Notes for L'ORFEO favola in musica (English) / Concert Hall ATM

Notes for the Monteverdi's L'ORFEO favola in musica

"Ahi caso acerbo" by Stephen Langridge

As I write these notes the lives of thousands of New Yorkers have been shattered by ab unforeseen catastrophe: ordinary people going about their daily lives. Tragedy is not the preserve of high-born ancients; nobility in grief is not an operatic stylization. If we needed reminding of this before September 11th, we know it now. There could not be a more poignant time to perform Monteverdi's Orfeo -- an opera about how one man and his community struggle to make sense of their lives in the wake sudden tragedy.

When Richard Boothby asked me to direct Orfeo for Purcell Quartet he told me that there would be no conductor, and that the musicians were keen to be involved in the stage action rather than put down in an orchestral pit. This seemed to me a wonderful idea, after all Orfeo is an ensemble opera: it relies not only on star performers, but also on group sensitivity in the madrigal-like choruses, and the intimacy and flexibility of singer and player in the recitatives.

The myth of Orpheus reflects the practice in pre-Hellenic matriarchal societies of Talking a representative Sun King, who was sacrificed at the end of the year, his blood spread on the earth to ensure a fruitful harvest. Orpheus, son of Apollo, is torn apart by Maenads, female followers of Dionysus. In the first version of Monteverdi's Orfeo the hero also suffered this fate. We have the libretto of this earlier version, but no music except for the final dance - traces of a violent end. Together with the religious, ceremonial flavour of much of the music of Orfeo, this has led me to the view that the piece is both a sacred mystery enacted and, at the same time, a story told/acted-out.

Our aim in this production has been to create a rural community where Gods, myths and rituals are closely bound to everyday life, but which is recognizably modern. I wanted to update the production so that the structure of the piece appeared to be the form necessary to contain the emotions of the characters, rather than as a historical style into which a story is poured. (Monteverdi was, after all, inventing opera not following a set pattern.) Our references have been drawn from geographically disparate sources: from Greek, Mexican and Spanish festivals, to the everyday lives and rites of European Gypsies', and people in the shattered landscapes of the war-torn Balkans trying to rebuild their lives (throughout Act One the chorus refers to bad times from which believe they are emerging - "E lunge omai disgombre/ Degli affanni e del duol gli orrori e l'ombre").

The villagers (played by singers, dancers, and musicians) gather to retell and relive the story of Orfeo and Euridice: a sacrificial ceremony; a ritual of love and loss; one man's grief enacted as a myth. We see the Plutone, La Musica, Orfeo etc, but we also see the human playing the role, at once representing the character, and possessed by its spirit.

"ORFEO Movement" by Ian Spink

One of the challenges of working on Orfeo lies in having to confront the landscape of grief which ebbs up from the core of the opera. The virtuoso music expresses this perfectly, yet making the narrative physical on stage it is another matter. Public expressions of grief are perhaps, for us in the UK, a territory we would rather tend to avoid.

The people in Orfeo's world have an active relationship with the earth and its spirits, responding to the seasons with their feelings. With their imaginations they create simple rituals which protect and bind them to earthly and mysterious forces.

We have tried to create for this world a movement-language which contains the tiny details of humans caught up in moments of celebration, joy, grief and suffering. The rituals which they create are part of their everyday lives, expressed with a strong sense of community.

Towards the beginning of the opera, separation between male and female is an important theme, with Orfeo and Euridice representing a joyous coming together of the sexes. The ancient circle, fertility dances and a snake motif appear when the sense of community and confidence are at their height.

Later, as tragedy strikes, we see a new, starker language of groupings. Orfeo, the messenger bringing news of Euridice's death and the chorus, become isolated figures in the tragedy. The community has come together as a single figure, a Greek chorus.

Orfeo's journey to regain Euridice presents yet another aspect of the human condition. Bodies float in their individual worlds of memory, unable to make contact with each other or the normal world. At Orfeo's ill-fated return to the world of the living we regain the element of a community enacting a story with simple images. The cycle is complete yet Orfeo has moved on to a higher level. We have come back to the beginning. A new beginning.

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