Zemlinsky - Der Zwerg (Wexford, 2025)

Alexander von Zemlinsky - Der Zwerg 

Wexford Festival Opera, 2025

Christopher Knopp, Chris Moran, Charne Rochford, Eleri Gwilym, Charlotte Baker, Ross Cumming, Victoria Harley, Olivia Carrell, Erin Fflur, Cerys Macallister, Heather Sammon, Eleanor O'Driscoll, Camilla Seale

Jerome Hynes Theatre, National Opera House, Wexford - 23rd October 2025

Strangely, Alexander von Zemlinsky seems to have been one of those early 20th century opera composers who have slipped into obscurity and have yet to gain a true foothold or recognition for their work. That of course was the fate of many German and Austrian composers around the first half of the 20th century, partly through the rapidly evolving changes in music, of which Zemlinsky played an not unacknowledged role, but like many of his contemporaries who fell out of favour with the political establishment, it was mostly due to him being Jewish. Of all Zemlinsky's works Der Zwerg (The Dwarf) appears to be the representative work that he is known for, and in some ways it's a suitable work that defines to a larger extent his character and reputation.

While many of the composers and works deemed Entartete (degenerate) by the Nazis have enjoyed some manner of reappraisal in recent decades, Zemlinsky and Der Zwerg remain largely unknown and rarely performed. It's a work however that fits in perfectly with the new ideals and ideas - both musical and philosophical - that were floating around at the time, particularly in Vienna. