demonstrates his hypnotic powers. Hoffmann understands now that Antonia is in danger; if she sings, she will die. At his urging, Antonia reluctantly agrees to give up singing and her dreams of fame. Dr. Miracle, however, doesn’t give up on anything. He returns to torment Antonia, asking her if she can sacrifice her talent to be a middle-class housewife. At first she withstands temptation, but when Miracle conjures up the voice and image of her mother, she can resist no longer – she must sing. Goaded on by the demonic doctor, Antonia sings herself to death. In desperation, Crespel turns on Hoffmann, but Nicklausse is there to restrain the grieving father. They are all too late: the devil has triumphed once again, aided by his servant, Frantz.

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LES CONTES DʼHOFFMANN

ACT 3 GIULlETTA Giulietta the beautiful courtesan and Nicklausse sing a barcarolle to this “night of love.“ Disappointed in love, Hoffmann has become a cynic who prefers wine and cards to women. Schlémil and Pittichinaccio, fight for Giulietta’s affections. Nicklausse tells Hoffmann he will drag him off at the first sign of infatuation. Hoffmann scoffs at this: only a fool could lose his heart to a courtesan. As the two friends leave, Dape­r ­tutto appears and vows that Hoffmann will indeed lose his heart – to the bewitching Giulietta. A woman will gladly lose her soul for a glittering jewel says Dapertutto as he uses a diamond to lure Giulietta to him. To keep the diamond, Giulietta must promise Dapertutto that she will seduce from Hoffmann his reflection – just as she bewitched Schlémil to get his shadow. Giulietta uses her wiles to captivate Hoffmann. His sincerity touches her – for a moment she seems to want to save him. But in the end, Hoffmann falls under her spell and offers her not only his image but his soul. Schlémil finds the two alone together and is enflamed with jealousy. “Let’s kill him”, suggests Pittichinaccio.

The gondolas come to take Giulietta away. Hoffmann demands that Schlémil give up the key to her room. The two men prepare to fight. Dapertutto lends Hoffmann his sword. Schlémil is fatally wounded. Hoffmann takes the key, but when he looks for Giulietta, she has forsaken him, choosing a diamond instead of his love.

EPILOGUE So ends the tales of Hoffmann, the story of his three loves.

When Nicklausse suggests that Stella is the incarnation of all three women, Hoffmann attacks his mentor in a drunken rage.

By the time Stella arrives, Hoffmann has drunk himself into oblivion. Andrès, now in Lindorf’s service, introduces Stella to the Councillor, who triumphantly escorts her to his car. Abandoning the character of Nicklausse, the Muse assumes her true form. She promises to ease Hoffmann’s sufferings, telling him that love in life is an illusion. The suffering poet returns to his writing desk to continue his search in his art.

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ANDREAS LÁNG IN AN INTERVIEW WITH DIRECTOR ANDREI ȘERBAN

TO FIND THE INVISIBLE THREAD al

Andrei, how far does the title character in Les Contes d’Hoffmann actually resemble the real poet? Isn’t the Hoffmann in the opera also an alter ego in certain respects of the composer, Jacques Offenbach? aş We’re looking at a real and almost symbiotic mixture. Naturally, Offenbach’s personality was very different from that of the poet E.T.A. Hoffmann, but even so the composer seems to have turned into a doppelgänger of Hoffmann to some extent while he was working on the opera Les Contes d’Hoff­ mann. The musical language developed in Hoffmann’s mind, and his world also moved between reality and fantastic projection, the seen and the unseen. Conversely, many of the problems from Hoffmann’s actual biography and the problems of some of the characters from his poems in the opera seem to be filtered through the eyes of the composer’s unusual, slightly ironic, whimsiROLANDO VILLAZÓN as HOFFMANN

cal personality. To put it another way, Offenbach felt his way into Hoffmann emotionally and intellectually, and at the same time interpreted him from his own point of view. al Is there a difference between how a director approaches an opera like Les Contes d’Hoffmann, which is a fantastic piece in every sense of the word, and how he approaches a more conventional work? aş Basically, every composer and every piece has to be approached individually. However, if we get caught up too much in questions of style and form, we very quickly forget why we’re making art. After all, the job of the artist and all those involved in the creation of a work of art is to find the invisible thread that ties music, story and life together, and helps us to find answers to the question of the meaning of our existence. In this respect, a director’s approach to all operas is the same, can I extract the

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ANDREI ŞERBAN IN AN INTERVIEW

essence of the work I’ve been entrusted with to show the deeper questions and perhaps answer them? al Many aspects of human life are deliberately buried, exaggerated, distorted in Les Contes d’Hoffmann. Does the director have to decipher all these elements so that he can reveal them to the public, as it were? aş No! Deciphering means resolving the mystery, and if I want to avoid damaging a work of art, I have to make sure I preserve its inner mystery. You can’t explain a mystery, at most you can simplify it, but then it loses its complexity.

