Richard STRAUSS: Elektra: Recordings Introduction and Survey
Opera in 1 Act, 1909
[After the band of the Grenadier Guards had played an Elektra
potpourri] His Majesty does not know what the Band has just played, but
it is never to be played again.
- King George V, quoted in Reid, Thomas Beecham, 1961.
If Richard Strauss' third opera, Salome, established his international reputation the completion of Elektra suggested a composer who was on
the brink of breaking the mould of opera (although this was not to be,
as his next opera Der Rosenkavalier demonstrated). Elektra comprises an immense, dissonant score and one of the most demanding parts ever
written for the female voice, with Elektra never off stage after her
first appearance. It shocks as few operas do, and weaves orchestration
of great complexity with vocal writing of thrilling power. Elektra has
not often been recorded in the studio, undoubted masterpiece that it
is, but we are fortunate to have a number of great recordings taken
from 'live' broadcasts. The aim of this survey is to guide the listener through the recordings that are currently on the market and offer a
final recommendation, or two.
Synopsis. Using a libretto by the Austrian poet, Hugo von Hofmannsthal,
the story of Elektra is based on the play Electra by the Greek
tragedian Sophocles. The opera starts with Klytemnestra's maids washing
away the blood of her murdered husband, Agamemnon, from the palace
walls. Elektra appears and is derided by the maids.
In her first monologue, "Allein! Weh ganz allein", Elektra invokes the
spirit of her father and celebrates the day when his murder will be
avenged. Her sister, Chrysothemis, still living within the palace
walls, informs Elektra that Klytemnestra and her lover, Aegisth, are
planning to immure her in the tower where they hope she will die.
Elektra rejects these words, when noises are heard from within the
palace proclaiming a sacrificial procession. Chrysothemis explains that
their mother has suffered terrible nightmares, and in a move to
exorcise them she plans a bloody sacrifice. At this stage Elektra
determines to confront her mother and lures her out of the palace
walls.
In "Was willst du? Seht doch dort", Klytemnestra pleads with Elektra to
help rid her of the nightmares that are now ravaging her body and mind. Elektra replies enigmatically that the sacrifice must be Klytemnestra
herself if she is to be freed from the nightmares.
Elektra then asks her mother about her brother, Orest. Klytemnestra
lies and tells Elektra that his years in the wilderness have made him
mad, a lie which leads the smoldering bitterness between the two women
to erupt into hatred. Elektra tells her mother that she will be hounded
to death and Klytemnestra retorts that Elektra herself will receive the severest of punishments.
Klytemnestra returns to the palace walls, when Chrysothemis arrives
with news of two strangers who have testified to Orest's death.
Elektra, crushed by this news, decides she will avenge her father's
death herself. Chrysothemis, dismayed by this, flees in terror. Elektra
looks for the axe with which her father was killed and comes upon a
stranger she soon recognises as her brother, Orest! Orest!.
Angered at his duplicity, Elektra refuses his embraces. Orest leaves
her and enters the palace, whereupon she hears the screams of her
mother and later those of Aegisth. Orest is proclaimed by the people as
their savior as the palace walls drip with blood. Chrysothemis invites
her sister to join in the celebrations but Elektra, now scarcely aware
of what is happening, escapes into her own closed world and at the
climax of a joyous dance collapses lifeless to the ground. Chrysothemis appears and calls to Orest but the palace doors remain shut.
The Music. The harmonic structure of Elektra owes a great deal to the
tonal disintegration that started with Wagner (another composer for
whom the leitmotif was an important functioning part of the
infrastructure of an opera). But it is also an opera of contrasts: both theatrical and psychological, dissonant climaxes set against intense
lyricism (Elektra's dance of death played out against the lyricism of
the Recognition Scene between Elektra and Orest). All of this is
achieved by building up huge blocks of sound and establishing tension
between contrasting chords. The chords of B minor and F minor establish
the Elektra theme and the D minor chord that comes to symbolise
Agamemnon is set symmetrically against this. Later, when Orest returns,
set against the chord of A-flat major, the symmetry becomes complete
with the pattern of B-D-F-A-flat now established.
From the opening, brutal triad of Elektra it is clear that Straussintended to explore his musical possibilities to their limit. The
score, compact yet monumental, is one of the most violent in all opera
and is composed of a series of multiple themes, all somehow
interrelated to each other. Its complexity comes down to Strauss'
ability to establish musical connections, at times hundreds of bars
apart, of simple and repeating chord progressions. Such complexity
underlines the drama of the opera and establishes Strauss as the
natural successor to Wagner. It is probably a mistake to view Elektra
as a radical work that might have allowed Strauss to write a truly
atonal masterpiece - as Schoenberg did progressing from Gurrelieder to
Moses and Aaron. Strauss' next work, Der Rosenkavalier, shuffled off
many of the coils of atonal development he might have pursued, and
allowed him to produce probably the most Romantic work of the century.
In a transparent performance of Elektra this development can clearly be
seen.
A Survey of Recordings
Like Verdi's La Traviata, Elektra is an opera that depends, entirely or otherwise, on the merits of the protagonist. Just as Violetta dominates Verdi's great opera, so Elektra carries that of Strauss: she must
encompass a vast range of emotion with a voice that requires her to
reach the depths of despair as well as the heights of ecstasy and histrionicism. For this reason, the best Elektras have often been great Wagnerians (although not exclusively).
The earliest recording of the opera derives from a 1937 concert
performance with Rose Pauly in the role of Elektra. Pauly was the most celebrated Elektra of the 1930s and all subsequent performances rest
somewhat in the shadows of this titanic and electrifying
interpretation.
The voice is pure in the upper staves (important in this opera), and
has marvellous power in reserve for her confrontation with Klytemnestra
(a noble interpretation from Enid Szánthó). Pauly's singing at the
climax of Klytemnestra's murder is unsurpassed on record - it truly
terrifies as no other interpretation has since, and her ecstatic waltz
has real power (as a performance it is unmatched). None of this would
be possible without the other great protagonist in this opera - the conductor. Artur Rodzinsky was a superb Strauss conductor and he leads
the New York Philharmonic through Strauss' complex score with
magnificent aplomb.
There are draw backs to this recording. Firstly, it is incomplete and
heavily cut to allow for a concert performance. Secondly, the sound is
at times very distorted, and at times very crackly, although the voices
sound real and focused. It remains, however, an indispensable recording
and is on Eklipse EKRCD17 at full-price...
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