Programme booklet »FIdelio«

L U DW I G VA N B E E T H OV E N

FIDELIO

CONTENTS

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SYNOPSIS P.

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“AN ANGEL LEONORE” INTERVIEW WITH FRANZ WELSER-MÖST P.

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WITH BEETHOVEN THERE IN REHEARSAL INTERVIEW WITH NIKOLAUS HABJAN

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ABOUT THE PUPPETRY P.

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NO COMPARISON – AND INCONCEIVABLY DIVINE OLIVER LÁNG P.

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BEETHOVEN THE TITAN. THE POWER OF AN IMAGE MELANIE UNSELD P.

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IMPRINT

L U DW I G VA N B E E T H OV E N

FIDELIO OPERA in two acts Text JOSEPH SONNLEITHNER & STEPHAN VON BREUNING & GEORG FRIEDRICH TREITSCHKE Text adapted by PAULUS HOCHGATTERER

ORCHESTRA

2 flutes / piccolo / 2 oboes 2 clarinets / 2 bassoons contrabassoon / 4 horns 2 trumpets / 2 trombones timpani / violin I / violin II viola / cello / double bass

STAGE ORCHESTRA

trumpet

AUTOGRAPH (3rd version)

Staatsbibliothek Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz

WORLD PREMIÈRE (3rd version)

23 MARCH 1814 Kärntnertortheater, Vienna

IN THE HOUSE ON THE RING Vienna Court Opera DURATION

2 H 45 M

10 JUNE 1869

INCL. 1 INTERMISSION

FIDELIO

SYNOPSIS

The grim everyday life of a prison. Deprived of their identity, prisoners vanish in the darkness of the cells. The place is governed by Pizarro, who is outwardly pleasant, ingratiating and smooth, but inwardly brutal and consumed by hatred. In the deepest dungeon he has hidden his opponent Florestan, who has already been languishing there in the dark for two years. He has been abandoned by everyone – except his wife Leonore, who is searching for him and plans to rescue him. Disguised as a man and calling herself Fidelio, she takes a job in the prison. Here she quickly gains the trust and affection of the jailer Rocco, who even intends to marry his daughter Marzelline to Fidelio.

ACT 1 The gatekeeper Jaquino, who was sure his own future was with Marzelline before Fidelio arrived, fights for her affections.

When she rejects him, his mood quickly becomes pressing and threatening. Jaquino is forced to beat angry retreat, while Marzelline dreams of spending her future in freedom with Fidelio.

In his quarters, Rocco shows them the accumulated treasures he has confiscated from the prisoners and sings about the joys of gold. Encouraged by his trust, Leonore asks to accompany him to the secret prisoners, among whom she suspects she will find her husband Florestan.

Previous pages: SCENE

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SYNOPSIS

Pizarro discovers that the Minister is investigating his abuses of power and is planning a surprise visit. He decides that Florestan, his most prominent victim, must be got rid of immediately. When Rocco refuses to carry out the murder, he orders him to dig a grave in the dungeon. He will perform the deed himself. Leonore successfully requests that the prisoners be given a moment in the sunshine: among their starving faces she hopes she will be able to discover her husband. But her hope is in vain.

ACT 2 Down in the dungeon, Florestan thinks about his fate. In a vision he sees his wife Leonore guiding him to freedom. Then Rocco and Fidelio arrive to dig Florestan’s grave. When Pizarro joins them and is about to commit the murder, Fidelio places herself in front of the prisoner and sings: “Töt’ erst sein Weib!” (“Kill his wife first!”) A trumpet signals the Minister’s arrival: liberation has come!

On the King’s orders, the Minister grants the prisoners their freedom. Leonore is allowed to release Florestan from his chains, while Pizarro is arrested. The prison is opened; Leonore’s actions are praised in song as she symbolises liberty, loyalty and courage.

Following page: TAREQ NAZMI as ROCCO

CHRISTOPHER MALTMAN as PIZARRO

BARRY COOPER

“BEETHOVEN’S VIEW OF HIS OWN COMPOSITIONS WAS SHAPED BY HIS CONCEPT OF MUSIC AS AN UPLIFTING FORCE. HE REGARDED HIS TASK AS AN ARTIST TO BRING HUMANITY CLOSER TO THE DIVINE THROUGH HIS ART.”

ANDREAS LÁNG IN AN INTERVIEW WITH FR ANZ WELSER-MÖST (CONDUCTOR)

“AN ANGEL LEONORE” al

In one of the early discussions about this new production, you described Fidelio as a philosophical idea. Is that based more on its subject matter or its composition? wm If one studies Beethoven closely, firstly one notices that many of his works grew out of philosophical and political ideas or at least carry a scent of them. This is equally true if we are talking about his Eroica, for example, his Fifth or Ninth Symphony with Schiller’s Ode to Joy, about his major piano sonatas or, indeed, about Fidelio.

And secondly, in Fidelio so many different influences come together – the Enlightenment, Biedermeier, Sturm und Drang, Romanticism, Beethoven the symphonic composer, his personal beliefs and desires – that this work defies excessive realism. To put it bluntly, it is not an opera in the conventional sense – and that is why this score is such a challenge for directors. al Seen purely in formal terms, Fidelio is unusual: the beginning feels like a singspiel, while the end is almost an oratorio. wm Beethoven repeatedly pushed boundaries in every respect: formally as well as in his programmatic orientation or in the technical demands placed on

the performers. This is also true of Fidelio. He did not do this for its own sake, for the mere pleasure of toying with the unconventional, it was driven by his intellectual and moral beliefs. The muchquoted line “From the heart – may it return to the heart”, which Beethoven set above his Missa solemnis, has nothing to do with sentimentality, but expresses the ideal of its time, which we should remember in all Beethoven’s works: liberty, equality and fraternity. An ideal, admittedly, that still needs to be fought for tenaciously. It is no coincidence that in the G major passage “Seid umschlungen Millionen” (“Be embraced, ye millions”) in the last movement of his Ninth Symphony, Beethoven emphasises the line “Über Sternen muss er wohnen” (“He must live above the stars”) with a fortissimo and a marked change of key to the symbolic E flat major. Beethoven’s interpretation of Schiller here is very much per aspera ad astra.

