Proles, Comrades, and Tenors

It seems that famed conductor Lorin Maazel has written an opera based on George Orwell's signature novel 1984.

A new opera is always time to rejoice, especially considering how few are written these days. I have great esteem for singing in general and the operatic medium in particular. You see, I've always thought of singing as a kind of vocal pornography - everything gets revealed. And opera is the hardcore variety. But unlike porn, opera can't be faked.

Anyway, this opera was dogged by controversy completely unrelated to its source material; Maazel was a compositional novice who has never written an opera before, yet he was being given a lavish premiere at the Royl Opera House at Covent Garden in London. The critical buzz was mostly negative, as these excerpts from the latest issue of OperaNews will demonstrate:

[T]he only proof of an operatic pudding is in the eating. It was with considerable interest that the capacity audience assembled to experience this new work, with a debut performance by widely acclaimed Canadian director Robert LePage and a cast including several admired singers.

A good cast is essential, of course. We wouldn't want another Traviata premiere on our hands.

1984 has a libretto by Yale English professor J.D. Mclatchy, working on this occassion in tandem with Tony Award-winning author Thomas Meehan (who also wrote such successful musicals as Annie and The Producers)

Very nice, but remember: prima la musica e poi le parole.

Orwell's political satire describes a future totalitarian state (modeled on Stalin's Soviet Union) set in a reconstituted England, its capital now reffered to as Airstrip One. War is perennial, denunciationas and executions are rife, and the presence of the great leader Big Brother is constant on television screens in every room that allow the authorities to watch what everyone is doing. The hero, Winston Smith, rebels first in thought and then in deed. He has an affair with a fellow dissident, Julia, but they are denounced, and under torture they ebtray each other. Winston ends up by declaring his sincee love for Big Brother.

Gee, thanks. I didn't know OperaNews also doubled as Cliffs Notes for Retards.

It’s a dark story with few contrasting moments, and Maazel’s first problem was to come up with some variety in the mood. He included a couple of numbers, one for Syme, Winston’s fellow-worker in the Ministry of Truth, who sings of the Newspeak, the language of political deception that has replaced English. American tenor Lawrence Brownlee shone in this punchy, cruelly high-lying piece, and won a round of applause. So did high-flying German soprano Diana Damrau, with a similarly flamboyant, off-the-peg coloratura aria for the Gym Instructress who gets the people exercising on her morning TV spot.

People are always fascinated by the difficult; though I'm inclined to think Big Brother would clamp down on such displays of individuality.

Elsewhere there are big choral scenes for the mass party rallies, relentlessly orchestrated. These are the better parts of the score, though their material, couched in a vaguely post-Britten to post-Shostakovich idiom, has none of the distinction or one-heard, never-forgotten quality of its models. The rest are largely solo vocal or dialogue scenes, with some surprisingly ineffective word settings, utterly nondescript in style and completely undistinguished in content. This made for a seriously tedious evening, leavened only by a love duet that might be pinned down as a collaboration between Puccini and Stephen Sondheim, only without their talent (let alone genius). This was one of the dreariest new operas in a while, and there’s quite some competition for that award.

Ouch. But that paragraph is revealing; it shows both Maazel's inability to write music that isn't mired in the past, as well as the critic's inability to conceive of anything new in musical style, forcing him to judge all he hears as compared to other, deader composers.

The cast did everything that could be expected of them. Simon Keelyside (Winston), Nancy Gustafson (Julia), and Richard Margison (O’Brien) engaged as much as possible with Maazel’s cold recreation of the characters, singing big and bold throughout. LePage’s production also did its best, but with such deadly musical material it must’ve been hard to generate what dramatic tension there was. Enthusiasm dissipated throughout the evening. There was the usual world premiere razzmatazz at the close. But there were also a couple of boos for Maazel, unprecedented in my experience for any other composer’s appearance on this venerable stage.

But what of those two arias you mentioned earlier? A single good number is enough to support a composer's reputation for the rest of his life and beyond.

I persoanlly haven't heard a single note of this work, so I can't say whether it's a surprise masterpiece or as bad as they say. Still, I think too much is being asked of poor Signor Maazel; this is, after all, his first opera. Classical music isn't the same as pop music; not every piece has to be a hit for a composer to maintain his reputation. Rossini, after all, wrote 70 operas, Handel at least 50, and Scarlatti over 100. Even Verdi and Wagner needed three operas to hit their stride. Agonizing endlesly over your first opera is a bad idea; best to shut your eyes and get it over with.

