Reimann - Lear (Berlin, 2026)

Aribert Reimann - Lear

Komische Oper Berlin, 2026

Nicholas Carter, Bar­rie Kos­ky, Scott Hendricks, Di­mi­try Iva­shchen­ko, Phi­lipp Mei­er­hö­fer, Jo­han­nes Dunz, Ivan Tur­šić, Gün­ter Pa­pen­dell, Ar­yeh Nuss­baum­ Co­hen, Brenton Ryan, Ro­sie Al­dri­dge, Ni­cole Che­va­lier, Pen­ny So­fro­nia­dou, Dag­mar Man­zel, Simon Wallfisch

Flughafen Templehof, Hangar 4 - 18th September 2026

Where else but in Germany and Berlin would you get to see two operas of such great extremes from one night to the next? This week at the Komische Oper you can see the full horror of madness, violence and the destruction of any basic human values in Aribert Reimann's Lear one night and the next evening at the Deutsche Oper experience the delirious eccentricities of Stockhausen's Mittwoch aus Licht that includes a flying Helicopter String Quartet and makes the case for music uniting the cosmos in peace, love and understanding. I think this is what you would call #Operamaxxing if opera ever were to become a modern trend, which is highly unlikely. Anyway I think Wagner did it 150 years ago, long before social media, when he created the Bayreuth Festival.

A new production of Aribert Reimann’s opera adaptation of Shakespeare's 'King Lear' in Berlin was always going to be an exceptional event but you couldn't help having a few minor misgivings in advance about some of the choices made for the staging. Those would definitely be minor misgivings though as, no matter what, Lear is one of the greatest operas ever written, or at least based on one of the greatest plays ever written and certainly one of the greatest adaptations of Shakespeare in opera. I'm prepared to stand over that first statement about it being one of the greatest operas ever written though, certainly based on how it eventually played out here in Barrie Kosky's new production for the Komische Oper. This turned out to be one of the most remarkable events I have ever experienced.

There was however initially just a flicker of doubt beforehand about whether Scott Hendricks would be able to carry off a major role like this. Hendricks has been variable in my experience: I don't think he is suited for the specific requirements and challenges of a Verdi or a Puccini baritone, but I have seen him give an exceptional performances in Prokofiev's The Fiery Angel, and more recently as Alberich in the Das Rheingold of Romeo Castellucci's aborted Ring Cycle at La Monnaie in Brussels. His committed performance there suggested that he could certainly give Reimann a go, even if you couldn't quite envision how it would pan out since Reimann really is a challenge on a whole other level. 

The other minor concern - or maybe rather call it an unknown - was the choice of the Komische Oper to stage the work in Hangar 4 of the now disused Templehof airport. Certainly the first of impression entering the venue was that it was going to be hard to fill that vast stage. Not so much a concern with the music filling the cavernous hall, it being more of a necessity as Lear has an orchestral volume level that few can match, not least with a whole battery of drummers and percussionists at the opposite end of the stage from the orchestra. 'Blow wind, blow' was certainly always going to blow you away.

Also not ideal was recognition that the singers would all be wearing microphones to effectively project to the audience in the round but in practice, with the volume this needs to be sung at, you could hear most of the performers acoustically - at least from where I was sitting - and be able to locate their voice directionally. Either that or someone (that would be Holger Schwark) was doing an incredible job on the sound design. One thing I had no concerns about whatsoever, aside from the unquestionable quality of the work itself, was the direction of Barrie Kosky. This I believe was the first time out of his many productions that I have seen where I have actually been present at the live performance. His recent work in particular has been outstanding (Die Frau ohne Schatten) and there a good reason why he was chief director at the Komische for ten years and clearly still has a good relationship with the Berlin opera house.

With Kosky at the helm, any minor misgivings soon came to nothing once the performance, the drama, the music and the extraordinary stage production pulled you in for a two hour and twenty minutes performance with no interval and no respite. And it didn't take long to reach a point of total immersion in the drama partly because Shakespeare's introduction of the characters is so immediate and partly since Reimann focussed concentration of the work retains the full essence of the power of that opening scene between Lear and his three daughters (and across the whole opera, it has to be said) in as full an adherence to Shakespeare's words in intent and translation as it's possible to achieve. Scott Hendricks rose to the challenges, impressing immediately, his interpretation superb and committed. He was helped somewhat by the fact that the role is mostly Sprechtgesang, but that's not to say that it doesn't still have considerable challenges.