And it’s according to that philosophical view of Beethoven that we are interpreting Fidelio. Our concept symbolises this constant expansion, this arduous path to reach the light, the shining light that manifests itself here in Leonore.

This is why attempts to pigeon-hole the piece such as “the beginning of Fide-

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lio is a singspiel, the ending is like an oratorio” don’t go far enough. Nikolaus Habjan and I have spent a lot of time talking about this misconception that the first numbers after the overture are inconsequential introductions that burble away nicely and that we only truly arrive in Fidelio with Leonore’s aria. He won’t allow these scenes, specifically the opening duet between Marzelline and Jaquino and Rocco’s Gold aria to drift off into silliness or perpetuate traditional cliches about the characters but will present the many-sided nature of each individual figure. Habjan will demonstrate that everyone has something inside them that can help reach the ideal I mentioned. al How can the conductor help to express the many-sided nature of these individual characters? wm Often through tiny details. Let’s take the beginning after the overture, for example, this short introduction to the duet: one can simply pass it by and treat it as light banter, or one can interpret the first motif made up of four notes as Jaquino’s uneasiness. This then gives these four notes a very specific atmospheric sense that should make the audience aware from the outset that Jaquino is not a simple, cut-out comic character, but a highly ambivalent person, driven by feelings and emotions. And if I deliberately cue the singer playing Rocco to start his aria “Hat man nicht auch Gold beineben” (“If you don’t have money with you”) a little too early after its brief introduction, one automatically senses Rocco’s greed – which Habjan also points out in the production – his almost erotic relationship with money.

And with that we are already miles away from a gentle, jolly light opera aria.

al

What is it that makes Leonore the shining light? Florestan’s actions, in standing up for the truth and then being imprisoned for two years in inhuman conditions as a consequence should not be underestimated either. wm Florestan has exposed injustice, which definitely makes him virtuous.

That is no small thing. But Leonore’s individualism makes her a Sturm und Drang character par excellence: in defiance of all reason, all the rules, all danger and any prospect of success she decides to rescue her husband and enters the lion’s den to do it. What makes her capable of this? Love, the highest of human virtues. That is what makes her so admirable, that is what elevates her to an ideal. al Beethoven started thinking about a total of at least 53 opera projects, but in the end, Fidelio would be the only one of them to be realised. Where did the problem lie? wm Beethoven really wrestled with music theatre as a genre: in reality it was a meeting of two different worlds.

His attempt to put a mythological and philosophical character on stage as a ballet in The Creatures of Prometheus had something absurd about it that could not work. And from the very beginning Beethoven, who was accustomed to expressing his intentions through music alone, had difficulty in coming to terms with opera, which lives from the interplay between words and music. There is a quite fundamental contradiction between Beethoven’s obligatory rhythmic pulse, which is constantly driving towards something, and the ups and downs or linguistic flow of a libretto, and his method of compos-

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FRANZ WELSER-MÖST IN AN INTERVIEW

ing, of developing a great whole from tiny motifs, is naturally at odds with the underlying character of an opera. al But with Fidelio Beethoven did manage one great success… wm And did it despite a pretty poor libretto. (laughs) Just as all the composers who followed measured themselves

by Beethoven’s symphonies, Mozart’s works were the model for many in the field of opera. It was not for nothing that E.T.A. Hoffmann called Don Giovanni “the opera of all operas”.

Beethoven knew this and looked for a different way of feeling at home in this genre. And what could be more familiar to him as a great symphonic composer than distributing the musical nerve plexus of Fidelio across the orchestra – just as Wagner would later, for example, in Tristan und Isolde? This enables essential things to be articulated that either cannot be expressed on stage or only in limited form. One can see this as early as the second number, in the fast C major section of Marzelline’s aria: in truth the purifying power of the flame of the Enlightenment that is blazing away here has nothing to do with the words that are being sung, but it reveals that the next Leonore is already growing up here. Or: why do we hear three horns in Leonore’s great aria? Because Beethoven is linking this directly to his Eroica, in which the horns are used as a heroic instrument. And this happens in the key of love, E major! At this point Beethoven expresses purely through the music what I said earlier: Leonore’s heroism is made possible by love. During rehearsal I regularly remind the singers to think of the subtext in their interpretation because that is what makes additional strings reso-

nate with the audience. Nikolaus Habjan also repeatedly draws out aspects in scenic terms that are only introduced in the orchestra pit – something I very much welcome. Here it’s interesting to look at the final bars of the score, for example: unlike in the Fifth Symphony, where Beethoven thoroughly celebrates the end point, it is missing musically in Fidelio. Everyone is cheering, everything seems wonderful – but the strangely abrupt musical ending communicates something else. Evidently, despite everything, the ideal of liberty, equality and fraternity has not become reality, not even in the theatre.

It remains a utopia. al Unlike with Tannhäuser, for example, or the Flying Dutchman there is hardly any discussion about which of the three versions of Fidelio ought to be performed: it is almost always the last one. wm Of course, for historical reasons it is possible to present one of the two earlier versions. It does happen occasionally. But it’s simply a fact that as he continued to work on it, Fidelio got better and better. So why not perform the last and best iteration of a work in progress? al One obvious question is about the third Leonore overture.

Otto Nicolai was the first to add it to the score – albeit before Act Two. It was then Gustav Mahler who moved it to what is now its traditional position before the final scene. Will it also be heard in this new production? wm In my lifetime I’ve omitted it only once and then I recognised that the finale needs this last kick to really lift off.