No, the director’s job is to to get the public to open itself to the mystery, to an existing paradox, and to experience it and live it out. al You were talking about Les Contes d’Hoffman once and mentioned the psychological reality... aş Well, we have a story here which presents three aspects of woman, and at the same time the artist’s inability to master everyday life. Someone can be as creative as they like in their art, but they can still be lost in their own life if they step outside and enter into an actual relationship with other people. This piece is a very good mirror for all artists. al So Hoffmann isn’t a victim of art? aş No!! He’s a victim of life. al How valid is the closing statement of Les Contes d’Hoffmann, that suffering makes you greater than anything else, and that true happiness is only found in art? aş The statement is undoubtedly true, for artists at least, particularly the artist of the 19th century who took refuge in art rather than trying to face life.

al

Hoffmann is told here that he should seek happiness in art and not life – and this was exactly the route that proved fatal for Antonia. aş In Antonia’s case, however, there’s the strange Freudian aspect as well, the curious relationship with her father, her mother, the sickness in the family, this dark cloud hanging over it. By contrast, Hoffmann is physically perfectly healthy. The paradox is that Hoffmann mines her death to yield new material for his own creativity. al Is Les Contes d’Hoffmann misogynist, as people occasionally claim? aş No, not at all. We see the individual female figures, Olympia, Antonia, Giulietta and Stella, from Hoffman’s point of view, and he completely misunderstands them. Hoffmann tries to reach the women, to possess them, and he doesn’t succeed. The mistake, the failure is on his part, not the part of the women. The women aren’t evil, Hoffmann simply doesn’t know how to deal with them. al Are the four villains negative characters only from Hoffmann’s point of view? aş I see them more as agents provocateurs than demons. The important function of demons, or the devil generally, is to deepen our understanding of the world, of ourselves, through problems and provocation. Without the devil, our spiritual development would be diminished. Hoffmann’s problem is that although he’s provoked by these demonic adversaries, he fails in his response, and flees to art, which is the same thing as fleeing from life’s problems. Hoffmann tries to achieve self-knowledge solely in and through art.

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TO FIND THE INVISIBLE THREAD

al

Vienna is presenting your production of Les Contes d’Hoffmann, what led to this version? aş It would probably take us too far afield if I mentioned all the ideas that went into this production. My main concern was that it should end with

the great, oratorio-like finale, this quasi apotheosis in which Hoffmann is shown at his desk, the only place where he is always triumphant, the only place where he’s at home, with the ink blots on the wall, and the ideas and dreams that his imagination has come up with.

The interview took place in 2014

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Following pages: GAËLLE ARQUEZ as NICKLAUSSE

DMITRY KORCHAK as HOFFMANN MARINA REBEKA as ANTONIA

ULRICH MÜLLER

A MULTITALENT

BY THE NAME OF AMADEUS In the inscription on his gravestone in Berlin, his friends praised him with these words: “excellent in his office, as a poet, as a composer, as a painter.”

Ernst Theodor Wilhelm Hoffmann was born in 1776 in Königsberg and died aged just 47 in 1822 in Berlin.

He changed his third Christian name to Amadeus in Mozart’s honour, and he too was indeed a sensational multi-talent. He earned his living as a lawyer.

After quitting his legal career earlier, in 1815 he was appointed legal counsellor at the court of appeal in Berlin. He was an extremely correct, efficient and very kind official. However, that did not prevent him from running afoul of his superiors shortly before his death.

They threatened him with proceedings because of his liberal political views and a satire of the Prussian director of police.

After working early on as a lawyer, Hoffmann was for many years a musician and composer for the theatres in Bamberg, Leipzig and Dresden. He wrote numerous, widely differing compositions, and he regarded the highly successful première of his opera

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A MULTI-TALEN T BY THE NA ME OF A M ADEUS

Undine at the Berlin Schauspielhaus (3 August 1816) as the pinnacle of his artistic career. Recent performances of this work do in fact show it to be a piece of remarkable quality; it is regrettable that this very early example of a German Romantic opera was eclipsed by Lortzing’s likewise excellent opera by the same name.

As a music critic, he was one of the first to recognise Beethoven’s exceptional talent. As an illustrator he possessed enough talent to alleviate his lot in times of personal need by selling his pictures. In fact, he was so unerring a satirist with his pencil that when he was a young councillor in then Prussian Poznan and created a caustic caricature of several officers, he was transferred to the extreme east of the country for two years for disciplinary reasons.

To this day, Hoffmann has international standing above all as an author, as writer of novellas (collections: Fantasiestücke in Callots Manier, Nachtstücke, The Serapion Brethren), fairy tales (e.g. The Golden Pot) and novels (Die Elixiere des Teufels, Lebensansichten des Katers Murr).