Besides, 1984 isn't the most obvious choice for an operatic setting. Orwell was a fantastic writer who was masterful in creating characters and atmosphere, but he had an admitted weakness, which he described as the tendency "[to] take a good story and turn it into journalism or political science." Fitting something like 1984 into the structure of an opera is no mean feat. It would mean extreme truncation of the story, for the ultra-oppressive world of 1984 is not just a distopia; it is a distopia with a purpose, a history, and a philosophy. It would take a certain kind of genuis to turn 'The Theory and Practice of Oligarchical Collectivism' into a singable aria.

This is not to say, of course, that complex political and social protest cannot be articulated through opera; Nabucco and Fidelio should be proof enough for that. Yet the limitations of opera as an art form are of detail, and not of expression. Also, most kinds of theatrical performance require a 'personal' focus of the story, diverting attention onto a one person's thoughts and emotions instead of the universal subject at hand. Even so, the effects of the various forms of music or literature are undeniable in that they are not frozen in the same way that other kinds of art are; the notes and words have a way of entering into people's consciousness in a way that would be impossible using any other artistic genre. It is for these reason that I believe words and music will always stand above visual art forms such as sculpture and painting. A picture is worth a thousand words? Then paint me the Gettysburg Adress.


P.S. Oh, and Bush's speech last night? A tepid pep talk from a mediocre coach. Nothing new; not even a sound bite.

On the Value of Symbols

At some point in the fairly distant past, I recall reading a philosophical parable which impressed me greatly. As best I can remember, it went like this:

The Devil has convened a meeting in Hell of all the lesser demons. He demands that all of them come forward and explain what progress is being made for the corruption of mankind. All his minions talk excitedly of the wars that have been started, the unnatural acts committed, the cruelties, the injustices of man against man. The The Devil finds this all unsatisfactory; this is the same tired routine he's been hearing since the dawn of time. Finally, the last demon stands up and says "My lord, i believe we have failed to dehumanize people because we have focused so much on crimes against God and Nature. We have failed to alienate Man against things."

The Devil is confused. "But in a modern society, Man has more things than ever. Are you suggesting we deprive him of them?"

The demon shakes his head. "No, sir. What I mean is that we should replace his things with a series of abstractions, outlines, and spirituality. Man must see objects as symbols; he must learn to use them for effect. They should never be given value in themselves. And, of course, the door to joy must always be firmly shut."

At that, Satan leaned back and smiled. "Brilliant." He said. "Let the work go foreward."


This little story has stayed with me for some time. Ever since reading it, I've been increasingly aware of the way people latch on to tiny, significance-laden fragments of larger beliefs and enlarge these fragments beyond anything reasonable or healthy.

I don't mean worthles slogans that are repeated over and over again; I mean when a 'slogan' of any type becomes more important in people's minds than what that slogan was originally supposed to embody.

Take the recent House approval of a bill to ban flag-burning. To those who support it, the American flag is supposed to represent the freedom and promise of America. Maybe it does, but in the end it's still only a piece of cloth. To sacrifice our civil liberties for the sake of a cloth is lunacy, no matter what mystical properties you ascribe to it.

In the furor over Mel Gibson's 'The Passion', the line was drawn with liberals protesting anti-Semitism and religious conservatives denying it, while neither side at all understood the concerns of the other. The reason is that, to the film's detractors, the murderous, jeering, vile Jews of the 'The Passion' were just who they appeared to be, and this translated to a certain hostility against Jews today. To Gibson's devotees, nobody in the film was a real person and it didn't matter if what was shown in the movie never happened. It was all symbolic, showing the cruelty suffered by Jesus before his death. Quite possibly that's how it was intended, but it never even occurred to them how anyone could be upset at the sight of hook-nosed Pharisees mingling with the Devil or little curly-haired Jerusalem boys suddenly becoming red-eyed vampires. The disconnect between symbolism and reality was complete.

The examples of this type of thing are endless, whether one uses icons (the cross, the flag), verbal or written mantras (the Ten Commandments), honorifics ('Greetings, Comrade'), pieces of clothing (headscarves) or even political systems ('democracy' or 'communism' as the answer to all ills).

What we end up with is a society where nothing matters in itself. I think we're all poorer for it, and should endeavor as best we can to rid ourselves of attachments to things that cloud our ability to see the country behind the flag, or the meaning behind the chants.

Edit: I remember now that I came across that fable in an essay entitled Enjoying this So-Called Iced Cream: Mr. Burns, Satan, and Happiness. Don't ask.

This Just Made Me Laugh

There are doubtless very few people who be seriously amused by these comics . I'm proud to be one of them.