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Inserting the third Leonore overture – in exactly the place that Mahler chose – improves the final focus on the philosophical idea we discussed earlier and is certainly in keeping with Beethoven’s spirit. al To what extent does a conductor learn new things about a work by collaborating with a director? Is there anything in relation to Fidelio, where you can say this new production has genuinely extended your horizons? wm The magnificent thing about interpretation is one is entering a relationship with a work of art and each time one does it from the position in which one currently finds oneself. So that relationship changes. I recently listened to Schubert’s A major sonata recorded by Radu Lupu in the middle of his life and in another, clearly later recording. The same piece, the same performer – and yet two very different results, but both have their own merits. In 2015 I conducted a new production of Fidelio in Salzburg directed by Claus Guth, who took a very sombre view of the piece.

Now, ten years later, I have met a director who approaches the score with incredible youthful enthusiasm, with real excitement. Both of them had an effect on my approach because working with a director naturally influences what I do. As so often in the theatre, it’s a case of give and take. Obviously, I am not suddenly going to conduct fifty per cent faster or slower. But a new point of view does enable me to discover and present new layers within a work. al That reminds me of Monet’s cathedral series: each painting shows the same detail of Rouen Cathedral, but in each case the

changing light produces a different impression… wm We see something similar with the variations in colour in series by Andy Warhol. Basically, the reason why we repeatedly engage with certain masterpieces is that altered parameters reveal new emphases and new nuances.

The spirit of each respective age, social debates and the current narrative influence the way that we see and interpret them. Fidelio is a perfect example of this, which can be seen in the history of its reception – including its misuse for political purposes – at the Vienna State Opera. Or remember, for example, the legendary Dresden production of Fidelio by Christine Mielitz in 1989, shortly before the Berlin wall came down. The city was regarded as the headquarters of the GDR’s secret service, which inspired Mielitz to give the entire audience the feeling that they were also inmates of Pizarro’s prison. During the premiere she even had all the doors locked to reinforce this impression. Of course, there were numerous members of the secret service present in the auditorium and the fact that it has since been established that one of them was a certain Vladimir Putin gives the premiere an additional edge in retrospect. al So any interpretation is a child of its time. wm We cannot disconnect ourselves from the time we are living in. But momentous events are not the only ones that are reflected in a performance.

Seemingly trivial elements such as a change in the weather, the health of one of the singers and the composition of the audience can affect a performance.

We performers attempt to get closer to a work of art, sometimes we are more successful than others. And because

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there is no one ultimate version, our efforts will only ever be attempts. For me as a conductor, however, I find it the greatest compliment if people are not talking about my interpretation when

the curtain falls, but about the piece itself. Because then I know that I have done justice to my task of bringing the work closer to the audience.

Following pages:

DANIEL JENZ as JAQUINO KATHRIN ZUKOWSKI as MARZELLINE

ELISABETH SCHMIERER

“IN CONTRAST TO BOUILLY’S ORIGINAL, ON ONE HAND NEW TRENDS FROM THE OPÉRA COMIQUE FOUND THEIR WAY INTO BEETHOVEN’S OPERA – THE GLORIFICATION OF LOVE NOT ONLY FOR ONE’S SPOUSE BUT FOR MANKIND IN GENERAL (…); ON THE OTHER HAND, THIS IDEAL – ESPECIALLY IN THE THIRD VERSION – WAS ELEVATED TO AN ALMOST METAPHYSICAL LEVEL.”

JOHANN WOLFGANG VON GOETHE

ON BEETHOVEN

“MORE FOCUSED, MORE ENERGETIC, MORE INTIMATE I’VE NEVER SEEN A ARTIST LIKE THIS BEFORE.”

OLIVER LÁNG IN AN INTERVIEW WITH NIKOLAUS HABJAN (STAGE DIRECTOR)

WITH BEETHOVEN THERE IN REHEARSAL ol

A few days ago a TV programme about Albrecht Dürer described how intensely he used his drawings as a way of understanding the world. Is it like that for you as a director? Do you learn more about our lives through your productions, through characters like Leonore and Rocco? nh That’s a very good question. The answer is definitely yes. I see my work as a director, but also as a puppeteer, as a great exploration of our existence.

Putting phenomena from life and society on stage teaches me about the world. Especially about important and topical issues and moral conduct, as in Fidelio. ol We’ll come to the topical and moral aspects in a minute. But first, because I’ve just seen how very engaged and happy you are when you’re working; is filing away intensely on individual

gestures, words and nuances at the beginning of the rehearsal process what you enjoy most?

Because everything is still open? nh Yes, I love doing this! Because in these early rehearsals we can shine a light on the characters from top to bottom and analyse them in detail. It’s lovely to be able to examine words and notes afresh over and over again, turning them around and looking at them from new angles. I always start rehearsals by singing through the scene once so that we start working with the music in our heads: what is it saying to us?

What does the conductor think? Then I introduce my own ideas and there will be ideas and initiatives from the singers. And these special moments keep happening when my ideas and those of the others will meet Beethoven’s music at a particular point. That’s remarkably satisfying and the great pleasure it gives everyone is tangible. That doesn’t

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mean that other phases of the working process aren’t equally enjoyable. Or the result. It is beautiful to be able to sit in a performance as a member of the audience and simply understand why which character does what and everything seems to make sense and occur naturally without any intended directorial concept shining through. I always say that the nicest moments are when you don’t notice the directing. ol It was very noticeable in the preliminary discussions that you know the piece inside out, down to every instrumental cue, every comma. nh I think that’s simply the director’s job. It’s essential to know the work that you are working on down to the tiniest detail. ol How clear is the image that you have in front of you before a rehearsal? Is there a directing book in which everything has already been written down? Or is it more about having an overall route in mind? nh I always have a plan, that not only consists of a general direction but also a lot of detail. But – and this is crucial – I am always prepared to abandon the plan if something better emerges in rehearsal. No matter whether that good idea comes from me or someone else.