In particular outside German-speaking countries, he is still considered an outstanding German Romantic artist, and his somewhat eccentric lifestyle and the fantastic nature of his works have sparked the imagination of audiences from the start. Characteristic of his stories is a blend of grotesque, uncanny and supernatural elements with bourgeois sham idyll and comicality, and the consistent use of musical themes. This earned him a large, enthusiastic readership. However, his readers could not (and did not want to) differentiate very precisely between the person who was the artist Hoffmann and the contents of his works, giving rise to the well-known but also misleading descriptor “Ghost Hoffmann.“

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Following pages:

SCENE

ULRICH MÜLLER

E.T.A. HOFFMANN – IN REALITY

AND ON THE STAGE With his almost dwarfish stature and large head, Hoffmann was rather conspicuous in appearance. This was emphasized by his often ebullient movements. Early tales revolved around his circle of friends in Berlin (1818 establishment of the so-called “Serapion Circle”) and in particular evenings spent carousing in the corner room of the wine bar Lutter [!] & Wegner in Berlin, especially with his friend, the famous actor Ludwig Devrient. Many have attested to the fact that he indulged extravagantly in wine, and that under its influence he was truly a gifted and fascinating entertainer. However, the story that he showed signs of mental illness (like many of the characters he depicted) belongs in the realm of malicious gossip.

A severe spinal cord ailment that may possibly have been related to his lifestyle (it cannot be proved that it was syphilis) caused him to become bedridden in 1822. Tradition has it that despite rapidly advancing paralysis he did not lose his sense of humour or his mental

faculties to the very last. He died more or less in the middle of dictating (as he could no longer write himself), but shortly before had asked to be turned with his face to the wall.

Hoffmann was particularly popular in France from the start: he was and is considered a paradigm of Romanticism, which has special appeal there to this day. The play by Jules Barbier and Michel Carré (Les Contes d’Hoffmann, Paris 1851) must be mentioned in this context. Barbier later reworked it into a libretto for Offenbach. In the stage and opera character of Hoffmann, the combination of life and work that the reading public had previously observed was finally completed, and this character – reinforced by many later revisions of the opera – became the epitome of the brilliant artist who cannot handle real life.

Walter Felsenstein had rehearsed meticulously (and which, incidentally, was later also made into a film directed

by Georg Mielke, and can therefore still be seen today). It was a momentous idea on the part of the two French theatre

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E.T.A. HOFFMANN – IN REALITY AND ON THE STAGE

writers Barbier and Carré to combine the character of the artist Hoffmann with the characters in his tales, in other words to transfer the author into his own fantasy world. Several themes, such as Hoffmann’s evenings carousing, his much admired alcoholic tales and fantasising, an unhappy love affair, and the importance that Mozart’s Don Giovanni had for him are taken from the real biography of the romantic artist or developed from it. Upon closer inspection, however, in the three “tales” in the opera, it is not that life and work are combined improperly, but rather the stage character Hoffmann imagines himself in famous tales by the author Hoffmann. While the framework plot uses themes from Ritter Gluck, Klein­ zach called Zinnober and The Golden Pot, the individual acts are based in particular on the tales The Sandman (Olympia), Councillor Krespel (Antonia) and New Year’s Eve Adventure (Giulietta). However, Offenbach and his librettist did not in fact know how the opera would actually end, and this ambiguity then led necessarily to the previously mentioned adulterated versions (which were naturally always “well meant.”)

The “combination method” used so memorably and skilfully in Les Contes d’Hoffmann was so convincing and successful that it was later used again in a modern Hoffmann opera. The opera in question was premièred at the Dresden Semper Oper directed by Joachim Herz in 1989 and was in the truest sense of

the term a “multi-layered” Golden Pot (libretto: Ingo Zimmermann, music: Eckehard Mayer).

It fits the international reception history of the artist E.T.A. Hoffmann very well that not only did his work acquire special renown in France, but the opera about Hoffmann also enjoyed considerable success there (première at the Paris Opéra-Comique on 10 February 1881, four months after Offenbach’s death). On the evening of the second performance of the German-language version (8 December 1881), the Vienna Ring Theatre went up in flames when a fire broke out following a gas explosion, causing four hundred deaths. This theatre catastrophe of the century threatened to brand Les Contes d’Hoffmann as an “unlucky work”, but even this could not halt the ultimate international triumph of the opera. Together with Carmen it has to this day remained the most-performed French opera.

Offenbach’s operatic success did not damage or distort the fame and reputation of his main character, namely the historic artist E.T.A. Hoffmann. In fact, the opera may have encouraged people to listen again to the music of the multi-genius Hoffmann (which is easy to do thanks to several recordings), and above all to reread his writings, which are still fascinating today, and allow ourselves to be seduced into the threshold areas between bourgeois everyday reality and amazing fantasy between consciousness, dream and madness.

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Following pages:

STEPHANIE HOUTZEEL as NICKLAUSSE

E.T.A. HOFFMANN

THREE WOMEN OLYMPIA Nathanael found an invitation and went to the Professor’s house at the appointed time with a racing pulse, as the carriages rolled up and the lights sparkled in the richly decorated rooms. The assembly was crowded and distinguished.

Olympia appeared, sumptuously and tastefully dressed, her shapely face and elegant stature commanding admiration. Nathanael was smitten; he was standing in the farthest row, and was unable to make out Olympia’s features clearly in the dazzling candlelight. Unnoticed, he took Coppola’s spyglass to gaze at the beautiful Olympia. Ah! He saw her looking towards him, her eyes full of longing.

“To dance, with her – with her!”