Considerable challenges for everyone, in fact. It soon became obvious to me - although having seen and reviewed two different previous productions of the work (Munich, 2021 and Hamburg, 2014) I already knew this - that Reimann's vocal writing for this work is one of the most impressive in all opera. Bel canto it is not, Wagnerian not so much either, but perhaps the difference is that it's one where the voice is used to its fullest expression across every single role, across every single note in the opera. Every voice approaches a controlled scream, as if on the edge of hysteria and madness, but it's also completely musical within the range that the composer pitches it. The orchestra is similarly charged and pitched, expressive but filling in all those nuances that might otherwise be lost in the condensing of the work, instead only making it even more dark and disturbing.

Dark and disturbing. I wish I had the ability or space to analyse just what Shakespeare achieves here in 'King Lear', but it's not really pertinent to the opera. In opera performance - modernised here only in so far as contemporary formal costumes and suits for businessmen/royalty and modern combat gear and guns for the troops - it's about how much the work can connect to the world we see around us, a work that speaks of the kind of people in power where madmen lead the blind. It's all there in Shakespeare and a director has all they need there without having to add a great deal more. Reimann himself had experience of a madman leading the blind. It's said that the thunderous noise that the percussionists and orchestra make during the 'Blow wind, blow' storm scene that sounds like the end of the world was inspired by the composer's memory of the air raid bombing and destruction of Berlin at the end of the war. It really does sound like it.

Barrie Kosky doesn't have the luxury of a lot of props and sets in this venue where the performance is essentially in the round, but he has a stage, he has brilliant singers and, as if they don't have enough to contend with, he makes sure they cover every inch of the vast platform with constant movement. Brenton Ryan as Edmund relishes the wide space, casting his arrogantly evil 'who's-going-to-take-me-on’ challenge to the audience as he strides from end to end, from corner to corner, but the same applies to everyone in the cast. It's not just choreography to make sure that they reach everyone in the round - which is essential nonetheless - but it applies to the pace of the opera, to the intensity of their mad designs and their headlong rush into self-destruction.

Minimalist through necessity, this was not however anything like a static performance, and if the venue ensured that this couldn't be a traditional proscenium arch, park-and-bark opera performance, it's all the better for it. A raised platform sweeping across the stage is well used for declamation, for running lengths, for Lear's men to gather around and carouse. Blocks of tiles are lifted from the stage to create holes, pits and graves, there is superb use of spot lighting, smoke fills the stage at the scene of utter madness - madder than any mad scene in bel canto - and there are thunderous thuds of the boots of troops piling onto the stage as the whole play and opera collapses under the weight of its characters violent excesses, or under Reimann's merciless score maybe. It's an incredible performance of an incredible work of opera, viscerally experienced in an overpowering account conducted by Nicholas Carter in this unusual but suitable venue.

I'm not sure there is any value in enumerating and listing the qualities of each of the performers individually. Every one of them, without exception, gave an impressive performance. Goneril (Ro­sie Al­dri­dge), Regan (Ni­cole Che­va­lier, who has also sung Reimann's Medea at the Komische) and Cordelia (Pen­ny So­fro­nia­dou) are a formidable trio as Lear's daughters, a force unlike any other in opera. Scott Hendricks was authoritative as their father, unquestionably putting in the best performance I've ever seen from him, this opera (and Kosky's direction I would say) undoubtedly bringing the best out of him. 

Since I've started then, the other family trio of Gloucester, Edgar and Edmund are less elaborated upon than in Shakespeare, but this subplot remains an important element that spawns even greater acts of atrocity. All the performances were notable for making this count, with Gün­ter Pa­pen­dell as Gloucester; the extraordinary Ar­yeh Nuss­baum­ Co­hen's Edgar challenging the patriarchal order in his queered transformation as Poor Tom; and Brenton Ryan as Edmund bringing full dramatic force that pushes the work to greater levels of horror and inhumanity, resulting in Regan chewing and spitting out Gloucester's eyeball. Chevalier's Regan was already showing twitchy signs of madness in first scene, and it's clear that power only intensifies it, which is indeed part of the premise of the play. Maybe not chewing eyeballs, but we have all heard of similar abuses and worse atrocities taking place in the modern world. This Lear offers us no comfortable assurances - and I can't say Stockhausen's vision of the communion of those opposing forces of good and evil made a convincing counter-argument the following evening in Berlin.

External links: Komische Oper

Debussy - Pelléas et Mélisande (Berlin, 2017)

Claude Debussy - Pelléas et Mélisande

Komische Oper, 2017

Jordan de Souza, Barrie Kosky, Jens Larsen, Nadine Weissmann, Dominik Köninger, Günter Papendell, Nadja Mchantaf

OperaVision - 15 October 2017

Proving that he has more than one trick up his sleeve, Barrie Kosky's production of Pelléas et Mélisande for the Komische Oper in Berlin glides along in a minimalist design production on a reduced stage with practically no props at all. Recognising that Pelléas et Mélisande tends to respond better to minimal intervention, Kosky is able even to remove all the familiar symbolism from the work and anything to do with nature, other than perhaps the most important aspect of it as far as this opera is concerned - human nature. But it's not all take, and Kosky has other ways of giving something else to the work that does succeed in bringing out its essential characteristics.