My ego has no problem with that. Because the director’s job is not only to find a way of staging the piece, it is also to bring everyone together and devise the best possible solution. ol Earlier, at the end of the morning, you said: “Beethoven was in the rehearsal just now!” What did you mean by that? nh What I meant was that it was one of those moments I just spoke about

when everything comes together, and everybody is pulling in the same direction. You literally feel that Beethoven would have appreciated the way we did that, putting our heart and soul into the work, because his music was woven into the scene. It’s as if he was there. We mustn’t forget that he was a great theatre lover, a theatregoer, he was very interested in theatre, he worked on numerous stage texts and wrote theatre music. As a result, you often come across some very intelligent theatrical decisions in his composing. He was more than “only” a composer. ol The Vienna State Opera has just bid farewell to a production that spent 55 years in the repertoire and was a formative experience for many people. As a director do you have to process this previous interpretation? Or are you simply going to do your Fidelio, regardless of what has gone before? nh The latter! I’m not constantly thinking about Otto Schenk’s production so that I can deliberately do something different. That’s not what I’m trying to do at all. Just as I would never try to provoke anyone who liked that production. That production had been performed since 1970, over 250 times. Which is a very long time for a single production. And is in the nature of opera and theatre to renew things.

Of course, I have studied Fidelio and its performance history at the State Opera and considered how that should inform my production. And I have also looked at it from the point of view of what have I perhaps already dealt with in other pieces. For example, I referred to Karl Böhm in my play about him – I don’t need to put that into Fidelio too.

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ol

How specifically do you position your work politically? Do you make references to certain moments in history, for example, that are intended to be recognisable? Will you locate Fidelio in a real existing or former dictatorship? nh No, that would reduce the work.

When I think about what Beethoven was trying to achieve with his works, I keep running into his great idealism.

And that transcends any one epoch. So I would like to create something that is ultimately independent of time. The less I try to place the story in a specific, narrow period or political situation, the more timeless the work becomes.

What matters are the big themes that Beethoven explores and these can be understood quite clearly without using historical references to frame them. ol In your work these great themes are not only love, courage and liberation but also the transformation of a supposedly minor character: Rocco. nh I think Rocco is the most important event in the play, he is actually the leading role. Because he is the only character who undergoes any development. That is why I am concentrating particularly on him. And Rocco is also timeless. ol Let’s talk about Rocco. He’s not a character we sympathise with.

But you take a much more positive view of him than he emerges with from many other productions. He is a classic hanger on, willing to do what he’s told, with an unappealingly prominent taste for money. nh When we look at our world, we are all willing to do what we’re told. Even

the best person has gone along with things at some point and none of us can claim to be an exception. And we must not fall prey to the error that Leo­nore is the character in the opera we identify with. Because she isn’t. She is a role model, but the character to identify with is Rocco. Leonore is an archetype, the heroine. Rocco by contrast is a human being with weaknesses, he’s greedy, afraid, a coward and he is pathologically flexible when it comes to morality. And yet: he does make a small difference by rejecting Pizarro’s influence in favour of Leonore. That is a small decision which is easily overlooked. But it is also the one that – on a broader scale – can change the world for the better. ol So Rocco is the example for us. nh I believe if you tell people: now you have to be a hero, it just intimidates them, they will be frozen in shock, and nothing happens. But if you say: you don’t have to be perfect but be careful what you allow yourself to be influenced by, that can change a great deal.

Because then someone might think: yes, I would rather listen to Fidelio and not to Pizarro. That can be a small decision with huge consequences. ol And what about Jaquino? In your production he brings a lot of aggression and stress into play. Is he another mini Rocco with a chance to be better – or is he already a Pizarro? nh For Pizarro it is a matter of life and death, he is close to ruin and plans to save himself by taking extreme action – murdering Florestan. Jaquino, by contrast, I look at through Marzelline’s eyes. This is a woman who previously had no alternative to marrying Jaquino, which she would have done with fatalistic indifference. But suddenly Fidelio

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enables her to see freedom, hope and great love. Jaquino now becomes absolutely unthinkable for her, what’s more: she sees marriage to him as a danger, as a form of harassment. She does not sing: “Es wurde zu Tode mir bang” (“I was worried to death”) for nothing. On top of this, there is the fact that her father Rocco has feelings for Fidelio and, on a certain level, has also fallen in love with him. Jaquino, who had been very confident about his marriage can see how things are slipping away from him. His aggression is the result of panic: he tries to hold on to Marzelline – and suddenly everything escalates. ol Back to Pizarro. Is he only driven to do this? Or is he absolutely evil, like Iago or Hagen, sadistic like Scarpia? nh For me Pizarro is a petty coward, severely narcissistic, incapable of empathy, someone who is constantly persuading himself of his own greatness. He makes a clear calculation: if Florestan’s imprisonment is discovered, my existence is endangered. Therefore, Florestan’s existence must be destroyed, along with all the proof. His focus is not on planning a murder, it is on his fear of being convicted. It is also important to me to show that he is two-faced, because Pizarro can appear very different: in the few moments when he is in public, I want to present him as sympathetically as possible, but behind this lies a puny individual. Who unfortunately happens to be in a position where he can cause a great deal of suffering. ol You spoke about the idealism that drove Beethoven on. And that is how the character of Leonore must be seen too: a heroine who risks everything to ­rescue the person she loves. But,

to put it provocatively, where does her truly exemplary great deed lie? She disguises herself and at the decisive moment of her confrontation with evil she is clearly better armed than Pizarro. Tosca is equally prepared to go to great lengths to save her lover, as are many other characters. But we sing the highest praises of Leonore. nh Of course that is partly due to the period – and the considerable idealisation within the character that we have to learn to deal with and we have to accept. I have often seen the cheering in the finale be slightly sabotaged or placed in a dystopic light. But that simply doesn’t work with Beethoven’s music. And besides, I think it is certainly worth the effort of for once saying: leave the happy ending and let people celebrate. That’s nice too. ol But can the jubilation not also have an official quality to it, in the sense of: now let’s cheer, authority has been restored, this is the new direction we’re going to follow? nh The lovely thing is that the Minister actually has no role to play beyond making Pizarro frightened. Rocco interrupts his speech before he can finish talking, and Leonore is given the moment at the end when she can free her husband from his chains. I very much like the way Beethoven has created this heavenly moment following the cheers.

It is Florestan who says he would not have been able to achieve it without his wife, not the voice of the king. So it is less a statement “from above” than “from one person to another”. ol What is Leonore’s reaction to all the jubilation? She becomes the

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new ideal. In your production this is even made clear visually. nh In everything we do it is possible that some things suddenly take on a life of their own that cannot be controlled.

This happens with Leonore’s disguise when Marzelline falls in love with her, and it happens at the end of the opera when Leonore turns into a symbol of liberation from political oppression.

She is not interested in that sort of thing personally. For her, the story is over once Florestan has been freed. What happens afterwards is of much greater importance to the others. ol In this production you use large puppets to complement the lovers Leonore and Florestan. Is puppetry, which is an important area of your work, something you can’t escape any more? Or do you use these figures because they are able to show something that would be much more difficult to communicate otherwise? nh If I am going to use puppets, for me they must always clearly add something. Let’s take Leonore: here we have a woman in disguise as a man called Fidelio who is trying to rescue her husband. She is caught in an eternal conflict between experiencing the strongest emotions and a pressure to conceal her identity. That is extremely exciting on a dramaturgical level, but extremely difficult to present on stage. In our case I have split the character: the singer Malin Byström embodies the world of Leonore’s inner feelings, and the puppet is what she presents to others: a controlled and reticent Fidelio. In this way I can

reveal all the tensions that arise from the disguise and depict emotional states in much more detail. Such as the way it breaks Leonore’s heart as soon as she realises what she is doing to Marzelline – but she goes ahead and does it anyway because she has a greater objective in mind. We can show that struggle very clearly by combining a human and a puppet. This might not be something singers are used to at first, but in the course of rehearsals it always turns out that we don’t lose 50 per cent of the acting, instead we get 200 per cent: 100 per cent from the human and 100 per cent from the puppet. ol But why have you doubled Florestan? He is only ever one person, who never dissembles and is never disguised. nh Paradoxically that comes from trying to make the acting more realistic.

With a puppet I can show the trauma of imprisonment more precisely, I can present a character who has spent two years in complete darkness, rotting away in jail with almost no food. So we have the singer – who is Florestan as Leonore remembers him. And we have the puppet – who is the prisoner after two years in prison. There are also numerous accounts of people who have been buried alive or survived imprisonment in inhuman conditions who have become estranged from themselves.

This is a well-known psychological process that I can show in the theatre thanks to the puppet. This also gives us the chance of enabling Leonore and Florestan to meet on a newly visible emotional level.

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ABOUT THE PUPPETRY A puppet is always truthful. It does not play a role – it is the role that we give it. As a result, it can be absolutely convincing, without any personal barrier.

So when a puppet dies, it dies better than any actor or singer. Because those performers will get back up again, they will bow and sweat. A puppet detached from its puppeteer is dead. And so affectingly dead that it can be heartbreaking. Puppets might not be able to show certain facial expressions, but they release emotions and ideas in those who are watching. The audience complements what we perform.

Because puppets are wonderful at channelling emotions projected onto them. Assuming, not only that they are not only well performed, but also well constructed, just like a musical instrument.

A puppet gives us the chance to present the internal and external world of a character – and in Leonore’s case there is a great distance between them.

We are confronted by a desperate woman who is inwardly torn: she is searching for her husband but must suppress her emotions, disguise herself and appear to the outside world as someone else – Fidelio. Her inner world, her soul is shown by the singer. What the character must also present to the outside world is shown by the puppet. These levels can separate and distance themselves from each other. They can each be felt through the music and the text, but both are not usually visible on stage.

In our production, however, we not only hear the inner and outer worlds, we can also see them.

DAVID BUTT PHILIP as FLORESTAN

MALIN BYSTRÖM as LEONORE

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OLIVER LÁNG

NO COMPARISON – AND INCONCEIVABLY DIVINE HOW BEETHOVEN’S FIDELIO CAME ABOUT Here a composer with republican leanings who is not opposed to the French Revolution writes an opera against tyranny and despotism, adapting a French story written by a political turncoat called Jean-Nicolas Bouilly.

This Bouilly, who followed a royalist phase by serving as chairman of the military commission in Tours during the post-revolutionary reign of terror, presented what he claimed was a true story he had himself witnessed where a courageous woman freed her husband from the hands of the Jacobins. In such unstable times, however, he wanted to avoid the subject arousing political suspicions and therefore moved the action over the border to Spain. The world premiere of the setting of this Léonore, ou l’Amour conjugal took place on 19 February 1798 at the Théâtre Feydeau in Paris.

With considerable success.

A few years later in Vienna. The Habsburg censor inspected and banned the material in German translation only ultimately to approve the plot in

a politically more innocuous version that was set earlier, in the 16th century.