That was now the peak of Nathanael’s desire, his dearest wish – but how could he scrape up the courage to ask her, the queen of the evening’s celebrations?

Without knowing how it happened, when the dance had already started he was standing close to Olympia, who had not yet been asked to dance, and found himself barely able to stammer a few words – but nevertheless taking her hand. Professor Spalanzani paced slowly through the empty room, his steps echoing hollowly, a grey, ghostly figure casting flickering shadows. “Do you love me? Do you love me, Olympia?

Just one word! Say you love me!” But for all Nathanael’s whispered pleas, Olympia only sighed as she rose to her feet, “Ah, ah!” “Ah, my glorious star of love,” Nathanael breathed, “You have risen for me and will light my innermost being for ever!” “Ah, ah,” Olympia repeated, moving on.

His heart af lame with desire, Nathanael decided to beg Olympia the very next day to tell him in plain words what her bold look of love had told him, that she would be his for ever.

While still on the stairs and in the hallway, he heard an uproar, apparently coming from Spalanzani’s study, with stamping feet, clattering, thumping, – “damned” dog of a simple-minded clockmaker – get out of here – the devil – stop – dollmaker – fiend! – stop – out of here – let go!” The voices were Spalanzani and the hideous Coppelius, wrangling and raging. Nathanael burst in, seized by a nameless fear. The professor had a female figure by the shoulders, the Italian Coppola had her feet, and they tugged and heaved back and forth, struggling wildly for possession. Filled with terror, Nathanael recoiled when he recognised the figure as Olympia; gripped by a wild rage, he tried to pull his beloved free from the infuriated pair, but at that very moment Coppola wrenched the figure from the professor’s hands with a mighty tug, striking Spalanzani a fear-

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ful blow with the figure that knocked him backwards over a table crowded with phials, retorts, bottles and glass cylinders which toppled, shattering in a thousand fragments. Coppola threw the figure over his shoulder, and laughing demonically ran quickly down the stairs, the figure’s horribly dangling feet thumping and clattering woodenly against the steps. – Nathanael stood motionless – he had seen, all too clearly, that Olympia’s pale, waxen face had no eyes, only black hollows; she was a lifeless doll. from: The Sandman (Night Pieces)

ANTONIA The sound of Antonia’s voice was strange, unique, often echoing the brea- thy tones of the Aeolian harp, or the trilling of the nightingale. The human breast seemed to have no place for such sounds. Glowing with love and joy, Antonia sang and sang all her most beautiful songs, while B... played in between, enraptured, intoxicated with joy. At first, Krespel too was lost in delight, but then he became thoughtful, silent, withdrawn. Finally, he sprang up, pressed Antonia to his bosom and begged, very softly: “don’t sing any more, if you love me – it breaks my heart – the worry – the worry.”

The doctor, his face expressive of deep concern from the start of this speech, replied: “enough, Antonia suffers from an organic weakness in her chest that gives her voice its wonderful power and the unusual, I would even say more than human sound to her song. But this will also mean an early

death for her, and if she goes on singing like this, I give her at most six months to live.” These words pierced the councillor to the heart. like a hundred swords.

His mind was made up. He told Antonia everything, gave her the choice of following her husband and yielding to his pleas and those of the world, and dying young as a result, or giving her father the peace and joy that had been missing in his old age, and so living for many years. Antonia fell sobbing into her father’s arms. He spoke to the husband, but although the latter assured him that no sound would pass Antonia’s lips, the councillor knew well that even B... would never be able to resist the temptation of hearing Antonia sing. And even if the world, the musical public, was told of Antonia’s illness, it would never cease its demands, as people are egotistical and cruel where their pleasures are involved. The councillor disappeared with Antonia.

She clung to Krespel with a deep, childlike love. “I’ll never sing again, I’ll live for you instead,” she often told her father, smiling, if someone had asked her to sing and she had refused. The councillor tried to shield her from such moments as far as possible, so that he become less and less willing to take her into society, and carefully avoided all music.

One night, the councillor thought he heard someone playing his piano in the next room. He tried to get up, but it was as if he was pinned, bound by iron bars, unable to move. Antonia began in soft, breathy notes which gradually swelled into a shattering fortissimo, and then the wonderful sounds became the deeply moving song which B... had once composed for her in the pious style of the old masters. Krespel

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E.T.A. HOFFMANN

said afterwards that he was in an unimaginable state, a deep fear matched by a joy he had never experienced before.

Suddenly, he had a vision of penetrating clarity, in which he saw B... and Antonia, wrapped in each other’s arms and gazing at each other with blissful happiness. The sound of the song and the accompanying pianoforte continued, without any sign of Antonia singing or B... touching the piano. The councillor fell into a swoon, the image fading with the sound. When he woke, he was left with the terrible fear from the dream.

He rushed into Antonia’s room. She was lying on the sofa with her eyes closed, a blissful smile on her face, her hands folded piously, as if sleeping and dreaming of heavenly joy and happiness. She was dead. from: Councillor Krespel ( The Serapion Brethren)

GIULIETTA Italy is the country of love. The evening breeze whispers like amorous sighs, the fragrances of orange and jasmine waft through the grove.