You're A Better Chairman Than I Am, Howard Dean

In most right-wing forums, DNC chairman Howard Dean is rarely, if ever taken seriously. This isn’t something for Democrats to worry about; when tapping into a major political movement, it is sometimes better to start off as a bit of a joke. Reagan and Clinton certainly did, to name just two.

Still, the flippant dismissal of the strength of Dean’s message rather annoys. The people who are so casual to label Dean a ‘nut’ haven’t spent days, weeks, and months talking to members of the Democratic Party in an effort to determine where they stand. I have, and I can tell you that the core of the party feels furious and betrayed over the endless efforts to compromise towards a ‘center’ that seems much further toward the right than should be possible for anyone calling him or herself a Democrat. This ‘core is bigger than you’d think; I’ve met plenty of people who described themselves as ‘not interested in politics’ who began fuming when asked if the Dems were moving to far to the right. For ten years, we tried to fight the GOP slime machine by seeking solutions to make everyone happy. We should’ve known that the more we offered, they greater the demands.

Now and then, Dean says a number of things that are impolitic, in that they are true, but it would be embarrassing for people to admit it. Take his statement about the GOP being a ‘white, Christian party’. Well, is he wrong? The most stunning development in non-white voting in 2004 – much touted in conservative circles – was that Bush managed to gain a majority of the Hispanic vote in one state, while still losing the Latino vote by 9 points nationally. By ‘Christian’, it can be assumed that dean is referring to hard-line evangelicals, who have more or less total control of the GOP at all levels.

Following his ‘gaffes’, some foolish Democrats (say, Lieberman and Biden) will try and earn points among their Republican buddies by condemning Dean. Silly rabbit, Republicans aren’t going to vote for you. Attacking your own party just makes it weaker.

Of course, Dean isn’t perfect; he recently announced that we ought to ‘stay into Iraq until the job is done’, whenever that is. I wish he hadn’t embraced the spectacularly unpopular and defeatist attitude shared by the White House. But that’s a different story…

V for Victory

WE WON!

Byrne, Bolling Take Lt. Governor's Races

Virginia voters yesterday chose two nominees with strong appeal for core loyalists in their respective parties as candidates for lieutenant governor this November.

State Sen. Bill Bolling (R-Hanover), a veteran state lawmaker and a leader of the legislature's antitax contingent, convincingly defeated a well-funded challenge from Prince William Board of County Supervisors Chairman Sean T. Connaughton to win the Republican Party nomination.

On the Democratic side, former state delegate, senator and U.S. representative Leslie L. Byrne beat back three competitors, including Del. J. Chapman Petersen of Fairfax, for her party's nomination. Byrne, 58, has long been known for her outspoken style in support of abortion rights and gay rights, as well as expanded health care and the environment. Yesterday's win represented the first step of a political comeback for Byrne, who lost her state Senate seat in 2002 when district lines were redrawn.

"We put together a grass-roots effort, and it paid off," Byrne said. "We won in places like Staunton, in places like Winchester, not just in Northern Virginia."

Byrne had perhaps the best name recognition in her party from more than two decades in politics. Voters at several polls said they felt comfortable with her long record.

"I know her -- she's a woman and she's been good for Fairfax," said county resident Elyse Galik, 51.

I knew all those hours stuffing envelopes, scanning data, and making phone calls - hundreds, thousands of phone calls - would pay off. The margin isn't as wide as I would like, but in a four-way competitive race you can't expect too much. Especially when turnout was as abysmal - 8 percent, by some counts - as it was.

The victory party was held at an Italian restaurant which served us all the bruschetta and priscuitto we could ask for, with a big dry-erase board on one wall to tally up the vote returns as they came in. Leslie was in the lead from the very beggining, and never fell less than six points ahead.

When it became clear that victory was imminent, attorney general candidate Creigh Deeds and gubernatorial candidate Tim Kaine showed up to offer their congratulations. Deeds is a personable guy who greeted me by name (we had met before at the Memorial Day parade) while Kaine simply shook hands and made what I assume is the standard what-a-great-team-we're-gonna-move-(this state)-forward speech. Leslie then got up and began to thank all of her supporters who were crowding the room, but quickly had to retire lest she start crying. It was an illuminating moment.

Now, on to the general. It'll be a battle of polar opposites - or, at least, as far apart as two mainstream American politicians can get. But that's the primary system for you, even though Virginia has an open primary.

Unfortunately, I won't be involved with the campaign anymore - they're moving the office to Mclean, Virginia, and I have no way of getting there. Ah, well, it's nice to be part, and I wish her all the bets in November.