However, by the time the work was eventually premiered in Vienna troops – and French ones at that! – had been occupying the city for a week. They represented a fury of conquest that was the military consequence of what had begun 15 years earlier as radical change: the French Revolution that was intended to abolish tyranny. Now Napoleon was in Vienna – recently selfcrowned Emperor and conqueror of half of Europe. Beethoven, formerly a great admirer, had even wanted to dedicate his Third Symphony to him, but changed his mind in a fury after Napoleon declared himself Emperor. He was so furious that he scratched away the dedication in the manuscript: “Isn’t he no more than an ordinary person? Now he will also trample all people’s rights underfoot and only pursue his own ambition, he will place himself above all others and become a tyrant!” Incidentally, the Third Symphony was given its

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first public performance in April 1805, six months before the world premiere of Fidelio. Where? At the Theater an der Wien, where Fidelio was premiered. Did the audiences watching Fidelio wonder which tyrannical regime the world premiere might have in mind? Probably not. Because in the first performance there were not many (Viennese) listeners present; there were empty seats and, it has been claimed, French soldiers.

But let’s not get ahead of ourselves.

Beethoven’s Fidelio had its beginnings between 1803 and 1804, at least the first written reference that has been found to it dates from this time. The composer speaks in a letter about an “old French book” (meaning the libretto Léonore, ou l’Amour conjugal mentioned above), which he had “quickly” had adapted.

The speedy adapter was Joseph Sonnleithner, a lawyer, man of the theatre, writer, director – and a powerful opera producer in Vienna. Two other Leonore operas were written at around the same time: one by Ferdinando Paër, and a second by Simon Mayr (in this version the story is set in Poland). Beethoven knew at least the first of these as a private performance of the Paër work had been given in Vienna at the home of his benefactor Prince Lobkowitz and a copy of this version was found among Beethoven’s posthumous papers.

In any event, work on the German-language Fidelio became more protracted, and then the world premiere had to be postponed: present day scholars assume that Beethoven’s new work was too ambitious for the singers and orchestra.

And to mention just one detail: Beethoven also turned out, like many of his colleagues, to be an effective recycler of his own existing ideas. He took the enchanting and breathtaking music for “O

namenlose Freude” (Oh nameless joy) from an earlier fragment, entitled Vestas Feuer (Vesta’s Fire), which he had begun to a libretto by Emanuel Schikaneder.

On the evening of 20 November 1805 when Fidelio (Beethoven had actually wanted to use the title Leonore but was overruled by the theatre management) was first performed at the Theater an der Wien, there was little talk of success. Not only did the half-empty theatre mentioned above dampen the mood, an irritation among the listeners at the novelty of Beethoven’s music probably had an effect.

Some of the coverage was certainly scathing, one famous review in Der Freimütige proclaiming, among other things, that the opera “is a very long way off being a complete or even merely an accomplished work”. And: “The overture consists of a very long adagio, excessive in all keys, followed by the entry of a C major allegro which is not first-rate either and bears no comparison to Beethoven’s other instrumental compositions – nor for example to his overture to the ballet Prometheus. The song pieces generally lack any new ideas, they are mostly too long, the libretto is repeated incessantly and finally, there is also at times a noticeable lack of characterisation.” (Leipziger Allgemeine Musikalische Zeitung).

After only two further performances, Fidelio vanished from the stage. Albeit not for long, because soon there was a first revision, which was intended to give the work greater rigour.

With alterations in the running order, a new overture, cuts (such as Rocco’s so-called “Gold aria”), tightening and changes in the dialogue, but also some new passages (such as the recitative “Gott, welch Dunkel hier” – God, how

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OLIVER LÁNG

dark it is here) and a Two Act form, it returned for a second world premiere – again at the Theater an der Wien – which was particularly notable for developing some of the characters further.

For example, unlike in the first version, it is now Leonore and not Marzelline who releases the prisoners from their cells – note the more incisive dramaturgy as Leonore is cast as the supporter of all the prisoners. The changes to the text were made by Stephan von Breuning, however this version, premiered on 29 March 1806, also failed to achieve a resounding success. While the documented opinions may sound more positive to us than for the first version, a financial dispute between the composer and the director of the theatre prevented a longer run: this Leonore was only performed twice in 1806.

It was followed by a further stage of revision that is usually overlooked and was intended to lead to a production in Prague – which failed to materialise.

Beethoven again wrote this version its own overture, which is now confusingly known as Leonore I. Then, at last: the composer was asked for Fidelio for a benefit performance at the Kärntnertortheater, which in turn led to a further comprehensive revision of the work. “Newly written and improved” is how the composer described his work, which again took up more time than he had planned. And once again there was a new adapter and librettist, another theatre writer and theatre maker: Friedrich Treitschke.

His approach to the text inspired the composer: “I have read your improvements to the opera with great pleasure; it makes me determined to rebuild the desolate ruins of an old castle”. In this final version, Rocco’s “Gold aria” reap-

pears, albeit in a gentler tone. The latest reworking misses out the lines that are critical of authority: “Drum ist auch Fortuna den Reichen so hold / sie thuen ja nur, was sie wollen / Verhüllen die Handlungen künstlich mit Gold / worüber sie schämen sich sollen” (Fortune is so meek before the rich/ they simply do whatever they like/ shrouding actions artificially in gold/ that they should be ashamed of). Also conspicuous in this version is the continued heroization and idealisation of the title character, evident for example in the detail that Leonore asks of her own volition and without Pizarro’s agreement for the prisoners to be allowed some fresh air.

Once again, the character of the protagonist is revised, with a sharper focus on humanity in general. It is understood that the opera is not only about two people, but about a visionary glimpse of the possibility of justice for all. Because this was what mattered to Beethoven in his Fidelio, to the republican Beethoven, who was also sharply critical of the nobility and his social betters (as long as he did not require their protection or finance). “In its finale the opera is actually no longer an opera, a great sung manifesto takes its place, comparable to the conclusion of the Ninth Symphony or the Credo of Missa solemnis”, writes Beethoven’s biographer Jan Caeyers.