Erasmus was stricken at first glance.

His eyes fixed on Giulietta, he sat with motionless lips, unable to speak as the youths loudly praised Giulietta’s grace and beauty. Then Giulietta asked, playfully: “Should I be your lady?” Erasmus flung himself down madly before her, pressing her hands to his breast and exclaiming: “Yes, you are she, I have ever loved you, my angel! – I have seen you in my dreams, you are my happiness, my bliss, my higher self!”

When Giulietta sang, it was as if heavenly sounds proceeded from her inner most being, awakening unknown,

barely suspected delight in her listeners.

Her marvellous, full, crystal voice had a mysterious warmth which captivated every personality. A gleam of red was heralding the dawn as Giulietta called an end to the celebrations. As people were leaving, Erasmus tried to accompany Giulietta, but she declined his offer, and showed him the house where he could find her later.

Giulietta received Erasmus with the admirable grace and friendliness that distinguished her. She met the desperate passion she aroused in Erasmus with a mild equanimity. Just occasionally, her eyes sparkled a little brighter, and Erasmus felt a shiver run through him at those moments when she gave him a most unusual look.

Giulietta had never been more lovable, had never revealed her inmost love to him with such total abandon. They were standing before the broad mirror on the face of the cabinet, flanked by bright candles. Giulietta pressed Erasmus to her more firmly, more intimately, as she whispered softly: “Leave me your reflection, my love, so that it is mine and will always be mine.”

“Giulietta,” exclaimed Erasmus in astonishment, “What do you mean?

My reflection?” – In the mirror he saw the reflection of Giulietta and himself sweetly embracing.

“How can you keep my reflection,” he continued, “which goes with me everywhere, looks back at me from every pool, every reflective surface?” – “You grudge me even the dream of yourself that you see in the mirror,” said Giulietta, “not even this for the one you wanted to give yourself to, body and soul? I am not to keep even your inconstant image to accompany me through this poor existence that must be with-

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out love or happiness now that you flee?” Scalding tears fell from Giulietta’s beautiful dark eyes. In an agony of love, Erasmus cried: “Must I leave you? If I must go, my reflection shall be always with you. No power, not even the devil himself can take it from you, until you have me with you, body and soul.”

Giulietta’s kiss burned like fire on his lips when he said this, then she loosed him and reached out longingly to the mirror. Erasmus saw how his image emerged, divorced from his own move-

ments, how it glided into Giulietta’s arms, how it disappeared with her in a strange vapour. Fearful voices mocked and laughed in demonic contempt; caught in the deathly chill of absolute terror, he sank to the ground, senseless – but horror wrenched him from the moment of paralysis, and surrounded by deepest night he stumbled out of the door and down the stairs. from: The Lost Reflection (Fantasy pieces in the manner of Callot)

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Following pages: THOMAS EBENSTEIN as CHOCHENILLE KS NEIL SHICOFF as HOFFMANN

ROTRAUD A. PERNER

ON EX PRESSING EMOTIONS As long as we exist in our bodies and our senses cannot separate from our spirit, we should not brush away passing fancies, they are what hue is to a painting, they uplift every idea that occupies our soul; with every thought of happiness, they fill us with a beneficial sense of gentle delight.

E.T.A. Hoffmann on 12 January 1795 to Theodor Gottlieb von Hippel

When at the end of Offenbach’s “narrative” opera, intoxicated by an excess of punch Hoffmann is no longer responsive, his muse comforts him:

“It is I, your Muse, your faithful friend,who wiped dry your tears and strewed roses along your path, who stilled earthly passions with a tender hand, who healed your wounds, who felt your suffering.

Hoffmann, be mine!”

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THE MUSE – A MOTHER FIGURE? Yet does this Muse not seem to be a substitute mother, who like many real mothers tolerates “no other goddesses before me” and therefore instils the masochistic tendency absolutely not to love any other woman who might make everyday life pleasant? One who also invades the love idyll, disguised in the demonic/caring guise of Dr Miracle: “...all these endowments in which heaven has allowed you a share / must they be hidden / in the shadow of domesticity?”

Or is she perhaps a mother who has recognised early on her son’s aptitude for “higher things” and wants to protect him from misunderstandings, disappointments and exploitation? In Joy from Suffering (1940), psychoanalyst Theodor Reik (1888-1969) identifies an unconscious need for punishment for immoral instinctual impulses as a factor in failed relationship ideals.

However, the first instance of punishment is the mother ... and the cause is usually a violation of her concept of discipline and purity.

Discipline is what the automaton Olympia represents: with no independent existence, she has exactly what passionate Hoffmann is lacking. This is a case of choice of partner familiar to couple therapists that is based on the principle of complements (which if there is no mutual development later leads to reproaches: “why aren’t you like me?” and separation). The fact that Olympia has only “fathers” and no mother also removes the element of competition.

In this stage of his development, Hoffmann is still focused on appearances; he is not yet searching for inner values.

Feeling one’s own subjectivity on the other hand makes one vulnerable and fearful: one worries about the loved person.

This concern is directed towards Antonia. Antonia too has no mother.

