You Cunning Little Vixen, You
Ah Spring! Time for inspiration and rebirth. Can you believe that Czech composer Leoš Janáček didn’t hear his first opera until he was 50? That’s pretty amazing for one who is considered to be among the most important composers to come out of the Czech Republic.
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Leoš Janáček's Das schlaue Füchslein, photo courtesy Leipzig Oper
Having been born in 1854 and entering the operatic world at the turn of the century, Janáček is part of a wave of 20th century composers who sought to bring everyday life and a variety of resources into musical composition. Perhaps this is one reason audiences are still connecting with his work. His melodies come from speech rather than notes. This means his work continues to be very original and unorthodox with odd spacing of chords and phrases. He wrote in what he referred to as “motifs” which he named “sčasovka” in his work on music theory. There is no real English translation, but was described by John Tyrrell, a leading specialist on Janáček’s music, as “a little flash of time, almost a kind of musical capsule, which Janáček often used in slow music as tiny swift motifs with remarkably characteristic rhythms that are supposed to pepper the musical flow.”
Janáček’s personal life was the stuff movies are made of. Tirelessly working on his music with no success early in his career; loss of himself after the death of his child; in love with one woman while married to another; after losing interest in that affair, living in the same house with his secretly divorced wife while suffering unrequited love for yet another woman. This all gave him plenty of fodder for creativity for sure.
Eun Yee You and the women's choir in Das schlaue Füchslein, photo: Andreas Birkigt
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Leipzig Opera
is premiering his lightest work,
Das schlaue Füchslein (the Cunning Vixen)
on Sat 25 Feb
It’s exactly my kind of thing………mainly told with animals! I’ve heard the costumes are fabulous and you can never lose with choreography from Heike Hennig and the Gewandhaus orchestra conducted by Matthias Foremny / William Lacey (29.6.)
Natually it will be sung in German. Here’s the quick wikipedia synopsis to prepare you in case you don’t have time to watch the BBC cartoon.
Act 1
In the forest, the animals and insects are playing and dancing. The Forester enters and lies down against a tree for a nap. A curious Vixen Cub (usually sung by a young girl), inquisitively chases a frog right into the lap of the surprised forester who forcibly takes the vixen home as a pet. Time passes (in the form of an orchestral interlude) and we see the Vixen, now grown to a young adult (and sung by a soprano), tied up in the forester’s yard with the conservative old dachshund. Fed up with life in confinement, the vixen chews through her rope, attacks the chickens, and hops the fence to freedom.
Act 2
The vixen takes over a badger’s home and kicks him out. In the inn, the pastor, forester, teacher and schoolmaster drink and talk about their mutual infatuation with the gypsy girl Terynka. The drunken schoolmaster leaves the inn and mistakes a sunflower behind which the vixen is hiding for Terynka and confesses his devotion to her. The forester, also on his way home, sees the vixen and fires two shots at her, sending her running. Later, the vixen, coming into her womanhood, meets a charming boy fox, and they retire to the badger’s home. An unexpected pregnancy and a forest full of gossipy creatures necessitate their marriage, which rounds out the act.
Act 3
The poacher Harasta is engaged to Terynka and is out hunting in preparation for their marriage. He sets a fox trap, which the numerous vixen cubs mock. Harasta, watching from a distance, shoots and kills the vixen, sending her children running. At Harasta’s wedding, the forester sees the vixen’s fur, which Harasta gave to Terynka as a wedding present, and flees to the forest to reflect. He returns to the place where he met the vixen, and sits at the tree grieving the loss of both the vixen and Terynka. His grief grows until, just as in the beginning of the opera, a frog unexpectedly jumps in his lap, the grandson of the one who did so in act one. This reassurance of the cycle of death leading to new life gives his heart a deep peace.
How was your weekend?
Well, last weekend was certainly packed with lots of great events in Leipzig, but the weather was also something pretty spectacular…in fact who could blame anyone for spending the whole time outside in Leipzig’s beautiful parks! Sorry Grassimesse, sorry Designers Open…you just couldn’t compete with nature this time….
Of Rugby, Kakapo and Castlepoint
We are the champions – New Zealand that is, and rugby is the game (or religion, if you prefer)!! On Sunday morning in a very crowded Irish pub on the Karli some very loyal Kiwis agonised with 4.3 million others (at least!) half a world away – geographically, but not in spirit – over much more than a game with a funny shaped ball. The country’s mental state was at state.
Hayley Westenra, singing sensation from earthquake stricken Christchurch, sang our national anthem very sweetly, to be followed by our warriors giving the haka their all. The French response was to create an arrow formation and advance to eyeball the Kiwis. Off-putting to say the least! They continued by not making it at all easy to put points on the board, and grey hairs were in the making. Kiwis are fairly modest types and the All Blacks have been known to lose their nerve when put under immense pressure, but finally the full-time whistle blew and we were on top. On top of the world!! The final score was 8 – 7, but who cares if there was only one point in it! The team who had played like champions throughout the competition, and only too happily welcomed so many so warmly while hosting the competition, had pulled it off. The Web Ellis Cup can now be tucked up with a hottie in a Kiwi nest for – at least – the next four years.
It was enough to make any Kiwi more than a bit tearfully homesick, but a trip to Leipzig’s Natural History Museum today helped as I came face to face with a couple of Kakapo (long deceased, but still a fine looking pair of native birds)! Then there was Wairarapa’s Castlepoint that featured in (and inspired – at least the dead whale did) the impressive DOK film ‘Vivan Las Antipodas!’ and thirdly New Zealand documentary film guru Alex Lee who made the trip to LE to talk business at the festival. So, Kiwi connections there are to be found and cherished in Leipzig, even if we are a long way from home.
The pride of all Kiwis