Primarily however, as far as I'm concerned, there's nothing anyone can do that can bring anything more to Pelléas et Mélisande than Debussy's music, and the real success of this production lies in the ravishing performance that Jordan de Souza, the new Kapellmeister of the Komische Oper Berlin, brings out of the house orchestra. The shimmering beauty and flow of the work is all there, but that suggests hazy impressionism and actually there is beautiful clarity and detail brought out of individual instruments and groups of instruments here, as well as a fully expressed dynamic - particularly to the instrumental interludes - that occasionally made it feel like you were hearing passages for the first time.

Listening to the conductor talk about his approach to the work in the interval feature, it's clear that he has a profound understanding of the workings and merit of Debussy's score, but I think it also comes out that there is a strong collaboration with Barrie Kosky that ensures that there is a strong connection between the orchestra pit and what takes place on the stage. Kosky is able to reflect the dynamic in the musical performance on the stage, and the means by which he achieves that - within the context of a minimal set design - is very interesting indeed.

Kosky cites Edgar Allan Poe's blend of horror and eroticism as a reference for Pelléas et Mélisande and it's an unusual but valid comparison. Rather than head in the direction of gothic melodrama however, Kosky takes a much less obvious route to express those characteristics. The set throughout is nothing more than a recessed set of framing borders that reduce the stage down into a claustrophobic cave. The oppressiveness of the set becomes more apparent later in the work when there are more characters all crammed together at the back of the stage, where a revolving panel brings characters onto and off the stage.

Elsewhere, the characters enter and leave by gliding around on the revolving sections of the stage. They never seem to walk on or walk off, but once on the stage are able to move around a little more freely, except when they can't; which amounts to the kind of volition they have and control over their actions and lives at any given time. In terms of movement and position, everything is relational to the geometric patterns of the stage, and within that human nature in Pelléas et Mélisande is something of a chaotic element, even as it flows gracefully in time with Debussy's score.

It's in such subtle contrasts that Kosky seeks to bring out the gothic horror of Pelléas et Mélisande, but it's not entirely hands-off, and there are subtle shifts of emphasis that are applied. Some feel random and designed to do nothing more than jar with your impressions and preconceptions (such as Mélisande swallowing her ring rather than drop it into the Blind Man's Well); others however are perfectly acceptable interpretations of the suggestive and ambiguous undercurrents that lie within the work and which exert such fascination. Sometimes Kosky works with the moods and other times against them, just to see how the opera responds, and it does prove to be extraordinarily responsive to the slightest of touches and shading. Pelléas et Mélisande is that kind of work.

Despite conventional psychological exploration being largely replaced by suggestion and symbolism, there is actually a great deal of leeway in how these enigmatic characters can be interpreted and in how they interact. While it's often possible for Golaud to be the central figure of the work and even a sympathetic character, Kosky directs Günter Papendell towards a more aggressive Golaud in this production. He manhandles Mélisande quite brutally and kicks her when she is pregnant, soon after Arkel is seen creepily pawing over her. The suggestion is that Mélisande later miscarries in a bloody manner that is far from the quiet deathbed conclusion you usually find in this opera.

Golaud and Arkel's behaviour is contrasted with a Pelléas and Mélisande who play up to nature of their childlike games ('jeux d'enfants'), or at least initially. Whether that develops into something more erotically charged or whether that is a projection of Golaud's fevered mind is always an ambiguous matter, and it remains so here even as it is vividly depicted. The singing performances are outstanding, distinct and expressive, with a similar clarity and precision that can be found in the orchestration. When you hear the voices and music performed in this way, the miraculous unique quality of Debussy's approach to opera is all the more evident and impressive.

Links: Komische Oper, OperaVision

Reimann - Medea (Berlin, 2017)

Aribert Reimann - Medea

Komische Oper, Berlin - 2017

Steven Sloane, Benedict Andrews, Nicole Chevalier, Anna Bernacka, Nadine Weissmann, Ivan Turšić, Günter Papendell, Eric Jurenas

Opera Platform - 21 May 2017

Revived for this new production at the Komische Oper in Berlin, Aribert Reimann's Medea still sounds as wildly demented as it did when it received its world premiere in Vienna in 2010. Its harsh dissonance hasn't become any easier to listen to over the last seven years, but the purpose of the composer's choice of this particular classical Greek myth has certainly become clearer in how it reflects certain vital aspects of our modern society and how people behave when pushed to their limits.

