Berg: Lulu Blu-ray Review
This Lulu is a doozy.
Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman, April 9, 2012
Gross overgeneralization alert: musicologists and historians will probably take exception to the following paragraph, but
bear with me for a moment. What purpose has music served throughout its inestimable history? From the furthest
reaches of human memory, music has probably been married to ritual, whether that meant the rhythmic drumbeats of
ancient cavemen or more formulaic utilization in ancient Greece and Rome. Somewhere along the way, the sheer
hedonistic pleasure that music gives gave birth to the idea of music as entertainment, though there was often still a
ritualistic element even in many of these "entertaining" outings, as in music written for coronations or religious festivities.
But when the Romantic Era pushed hedonism to what was heretofore unexpected excesses of expression, a decidedly
odd thing happened. The decline of traditional tonality seemed to cry out for
some kind of structure, something to
pin a composition on, and the leading thinkers of the early twentieth century went back to the musical drawing board,
"inventing" serial composition. Some would argue that this reduced the Art of Music to a mere Intellectual Exercise, and in
less than graceful hands, that's exactly what a lot of twelve tone opuses end up sounding like. What's so bracing about
so much of Alban Berg's efforts in this seemingly extremely restrictive compositional landscape is how outrageously
emotional so much of his music actually is. There's probably no greater example than
Lulu, a piece that
was left incomplete when Berg died in 1935, but which was somewhat finessed posthumously and premiered in a two act
(unfinished) form in Zurich in 1937.
Lulu is a difficult, astringent and sarcastic piece that is purposefully antagonistic toward its potential audience,
perhaps one of the reasons there has thus far been only one other Blu-ray release of a performance (reviewed
here). And yet
Lulu is in many
ways one of the most immediately accessible pieces in the entire tortured history of dodecaphony. Berg's music
reaches
into the depths of the soul, eschewing the purely structural elements of "row" compositional techniques to deliver a
bristlingly visceral experience. Classic film lovers may be surprised to find out they're already somewhat acquainted
with
the basic plot of
Lulu, for Berg adapted two plays of Franz Wedekind, the same works that entered the lexicon
of
classic cinema with the famous Georg Wilhelm Pabst film adaptation of them,
Pandora's Box, starring Louise
Brooks. (Berg, like Pabst, utilized not just Wedekind's own
Pandora's Box but also
another Wedekind piece,
Earth Spirit, for part of his libretto. Trivia lovers might already know that yet another
Wedekind piece provided grist for the mill of the Broadway smash
Spring Awakening).
It was only after the death of Berg's widow Helene in 1976 that
Lulu was finally finished into what has become
its newly traditionally staged three act form. This riveting Salzburg Festival production begins with The Animal Trainer
(Thomas Johannnes Meyer) appearing before a carnival striped curtain, perfectly
a propos since the Trainer acts
like a Barker urging the audience to witness some freaks of nature. (The Animal Trainer seems in his own way to be a
precursor to the similarly bizarre Emcee of Kander and Ebb's
Cabaret, a musical which seems to capture some of
the same German Expressionist spirit that
Lulu does.) We then are into the opera proper and one of this
production's most notable achievements, absolutely stunning painted backdrops by German artist Daniel Richter.
Lulu (Patricia Petibon) is introduced as a snake taken human form, and indeed
Lulu spends the next several
hours playing out the woman's venomous attacks (intentional or otherwise) on several hapless males, until Lulu herself
becomes prey rather than predator. Lulu is perhaps better seen as a chimera, a changeling who becomes any number
of different women in the eyes of her various paramours, as evidenced by the many different names they call her
throughout the opera. This production highlights the fact that Lulu
wants to be all these different women—it's a
"talent" that in fact grants her the incredible power she wields over the starstruck men, even if it means their demise.
This performance is perhaps more lascivious than the Royal Opera House production, and it's rather notable that while
the British production was a study in black, this Salzburg outing is a study in white. The cast here is largely fantastic,
with Petibon both alluring and frightening in equal measure. Michael Volle portrays Dr. Schon, Pavel Breslik is The
Painter, Thomas Piffka is Alwa and Tanja Ariane Baumgartner plays Countess Geschwitz. Volle is actually kind of
terrifying in his depiction, while Breslik is an unusual casting choice for this role. The Vienna Philharmonic brings
incredible luster to the orchestral performance under the baton of Marc Albrecht. Director Vera Nemirova, who has
flirted more than a bit with a Eurotrash
ethos in her career, here is rather remarkably restrained, especially
given the hyperbolic ambience of
Lulu, an opera that fairly screams "Eurotrash" by its very existence. While not
quite as minimalist as the Royal Opera House production, this outing also puts the focus squarely on the characters and
the music rather than any outrageous stagecraft or revisionism. That may not make this
Lulu any easier to
absorb, but it certainly adds to its palpable impact.
Berg: Lulu Blu-ray, Overall Score and Recommendation
Lulu is one of the most bracing pieces in all of operatic repertoire, and it features one of the most enigmatic, riveting
"heroines" in all of Art. Lulu is a decidedly complex character, and too often productions seem opaque and unfocused
because Lulu's machinations never seem to make much sense. There's a very thin line that needs to be toed in any
production of this opera, as the music is so declamatory and the characters so hyperbolic that the whole thing can seem like
a cartoon, something also made dangerous by Berg's rather trenchant sense of humor which filters through the opera. The
good news is this Salzburg Festival production gets just about everything right. From a production design standpoint, this
production is a true standout, with some incredibly beautiful and evocative paintings by Daniel Richter helping to
appropriately set the mood. And stage director Vera Nemirova doesn't ever push things
too far, instead letting the
instrinsic power of the piece speak for itself rather than beating the audience over the head with any directorial additions.
The cast here is largely wonderful, with Petibon a real standout in the title role, matched by some very visceral work by her
cast mates, especially Volle and Breslik.
Lulu is certainly not going to be everyone's cup of tea, but for those who
want to experience one of the most iconic pieces of 20th century opera, this production is certainly a great place to start.
The video quality here is great, and while the lack of a lossless surround track is puzzling, at least the uncompressed LPCM
2.0 track sounds very good. Future releases should really have some sort of supplementary material, though, even if that's
only an insert booklet with explanatory essays.
Recommended.
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