It has been shown to be a “music of ideals”, a combination of art and ethics that views art as the expression of what transcends the individual. Although: Beethoven’s great humanist intention would not prevent later holders of political power from using and abusing the work to advance their respective views.

In any event: the third version finally received its world premiere on 23 May 1814 – and this time success was not

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slow to arrive. How different the reviews sounded now: “The music for this opera is a deeply considered, purely felt fabric of creative imagination, of the most sheer originality, the most heavenly upsurge of the earthly into the inconceivably divine”, the reviewer of the Wiener Theaterzeitung wrote about the first performance in rapturous euphoria. Beethoven, at the pinnacle of his fame, was now also accepted as an

opera composer. In the twelve years of his life that remained, he would leave Fidelio alone, even if, as the musicologist Helga Lühning has shown, there was no last “final edition”, as was the composer’s usual practice. But from now on Fidelio would never leave the international opera repertoire – at the House on the Ring alone it has been performed some eight hundred times in 150 years.

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Following pages:

TAREQ NAZMI as ROCCO MALIN BYSTRÖM as LEONORE

MELANIE UNSELD

BEETHOVEN

THE TITAN. THE

POWER OF AN IMAGE Unclothed he sits on a splendid throne.

Lying across his legs is a heavy, dark cloth. His naked feet wear plain sandals. Nothing that the figure is wearing suggests a historical person from the early 19th century. There are no breeches, shirt or frockcoat… His hair is curly and uncombed, it too reveals no fashion, no period reference. His right hand, lying on his knee, is balled into a fist, his serious gaze appears to be looking inwards and at the same time broadens out into an indeterminate distance.

The allusions to ancient figures, to marble statues of gods and heroes, are unmistakable. And even if the figure’s posture, his bent back and an upper body that is strong but not muscular, does not suggest a Herculean figure, the figure as a whole is akin to that of a Titan. His only companion is an eagle that sits at his feet and appears to shrink back in fear at such strength of will.

No other monument sums up the image that the bourgeois 19th century created for the composer Ludwig van Beethoven better than Max Klinger’s statue, which the artist designed for

the Beethoven exhibition in Vienna in 1902. Klinger’s statue crystallises an entire discourse: this is Beethoven as a Titan, as an artist who is removed from all ages and all temporality, as a genius, a lonely and profoundly serious figure.

This image is so firmly entrenched in our cultural memory that one wonders whether we are capable of imagining Beethoven without this pronounced furrow in his brow. At the same time, the question arises of how this image interrelates to the historical sources that provide information about Ludwig van Beethoven.

Here a contradiction immediately becomes apparent: the Beethoven who was employed by the Theater an der Wien at the beginning of 1803, living there amongst other theatre families and working on his career as an opera composer, is described as active and sociable. Ignaz Seyfried, for example, looking back on this time remembered his “bachelor household” with Beethoven, a form of co-habitation between two single men who both worked in the theatre: “When he was composing Fide-

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BEETHOVEN THE TITAN. THE POWER OF AN IMAGE

lio , the oratorio Christus am Oelberge, the symphonies in E flat, C minor and F, the piano concertos in C minor and G major and the violin concerto in D, we both lived in one and the same house and, because we were a bachelor household, visited the same eating house almost every day, and would chat together for many an unforgettable hour in collegial homeliness; because Beethoven then was cheery, welcomed every joke, jocund, with a spirited lust for life, witty and quite often satirical.” In the letter to his brother from 1802 that became famous as the “Heiligenstadt Testament”, Beethoven also describes himself as having been “born with a fiery and active temperament [and am] susceptible to the distractions of company.”

He loved experiencing “relaxation in the company of others, refined conversation, mutual exchanges of ideas.” At the same time, he complains that he has been “thought to be or called malevolent, stubborn and misanthropic” – “what injustice they do to me.”

How did this contradiction come about? And where does the image of Beethoven as a lonely, misanthropic person come from?

Ludwig van Beethoven, born in Bonn in 1770, had been living in Vienna since 1792. Having originally planned to visit as a student, it had become the centre of his life and there was no question of this young court musician from Bonn returning home: his native city was occupied by Napoleon’s troops.

Now he had to establish himself in Vienna – in the heart of a thriving musical culture that offered inspiration and rivalry in equal measure. Beethoven was in demand as a pianist, and he hoped to achieve additional success in the the-

atre. For Vienna around 1800 was (as now) a city that loved theatre and several stages offered frequently changing programmes. Which constantly called for new pieces. The Theater an der Wien, which had moved in 1801 to the site on the Wienzeile that it still occupies now, was one of the vibrant theatres of the period. It is quite understandable that this was where Beethoven tried to make contacts and as it were ‘immersed’ himself in the world of Viennese theatre. Here he could learn how to compose for voices and what went down well with the audience.

Admittedly, the young composer did not bring much experience with him, up until then he had composed very little for the stage. He had a great deal to learn about the theatre and a great deal of experience to gain to become successful as a composer for the stage.

So he took lessons from Antonio Salieri – still one of the most important names on the Viennese opera scene even after the beginning of the 19th century – and went frequently and regularly to the theatre to learn by listening and watching. Seyfried remembers: “Beethoven […] liked to visit […] opera performances repeatedly; especially those at the Theater an der Wien, which was flourishing so splendidly at that time, partly to take advantage of its convenience as he simply needed to set foot outside his lodgings to be sitting in the stalls. There he was fascinated chiefly by Cherubini’s and Mehul’s creations, which were then beginning to fill the whole of Vienna with enthusiasm. Then he would plant himself firmly behind the lectern and would stay there, as silent as a tailor’s dummy, until the last stroke of the bow.”