For good reason then, Reimann's work is one that pushes well beyond the boundaries of tonality. It opens quietly, but it doesn't stay that way for long, building into a tumultuous cacophony that reflects Medea's utter desperation and anger by the end of Act I. The second half of Medea sounds like something has been broken, the music limping along with occasional blasts of brass and squealing strings, the voice of Medea straining to hold herself together, struggling between anger and supplication, between love and the desire for revenge.

It's not easy listening, but then it's not easy watching someone's life collapse in front of you. Medea's life might just fall apart within the framework of a Greek myth or an opera, but the challenge is to make this feel real, relevant and important in the world today. Somehow though, even though the musical force of the work made a striking impression on its own terms, it was hard to see how it could be applied to real life when it received its premiere in 2010. The composer, if I recall, made some remarks about Jason's social climbing ambitions and about the work being about wanting to make a better life for yourself, but it hardly seemed like a matter of pressing social relevance.

In 2017 however that has changed completely and, regardless of what Reimann's intentions might have been and whether or not there was an element of Delphic prophesy in his vision, the refugee crisis and its handling by our governments in the years in-between throws a different light on the work. The fear and mistrust of foreign ways that has been generated and the growing danger of terrorism surely couldn't be more obvious and relevant to the German public at the Komische Opera in Berlin, or indeed to any European or American audience. Whether prophetic or not, it's the undoubted acuity of Reimann's adaptation of Franz Grillparzer's version of the Euripides' tragedy and the intense musical accompaniment that underlines the human nature of Medea's dilemma and treatment with a terrible degree of truth and conviction.

Medea and Jason are indeed refugees, fleeing their homeland of Colchis, bringing fear and suspicion along with them to Corinth. Creon is already wary, having heard of Medea's reputation as a practitioner of the dark arts. When a messenger from the Amphictyonic League appears and adds further fuel to the fire by describing how Medea used spells and potions to murder King Pelias, he is painting her as a terrorist and warning that it would be unwise to let these refugees into the country. With a difficult choice to make, since Jason and Medea have children, Creon agrees to give Jason shelter, but banishes Medea and offers his daughter Creusa as a new mother for them.

Well, we've also seen the fate of the children of refugees caught up in the political disputes and war-mongering of governments, and with that in mind it's hard not to feel on an intensely visceral level Medea's desperation and how this leads to the death of her children. Reimann's Medea is not a political statement or overtly anti-war treatment of the Greek tragedy, but as someone who lived through the allied destruction of Germany during the Second World War (and who has summoned up the forces of Armageddon in his scoring for his opera Lear), the composer unquestionably characterises the nature of an individual human being - and specifically a mother - caught up in such a terrible event.

It's a deeply troubled interiorised world that Reimann scores, one that evidently bears some comparison with how Strauss psychologically probed Elektra in that Greek tragedy, but evidently Reimann takes the atonal dissonance even further. There is scarcely a note in Medea that isn't mangled or pitched at a level that assaults the ears of the audience; there's no flow or melody, just a fractured structure that makes Medea seem like she is in the middle of a nightmare, an edgy sense of her trying to hold it together and lashing out in explosive outbursts, the music clashing with singing that rises towards a scream.

Benedict Andrews's direction and the production design for the Komische Medea adopt a similar reflection of devastation of mood and mindset that could be seen in the rocky cratered landscapes of Marco Arturo Marelli's Vienna premiere production. If anything - and it may be very much to do with sudden realisation of real-world context - this production seems to strike an even darker tone. There is at least greater emphasis placed upon measuring the weight of the words of the libretto and their meaning. In the black ash of the landscape, Medea literally tries to bury her past, her potions, her memories, even the Golden Fleece. When the future seems to hold nothing for her, she eventually buries that as well, with devastating consequences.

There is no question that Reimann's score delivers every ounce of impact that is implicit in Medea's actions, and Steven Sloane's conducting of the Komische orchestra brings that out forcefully. It also has to be brought out in the intensely demanding vocal score that Reimann has composed for the role of Medea, and that is fully undertaken by Nicole Chevalier, who gives a fearsome performance that matches the singing challenges, and at the same time achieves some measure of sympathy for her predicament. There are excellent performances elsewhere that manage to rise beyond the individual and the mythological to a more universal application of the themes. Ivan Turšić's Creon embodies the difficult position of applying the rule of law, while Günter Papendell's Jason and Anna Bernacka's Creusa try to adopt a caring but practical approach to the problem that they face. None of it however will be enough to appease the rage of the abused and mistreated Medea or prevent the disaster that is about to be unleashed.