This offers Hoffmann the opportunity to approach her with the traditional intention of entering a liaison. And once again he does not reckon on his intentions being foiled by a demonic father figure. As naive as he is, he once again does not suspect that on this, his first attempt to get close to an experienced woman as as purposeful man and not just as a dreamer, he is bound to encounter such demons in the Venetian red light district and furthermore as professionals.

With Reik, one might detect subtle masochism: “Everyone knows people who as it were flaunt their suffering. In masochism, suffering has an extremely clear exterior donned for your surroundings, a façade specifically for the people around you. If the people around you pay you no attention, the suffering loses much of its enjoyable nature.” As if involuntarily, the character Hoffmann switches from the song about Kleinzach to a declaration of his new love, entirely in keeping with “what’s in one’s heart is on one’s lips”; it is as if he gave himself the cue for sympathy and approval, in short to command the energy that derives from attention.

THE MYTH OF THE SUFFERING ARTIST For religious purposes, in Civilization and Its Discontents Sigmund Freud traced the derivation of this to “the infant’s helplessness and the longing for the father aroused by it”, which “is

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constantly sustained by the fear of the superiority of Fate.” But does the desire for erotic love not count as yearning for paradisal experience of happiness?

“Life as we find it is too hard for us,” Freud states, and “We cannot bear it without palliative remedies.” He lists three such remedies, namely: “powerful diversions of interest, which lead us to care little about our misery,” in which context he refers to science and also quotes Voltaire, who advises his Candide to work in the garden; “substitutive gratification, which lessens it”, such as art; and “intoxicating substances, which make us insensitive to it.” One “technique to guard against pain” described by Freud “uses libido displacements”, i.e. “transferring the instinctual aims into such directions that they cannot be frustrated by the outer world”, because “sublimation of the instincts lends an aid in this. Its success is greatest when a man knows how to heighten sufficiently his capacity for obtaining pleasure from mental and intellectual work.” Heighten, refine – this advice on managing instincts can also be found in education guides with a religious overtone. Freud does concede, however, that the weak point of this method lies in the fact that it is not generally applicable, as it is only available to the few.

However, drawing the reverse conclusion from this “technique”, namely that artistic activity and intellectual work require suffering and deflecting pain, seems no more than superficial comfort to those who do not consider themselves to be creative and who want to protect themselves from feelings of inadequacy. These are the people whose creativity was not encouraged or permitted when they were small, frequently crippling it. One need only

compare the drawings of children before they start school with those afterwards, when they want to be considered equal to the supposed requirements of state and society, i.e. business (without regard to the business sector of art!).

The term “sublimation” introduced

by Freud to psychoanalysis evokes both “sublime”, which is associated with size and loftiness, and the chemical process by which a body is transformed direct from the solid state to a gas, Laplanche and Pontalis explain in their Language of Psychoanalysis. Behind both explanations we can see a hint of the attitude of undervaluing the the physical, and in particular the sexual; this attitude prevailed in Hoffmann’s day (1776-1822), in Offenbach’s (1819-1880) and also Freud’s (1856-1932). Currently a kind of counter-attitude prevails, albeit in commercialized form. However, both “attitudes” are lacking the balance of options.

SUBLIMATION AS SELF-ENRICHMENT The Geneva specialist in German studies, Jean Starobinski, wrote in Psycho­ analysis in Literature that he considered it the duty of literary studies not to limit analysis to the “envisioned” world, but to focus in the human context on the “imaginative potential” from which it springs.

“Imaginative potential” can stem not just from suffering. There are states of stress which can certainly be enjoyable, as everyone knows who has organised parties with children or young people or who writes love letters without any compulsion to perfection or fear of rejection. This stress in the widest sense of the word is necessary when

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something must be unleashed or is being released: regardless whether it is a cell dividing, an arrow leaving the bow, or a song leaving the vocal cords, a step into the unknown or towards a longedfor person being braved, activity always requires neuronal excitement. However, most people do not welcome it as “bridal anticipation”, as it were, but call it stage fright or exam nerves – a consequence of an ambitious upbringing and/or ridicule.

OR IS IT JUST DEPRESSION AFTER ALL? Without attention, many people turn their creative potential inwards, and that can be the root of a depressive reaction. Depression is a pathology of considerable breadth whose main characteristic is a loss of self esteem. Depressive individuals are not equal to the task of self-realization, as sociologist Alain Ehrenberg explains in Creation and De­ pression.

But does the exact opposite not hold true: that depression is as it were the quiet before the storm that precedes the necessary aggressive step to creative and to artistic self-development? And that it takes no more than instruction in artistic skills and techniques to express emotions in such a form that others can be prosocially touched by it? (Which incidentally is an argument in favour of increasing arts subjects in schools: from them children learn to express their feelings and creativity, making them another form of release from emotional pressure preferable to acts of violence.)