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MELANIE UNSELD

After his first attempted composition (the opera Vestas Feuer remained a fragment) in 1805 Beethoven’s debut opera was staged at the Theater an der Wien: Fidelio or: Married Love. The fact that he was asked to rework several sections after the first performances is as typical of the time as the fact that other productions were soon pushing their way on stage for next season. With five performances between November 1805 and April 1806 Beethoven’s Fidelio was clearly one of the house’s more regularly performed operas – and certainly a success for the composer.

Sources show Beethoven in these years to be a member of a bustling theatre scene: artists lived and worked together, exchanged ideas and supported each other with benefit concerts and other performances. The network that can be observed here contains orchestral musicians – such as the concert master Franz Clement, for whom Beethoven wrote his Violin Concerto – singers – such as Friedrich Heinrich Demmer, from the Demmer family of singers, and Anna Milder, who were both involved in the performance of Fidelio – but also publishers, supporters, patrons, librettists, theatre directors and producers etc., not forgetting members of the audience who on other days might visit Vienna’s sheet music shops, where they could buy adaptations of what they had heard on stage the night before.

It is reasonable to imagine this network as being extremely lively and sociable. And it is equally reasonable to think of Beethoven at the heart of just such an active society. Which makes the contrast with the stern and serious loner all the greater. In the letter to his brother written in October 1802, Beet­

hoven complains about the unfairness of describing him as malevolent or even misanthropic. It was nothing other than his deteriorating hearing that forced him to withdraw from people. Indeed, Beethoven’s hearing loss began at just this point in time – an absolute disaster for a musician reliant on the ability to hear. When Beethoven wrote the Heiligenstadt Testament, he was not yet 32 years old and, while a successful musician, he lacked a permanent position.

Progressive hearing loss was a direct threat to his career. His despair at this is evident in every line of the letter, while at the same time he asked for understanding that this was the reason why he withdrew more and more: “I may enter company entirely on my own only as much as the highest necessity demands, I must live like a banished man, if I approach company, a hot anxiety attacks me in which I fear I am in danger of my condition being noticed.”

There are numerous reports that and how Beethoven attempted to compensate for his advancing deafness: conversations were conducted in writing (which is why we can read many everyday conversations in the so-called conversation books), ear trumpets were supposed to amplify the sound of the piano etc. However, his deafness would remain a challenge until Beethoven’s death, especially in social situations. He found it difficult “to tell people: speak louder, shout, because I am deaf.”

If we must therefore imagine Beethoven in dual form – on one hand sociable and ironic, busy and well connected, and on the other sad, serious and withdrawn – then it becomes evident that only one of these two sides has entered our cultural memory.

The sociable Beethoven has almost

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BEETHOVEN THE TITAN. THE POWER OF AN IMAGE

vanished from the world of our imagination, while the serious thinker, the lonely hero appears to be omnipresent.

This can be explained not least by the fact that precisely this notion of the lonely, serious outsider coincides only too well with popular 19th century preconceptions of what a powerful historical figure looked like. Whether this was Thomas Carlyle’s “hero”, Jakob Burckhardt’s idea of special “greatness” or Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel’s concept of a “world-historical individual” – these all revolved around the exceptional manifestation of a man imagined to be an outsider and equipped with attributes of particular power (of influence) and greatness. What’s more, this outsider status was connected to a moral dispensation, which – in Hegel’s words – allowed the “world-historical individual to tread on many innocent flowers and destroy some things on his way.” And Hegel understood this exceptional figure to be a male loner. As soon as the hero “marries […] [he] becomes a philistine [,] just like all the others.”

Behind these concepts of great heroes, loners and outsiders, it is not hard to detect the idea of the genius. Indeed, this idea was that of the “world-historical individual” translated into the field of the arts. The genius who needed solitude (and not exchange and conversation) to create great works, who was maladjusted and notoriously unsuited to everyday life, therefore (also)

not understood by his contemporaries, but who would be appreciated in future because only then could his outsider status be properly recognised… Imagining Beethoven this way was not hard.

A failure to understand his late compositions – such as the late string quartets – could be spun into the idea of him being forward-looking, his withdrawal from company and social interactions could be interpreted as the underlying character behind behaviour that so thoroughly contradicted an awkward bourgeois ideal. All this coalesced into the blueprint for that “world-historical individual” that went round treading on flowers. In short, Beethoven fitted the narrative. And through Beethoven, the narrative could be illustrated, reinforced and made comprehensible.

What is also astonishing is how long the power of this image has lasted.

It was not until his 200th birthday arrived in 1970, when the anniversary coincided with social and aesthetic turbulence sparked by the 1968 movement.

Now more attention was paid to the fact the heroization of Beethoven says little about the composer himself – but all the more about those who imagine Beethoven in this way. Imagining the young Beethoven, the composer of Fidelio, the man who lived in the theatre, the pupil of Salieri, the bustling musician and colleague, as someone who was also sociable, laughing and joking would still take some considerable time.

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Following pages: SCENE

IMPRINT LU DW IG VA N B E E T HOV E N

FIDELIO SEASON 2025/26 PREMIÈRE 16 DECEMBER 2025 Publisher WIENER STAATSOPER GMBH, Opernring 2, 1010 Wien Director DR. BOGDAN ROŠČIĆ Administrative Director DR. PETRA BOHUSLAV General Editors ANDREAS LÁNG, OLIVER LÁNG Design & concept EXEX Layout & typesetting MIWA MEUSBURGER Cover image concept MARTIN CONRADS, BERLIN Printed by PRINT ALLIANCE HAV PRODUKTIONS GMBH, BAD VÖSLAU TEXT REFERENCES All texts were written for the 2025 premiere program booklet. IMAGE REFERENCES Cover image: © Emmanuel Croset, TopshotSAfrica-Urbanism-Architecture, GettyImages. Performance photos: Michael Pöhn/Wiener Staatsoper GmbH ENGLISH TRANSLATIONS David Tushingham.

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