Links: Komische Oper, Opera Platform

Mussorgsky - Sorochintsy Fair (Berlin, 2017)

Modest Mussorgsky - Sorochintsy Fair

Komische Oper, Berlin - 2017

Henrik Nánási, Barrie Kosky, Jens Larsen, Agnes Zwierko, Mirka Wagner, Alexander Lewis, Ivan Turšić, Tom Erik Lie, Hans Gröning, Carsten Sabrowski

Opera Platform - March 2017

Who knew that Mussorgsky composed and left unfinished another opera in between the unfinished masterpieces of Boris Godunov and Khovanshchina? I didn't anyway, so all credit to Barrie Kosky and the Komische Oper in Berlin for uncovering this little known and almost never performed work by one of Russia's greatest composers. The question however is whether there might be a reason for Sorochintsy Fair being relatively unknown. Is it any good?

Happily, the answer is a resounding yes, and what a pleasant treat this surprise opera turns out to be. Then again it's hard to imagine any Mussorgsky lyrical piece not being worthy of performance other than for sake of its incompleteness, and that indeed is yet again the case with Sorochintsy Fair, the opera being completed after the composers death by Vissarion Shebalin. Sorochintsy Fair is not a grand epic masterpiece like Boris Godunov or Khovanshchina, but it has one essential quality that all Mussorgsky's work has: it's essentially Russian.

It could hardly be anything but essentially Russian, but based on a story by Nikolai Gogol (the same source as Tchaikovsky's similarly themed Cherevichki), Sorochintsy Fair has a more down-to-earth, common people quality elevated to a mythical or surreal folk-legend status that demonstrates colourful and lyrical qualities that we don't often see in Mussorgsky. And another side and feature of the Russian character that we would not expect from a composer more associated with historical epics; a devilish sense of humour.

Sorochintsy Fair demonstrates brilliantly where Gogol's macabre folk tales of grotesque characters and surreal situations often find their origin: in drink. All good intentions for selling his wheat and the mare go out of the window when merchant Cherevik has a few drinks at the market in Sorochintsy with his friend Chumak. Clearly he has been laid astray by the devil while celebrating his acceptance of a proposal by a young peasant lad, Gritsko, to marry his daughter Parasya.

Cherevik's wife Khivyra however, quickly hiding her lover away inside a large pig she is cooking, is less than pleased by the developments. She has ideas of a better match for her daughter than the son of a peasant and gives her foolish husband, who comes back home roaring drunk, no small amount of abuse for failing to sell their produce. With the wheat unsold, how are they supposed to pay for a wedding?

You can see how the ghost stories of supernatural events arise from explaining all those bumps in the night. The husband staggering in drunk, the wife hiding the lover in a wardrobe (or pig) have to be explained somehow, and clearly it's all the work of the devil. Parasya and Gritsko however realise that they can make this work to their advantage also, Gritsko making a deal to sell oxen to the gypsy at an advantageous rate if he plays up the legend of the Red Overcoat at the Sorochintsy fair.

Mussorgsky illustrates all these colourful situations of bedroom farce, marital discord, slapstick falling around drunkenness and innocent romance with the most glorious musical compositions. He also captures the colour of the fair in the opening sequence with the most wonderful choral songs. Demonstrating that the Russian idiom can be effectively played by non-Russians, the musical performance under Henrik Nánási is richly colourful, and who better to illustrate these kind of colourful situations than director Barrie Kosky.

I'm sure that the Intendant and chief artistic director at the Komische Oper has already overspent their budget with a host of extravagant productions this year. This one is a little more pared down but it still moves brightly along, keeping the limited dramatic situations engaging and fun.  And that suits the nature of the work, where the pleasures are simple ones and where there is time for both reflection and irreverence. Sorochintsy Fair is a work that in many ways carries its own spectacle, with Gritsko's dream of the 'Sagana' devil's feast. It's a choral extravaganza that couldn't be anything but a show-stopper, and indeed it works terrifically here with demonic figures in red coats and pig heads tormenting the young lovers.

The Komische's ambition is also well served by a wonderful cast who demonstrate that roles of such deeply Russian character can also be sung well by a wide mix of international talent. The singing and acting performances are just outstanding, fully in the spirit of Gogol, Mussorgsky and Kosky. Jens Larsen's Cherevik's has a thoroughly Russian deep bass clarity and resonance; Agnes Zwierko entertains with a well-sung comic performance as Khivyra; Mirka Wagner and Alexander Lewis as the young couple Gritsko and Parasya offer a lighter lyrical delivery that adds complementary vocal textures to the more strident choruses and comic declamation.