Today, Hoffmann would probably seek out group therapy and talk to the like-minded people there about his more or less frequent disappointments

over his lifetime and the healing emotional reactions. And someone in the group would confront him with his illusions and behavioural patterns. Perhaps then Hoffmann would no longer fall for “outstanding” women, but would “content himself” with an average woman with more warmth. The general public would nevertheless still enjoy the works of his remarkably varied, broad creativity: one does not have to suffer to express impressions artistically. One must merely train the perception, promote creativity and not allow oneself to take offence at ignorant scoffers.

AND THE HISTORICAL HOFFMANN? From the choice of the name that inspired him – Amadeus – we can conclude that the fastidious and respected lawyer Ernst Theodor Wilhelm Hoffmann felt in himself a growth potential that he would have to trigger through the ongoing practice of a dependable career in impersonal and dry with a continuously reliable legal profession. Such diverse talents as musician (composer and band leader), cartoonist (and caricaturist) and writer, not to mention his job as music critic, all put pressure on him from one side to grow beyond himself time and again – but on the other side he also had to secure his living and provide for his family. The critical freethinker had to leave his legal work several times, since he jeopardised his reputation both with his caricatures and with his literary works, in which superiors were easily identifiable who seemed to him too conservative of repressive.

This definitely reinforces the viewpoint represented by Theodor Reik that masochistic impulses seek an audience.

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Following pages: KS ELĪNA GARANČA as NICKLAUSSE

KS BRYN TERFEL as COPPÉLIUS

O S WA L D PA N AG L

LES CONTES D’HOFFMANN IN THE REPERTOIRE OF THE WIENER STAATSOPER The special circumstances surrounding the early performance history of this opera, and above all the stigma attached to it following the fire at the Vienna Ring Theatre before the second performance have meant that Les Contes d’Hoffmann was only the 197th work to be performed at the opera house on the Ring.

The première in the era of Gustav Mahler (with the theatre director himself conducting) on 11 November 1901 presented an abridged version that eliminated the characters of Stella, Lindorf and Andrès in the prologue and epilogue. Fritz Schrödter performed the title role, the three women were sung

by Marie Gutheil-Schoder, Josef Ritter was heard in the triple role of Coppélius/ Dapertutto/Miracle, and Hans Breuer, who was also famous as Mime, sang the three buffo roles. By 1926, the production had been on the schedule 188 times at the Court Opera or later Staatsoper.

Hoffmann was sung by Georg Maikl

and Karl Aagard Østvig, the tenor who also sang in major Strauss and Korngold premières, and once by Richard Tauber as guest artist. The three villains became major roles for Wilhelm Hesch, Hermann Wiedemann, Emil Schipper and Alfred Jerger. All three women’s roles have subsequently been sung by Selma Kurz and Berta Kiurina; after that, it has been the rule rather than the exception to have the roles separated by different voice types. The opera house’s legendary singers such as Maria Jeritza and Lotte Lehmann have been heard as Antonia and Giulietta, with Elisabeth Schumann and Luise Helletsgrube performing only Antonia.

A new production of a different version was performed on 19 November 1930, conducted by Clemens Krauss, who was at the time also director of the Staatsoper. Lothar Wallerstein created the production with décor by Oscar Strnad. The cast included Alfred Piccaver (Hoffmann), Wilhelm Rode bari­

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tone roles), Erich Zimmermann (buffo roles) and the ladies Adele Kern (Olympia), Eva Hadrabová (Giulietta), and Margit Schenker-Angerer (Antonia).

This production is still remembered by opera enthusiasts in Vienna. In the 39 performances of the work put on by 1936, Kolomán von Pataky and the young Julius Patzak as a guest were heard as Hoffmann, the baritone roles were sung by Karl Hammes, and the servants by William Wernigk; Jarmila Novotná gave several outstanding performances of all three women’s roles.

A new production of Les Contes d’Hoffmann could not be mounted until after the Second World War due to the ostracism of Jacques Offenbach for racist reasons during the Nazi era.

In the auxiliary performance space at Theater an der Wien, the team of Josef Krips, Oscar Fritz Schuh and Robert Kautsky performed the opera again on 24 October 1945. With Anton Dermota, Paul Schöffler, Irmgard Seefried (in all three women’s roles!) and Peter Klein, the première was a huge success with audiences, with the result that the opera was on the schedule no less than 183 times between then and 27 September 1955. Casts included Julius Patzak, Hugo Meyer-Welfing, Walther Ludwig, Rudolf Schock, and also Wolfgang Windgassen and Sándor Kónya as Hoffmann, Hans Hotter, Karl Kamann, Josef Metternich, George London and Theo Baylé as the various adversaries of the protagonist, and a number of changing casts in the women’s roles.

Amongst others, Emmy Loose, Wilma Lipp, Ruthilde Boesch, Ilse Hollweg and Rita Streich were heard as Olympia, Sena Jurinac, Maria Cebotari, Emmy Funk, Elfriede Trötschel, Carla

Martinis, Judith Hellwig as Antonia, and Hilde Konetzni, Ljuba Welitsch and Daniza Ilitsch as Giulietta. Conductors in this ten-year period were principal conductor Rudolf Moralt, Felix Prohaska, Wilhelm Loibner, Meinhard Zallinger and Heinrich Hollreiser.