Links: Komische Oper, Opera Platform

Tchaikovsky - Eugene Onegin (Komische Berlin, 2016 - Webcast)

Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky - Eugene Onegin

Komische Oper Berlin, 2016

Henrik Nánási, Barrie Kosky, Günter Papendell, Asmik Grigorian, Karolina Gumos, Aleš Briscein, Christiane Oertel, Alexey Antonov, Margarita Nekrasova, Yakov Strizhak, Christoph Späth

Opera Platform - 31 January 2016

Looked at it dispassionately the plot of Eugene Onegin is a slight one, but Tchaikovsky's beautiful opera is by no means a work to view dispassionately. Musically and lyrically its themes are much deeper and resonant and it's much more than a story of unrequited love, which is a commonplace episode that typically plays a small part in many of the great works of Russian literature (as does the obligatory duel scene). Even if Eugene Onegin holds this as the emotional core of the work, with the clever structural twist of the role of the unrequited lover being reversed later in the work and the whole thing even revolving around a duel centrepiece, the themes of the opera can be seen in a broader view to be just as much about time and perspective.

That also sounds like a rather 'dispassionate' way to view one of the most beautiful and lyrical works in Russian music and literature, and of course, its brilliance lies in Tchaikovsky's own very personal and sensitive response to the themes Pushkin explores in the work. Eugene Onegin is not as straightforward then as being a work about the innocence of youth that becomes older and wiser through experience, it's more about how time itself can transform feelings. Those feelings and the shared experience of Tatyana and Onegin during the time of their meeting on the Larin country estate and the tragic transform over time in unexpected ways, but at the heart there is a strong ring of truth to them.

The transformation that takes place in the intervening years is by no means a straightforward progression, and it would be a mistake to tie Eugene Onegin down to direct cause and effect. Tchaikovsky weaves many other elements and colourful scenes that are seemingly there to enliven the otherwise melancholic tone of torment and regret that dominates, as well as help fill out the thin plot of the opera, but all of them contribute to the greater themes of the work. Various aspects and thematic connections can be drawn out just as much from Lensky and Olga, as well as nurse Filippyevna's account of her arranged marriage at the age of thirteen that deepened into something warm and loving over time.

The place of men and women in society, the pressures to conform to social expectations as well as romantic ideals; all of these issues contribute to a minor incident that is nonetheless of vast significance to Tatyana and later Onegin - even if the relative importance of what it means tragically never coincides within both of them at the same time. "Happiness was once so near, so near!". There is something inherently and vitally Russian about that, something that is at the same time both passionate in the exploration and expression of one's deeper nature, yet also dispassionate in its abandonment to fate and the course it will set them upon. This idea of huge forces being set into motion by an outwardly minor matter is something that must be captured in any successful stage presentation of the work.

In line with the nature of the work itself, there are many ways to balance and blend those themes. It can be as simple and austere as Robert Carson's production, letting the light and the music express everything that isn't brought out on the surface, or you can throw everything up there on the stage in an all-encompassing Stefan Herheim manner and let the music hold the true course of the sentiments. With Barrie Kosky at the Komische Oper in Berlin it could go either way, but you can at least be sure that it is probably going to be colourful and elaborate. That certainly is the impression you get at the start of Act I, where a whole hyper-realistic chunk of the Russian countryside appears to be deposited right up there on the stage.

This is not however the kind of kitsch forest scene that you will find for example in Otto Schenk's The Cunning Little Vixen. It's not that Kosky is adverse to a bit of kitsch and camp when it's appropriate, but in the case of Eugene Onegin the set serves that deeper purpose of the work. The single forest scene, the lump of Russian countryside that remains in place throughout most of the opera, reflects the importance of the location and of nature in the work. Without getting too bogged down in period detail, which isn't as important as the broader themes, it does however also suggest memories of the past - on how the golden days of youth are reflected upon in moments of crisis. Even when we are in a ballroom in the final scene of the opera, the rough grass that serves as a carpet remains there as a reminder that the past never leaves us.

Kosky of course pays just as much attention to the human drama as the broader Russian themes of the work and its considerations in regards to time and memory. The human emotions are not so much conflated with or inflated by their proximity to the Russian landscape, as much as given the vast space they need to be fully expressed. Tchaikovsky's High Romanticism isn't the same as Debussy's Expressionism, but a stage production is capable of highlighting these human sentiments in terms of light, mood and nature. Kosky's production uses shadow and light, uses the trees, sunlight and moonlight not so much to heighten drama, as much as connect human feelings with nature; relating those features to the surge of excitement, anxiety, melancholy that Tchaikovsky pours into the melodies of the score.

Playing to the human sentiments, the actions and behaviour of each and every one of the characters touches on the essence of their nature in a way that, for example, Deborah Warner and Fiona Shaw did not in their Met production when the inner truth of the work was betrayed for the sake of stage drama. The casting helps here, the Komische's production benefitting from a relatively young cast who prove to be quite capable of the dramatic and the singing challenges that the work presents. All of them are tested in passages, but the lyrical beauty of the singing and what it reveals about the characters is handled wonderfully. The Lithuanian soprano Asmik Grigorian in particular is rivetting as Tatjana, her singing and the emotional force behind it impressive; Günter Papendell is a less brusque and a softer Onegin than you usually find, but it works well with the reading here.

There are no major deviations in this production away from the familiar trajectory of the plot and characterisation, but Kosky introduces little revealing touches that present an alternative or more ambiguous way of looking at the situation. Here, for example, you can feel some sympathy for Onegin, not disdain for his arrogance and aloofness. More so than Tatyana, he's the one who comes across as naive in believing he knows it all when he rejects her written declaration of love. Even Tatyana, in their final scene together, recognises that Onegin behaved honourably towards her and didn't take advantage of a young vulnerable country girl. The handling of the duel is also important and Kosky's choice to keep it off-stage works well. Onegin's horror for what has occurred is directed straight afterwards towards Tatyana who has turns up on the scene, making the kind of impact that is necessary for what follows.

What follows of course isn't just a matter of role-reversal. The past still has a hold over Tatyana, who is not indifferent to Onegin, but time has separated them in a way that is impossible to recover. Kosky's production and the direction of the performances captures this with all the ambiguity of feeling that the desperate struggle of the final scene requires. Most productions at the Komische are in German language, I believe, but the decision to keep Yevgeniy Onegin in Russian (even Monsieur Triquet's song is in Russian, which I think is the first time I've heard it sung in anything but French) is an essential element in keeping the whole production as authentic as possible. The fine performance of the orchestra under the Henrik Nánási is another vital component that the Komische seem to get perfectly right, with the chorus also meeting every expectation.


Links: Opera Platform, Komische Oper

Monteverdi - Orpheus/Odysseus/Poppea (Komische Berlin, 2014 - Blu-ray)

Claudio Monteverdi - Orpheus/Odysseus/Poppea

Komische Oper, Berlin - 2014

André de Ridder, Barrie Kosky, Dominik Köninger, Julia Novikova, Peter Renz, Günter Papendell, Ezgi Kutlu, Tansel Akzeybek, Brigitte Geller, Roger Smeets, Helene Schneiderman

Arthaus Musk - Blu-ray

Barrie Kosky's work is becoming more widely known in the UK from colourful, fresh and not entirely controversy-free productions of mainly Baroque opera at the ENO (Rameau's Castor and Pollux), Glyndebourne (Handel's Saul) and Edinburgh (Mozart's The Magic Flute), but the Australian director is also the artistic director at the Komische Oper in Berlin, the city's German language opera company. You can expect then that his Monteverdi Trilogy (L'Orfeo, Il Ritorno d'Ulisse in Patria and L'Incoronazione di Poppea the composer's only existing complete operas) is going to be very different from any other versions of some of opera's earliest and greatest compositions. You don't know the half of it...

It's the Komische, so even Monteverdi is subjected to the German language treatment. That might sound strange to the ears were the works performed in an historically-informed way on period instruments, but remarkably the musical interpretation is just as "translated" here. While the melodic line and continuo is followed in as far as Monteverdi variously scored it for these works with theorbo and bass viol, Elena Kats-Chemin has introduced new instrumentation for all three works, including an accordion, a banjo and an electric guitar as well as a range of exotic instruments like the djoza from Iran, a West African kora (bridge-harp) and a Syrian oud (lute).

The familiar melodies and rhythmic structure is there, but less rigidly adhered to, blending into a much richer texture of plucked and hammered sounds that actually give a real kick to the arrangements. It's not just the colour of the instruments that is used either, but the melody can stray into a tango, into German jazz, Slavic folk, klezmer or ragtime swing. It might sound outrageous, but it gets across the wide dynamic of the tones within and across these works and is always appropriate to the context. What is also fascinating is hearing those instruments play baroque music and discovering the connections the various styles have with one another. It's as if they can all be ultimately traced back to Monteverdi, and I suppose in a way they can.

Needless to say, Barrie Kosky revels in the opportunities to match the colour and playful nature of the music with vividly bright, colourful productions that are inventive in situation on a busy stage that is usually a riot of dance and movement. Musically and in terms of staging, reflecting the director's concept of the loss and ultimate destruction of the Arcadian ideal across the three works, the trilogy is at its most elaborate in Orpheus (L'Orfeo). This would be appropriate for a work that spans such a wide range of human experiences and emotions, from joyful celebration to mournful despair and the determination of Orpheus not to be defeated by the cruel war constantly waged between the Gods subjecting mankind to the whims of Time, Love, Fate and Chance.