On 7 January 1956, this production was put on the schedule at the newlyopened opera house on the Ring. Under the baton of Heinrich Hollreiser and Berislav Klobučar, Rudolf Shock, Karl Kamann and Peter Klein were cast as the male leads in a total of only ten performances, with Rita Streich (Olympia), Teresa Stich-Randall (Antonia) and Ljuba Welitsch and Christel Goltz (Giulietta). The young Christa Ludwig played the breeches role of Nicklausse.

The long-overdue new production took place in the second season conducted by director Herbert von Karajan.

In a double première of the opera on 26 and 27 October 1957, Anton Dermota and Ivo Zidek sang Hoffmann, Paul Schöffler/Walter Berry the villains, Teresa Stich-Randall/Wilma Lipp Antonia, Ira Malaniuk/Gerda Scheyrer Giulietta, and Christa Ludwig/Dagmar Hermann Nicklausse. Mimi Coertse (Olympia) and the tireless Peter Klein (buffo roles) performed in both performances. The interpretation of the cast with Antonio Votto, Adolf Rott and Robert Kautsky was not a great success with either audiences or the critics, and the production was restaged just 19 times in eighteen months, with Waldemar Kmentt as the eponymous hero, Walter Berry in the baritone roles and Erika Köth (Olympia) offering interesting variations in the cast.

The next new production was also conceived as a double première with

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alternating casts. It was conducted by Josef Krips, with sets and costumes designed by Otto Schenk, Günther Schneider-Siemssen and Hill ReihsGromes. On 16 October 1966, Waldemar Kmentt (Hoffmann), Otto Wiener (bari­ tone roles), Anja Silja (in all the women’s roles) and Gerhard Stolze (buffo roles) sang the lead roles. On 22 October 1966, the cast changed to Jean Cox, Thomas Tipton, Lucia Popp (Olympia), Wilma Lipp (Antonia), Ruth Hesse (Giulietta) and – still – Peter Klein.

The last of a total of 87 performances of this production took place on 21 November 1977. Prior to that date, William Blankenship, Josef Hopferwieser and William Cochran had sung the title role, Ernst Gutstein, Eberhard Waechter, Franz Grundheber and Gottfried Hornik his adversaries, Sylvia Gészty, Edita Gruberova and Arleen Augér Olympia, Lotte Rysanek Antonia and Gertrude Jahn Giulietta, also with Heinz Zednik as the tenor servants.

The current production with mise-enscène by Andrei Şerbans celebrated its première on 20 December 1993 and was a triumph in every regard. It is no wonder then that after almost a quarter of a century the production is still extremely popular. Major singers in the lead roles have been Natalie Dessay, Stefania Bonfadelli and Daniela Fally as Olympia, Barbara Frittoli, Soile Isokoski, Inva Mula, Adrianne Pieczonka, Ildikó Raimondi, Krassimira Stoya­­­nova and Marina Rebeka as Antonia, Eliane Coelho and Nadia Krasteva as Giulietta, Elīna Garanča, Angelika Kirchschlager, Sophie Koch and Stephanie Houtzeel as Nicklausse, Plácido Domingo, Neil Shicoff, Rolando Villazón, Francisco Araiza, Luis Lima and Giuseppe Sabbatini in the title role, Heinz Zednik, Herwig Pecoraro, Thomas Ebenstein and John Dickie in the buffo roles, Bryn Terfel, Ruggero Raimondi, Samuel Ramey, James Morris and Monte Pederson as the four villains.

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KS PLÁCIDO DOMINGO

as HOFFMANN

IMPRINT JACQUES OFFENBACH

LES CONTES D’HOFFMANN SEASON 2024/25 PREMIÈRE OF THE PRODUCTION 20 DECEMBER 1993 ( R E V I VA L : 1 3 DE C E M B E R 2 0 2 4) Publisher WIENER STAATSOPER GMBH, Opernring 2, 1010 Wien Director DR. BOGDAN ROŠČIĆ Music Director PHILIPPE JORDAN Administrative Director DR. PETRA BOHUSLAV General Editors SERGIO MORABITO, ANDREAS LÁNG AND OLIVER LÁNG Design & concept EXEX Layout & typesetting MIWA MEUSBURGER Printed by PRINT ALLIANCE HAV PRODUKTIONS GMBH, BAD VÖSLAU TEXT & IMAGE REFERENCES This programme is based on the 1993 première programme and the 2014 revival programme. IMAGE REFERENCES Cover image: Sigurður Guðmundsson, Extension, 1974, Courtesy of Sigurður Guðmundsson and i8 Gallery, Reykjavík © Bildrecht, Wien 2024.

Cover image concept: Martin Conrads, Berlin. Performance photos: Axel Zeininger / Wiener Staatsoper GmbH, (p 8, 32, 33, 37), Michael Pöhn/Wiener Staatsoper GmbH (p 2-3, 12, 13, 16-17, 20-21, 26, 27). The English translation is by Andrew Smith.

Reproduction only with approval of Wiener Staatsoper GmbH / Dramaturgy. Holders of rights who were unavailable regarding retrospect compensation are requested to make contact.

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