Kosky's production then strongly marks the contrast between Paradise and Hell, illustrating the endeavours of Orpheus and the power of human art and ingenuity to celebrate love and beauty in the face of outrageous fortune. The stage is filled with movement, with dancers and life-size puppets, but it works in a complementary way with the nature of the subject and with the unconventional musical interpretation conducted here by André de Ridder. As the most adventurous of the three stagings, it works marvellously, allowing the German language performance to fit in well with the celebration of life in all its richness and colour. The singing performances by Dominik Köninger as Orpheus, Julia Novikova as Eurydice and Peter Renz as Amor, no doubt help make that work as well with the sheer lyrical beauty of the voices.

The rather more austere staging for Odysseus (Il Ritorno d'Ulisse in Patria) doesn't significantly alter the impact that is achieved by the richness of the work itself. Accordingly, the music has the same kind of musical reinterpretation but with a different colour from that of Orpheus. Turkish melodies and rhythms infuse Poppea's lament and other imaginative musical flourishes on a grand piano are inserted in those Monteverdean short bursts of melody in the middle of recitative. The scene of the three suitors characterises their claims with a tango rhythm or a burst of a Habanera. Again without destroying the composer's structure, this is very much in the spirit of improvisation and interpretation that are a vital element to the make-up of Monteverdi's operas, the singing voices taking up the main expression of emotions. Ezgi Kutlu in particular impresses here as Poppea, but Günter Papendell's Odysseus and Tansel Akzeybek's Telemachus are also very strong.

In terms of the advancing the concept of the staging, one of the main factors that establishes the tone of the work is of course the Prelude. In Odysseus, Time, Fortune and Love make fools of the activities of men and the purpose of Odysseus. The expedition to Troy and the war that ensued has led to Odysseus blown off course for 20 years. Arcadia has been lost, Odysseus is wandering, longing for a return to peace in his homeland, with his family and loved ones, and it is also causing Penelope great torment. The 'patria' here then is nothing more then than the green, green grass of home, a mostly bare platform with the orchestra behind the performers. The period is kind of late-60s/early-70s, the suitors looking particularly sleazy as if they've just spilled out of a bar hoping to pick up a wealthy widow, but the tone at the same time colourfully evokes nostalgia for old-fashioned ways.

The set is also minimally dressed for Poppea (L'Incoronazione di Poppea), but this is more than compensated for by the colour, movement and stage directions that extend out beyond the orchestra pit on a wide platform. Disappointingly however, having got quite used to it in the other two works, the musical reinterpretation is less evident here, despite L'incoronazione di Poppea being a work that has a wide range of emotional colour and variety of situation. A little bit of electric guitar makes fitful appearances, and banjos are used to bring a little more of an edge to the basso continuo. Somehow however, despite the fact that great care has been take to establish a distinct sound world to each of the works, it isn't until quite late in the piece that the instrumentation finds the kind of rhythmic pulse that should drive the work.

Barrie Kosky however is not short of ways to use the singers, dancers and supernumerary sprites to push the expressions of all the violent and lustful passions in Poppea into the movement and exhibition of the body. There is a considerable amount of full-frontal nudity here, mostly male, none of which is the least bit erotic. Amor - a vital character to all three works (sung in each by Peter Renz) - is a constant presence here, but again taking its lead from the prelude, Love might be dominant, but Virtue has been defeated and Arcadia destroyed. Poppea takes place consequently on the side of a volcano, grey, with large boulders littering the landscape. The contrast between Nero and Poppea's violent love and the monstrousness of their actions towards others is depicted in all its horror, and matched by the intense singing. All of the performers are simply outstanding here, but I particularly liked Helene Schneiderman's unrepentantly vengeful Octavia.

The quality of the visual aspect of each of the Blu-ray discs is fine, but there is a little bit of haziness to the image with some minor blurring in movement that is not as clinically sharp as most HD releases. On Orpheus and Odysseus, there is a kind of yellowish tint with gives a warmer tone. These characteristics are less evident on Poppea, which also seems sharper. The singing sounds a little amplified which might be down to the use of radio mics, although they are not obviously worn by the performers, and the mixing is not quite as bright as you might find on recordings of baroque music. It's warmly toned if you like, and comes over well on the DTS HD-Master Audio 5.1 and PCM stereo mixes, but best of all on headphones. Subtitles are in German, English, French and Turkish. There are no extra feaures on the discs, but there are synopses and a great deal of information on the production in the large booklet that comes with the box set.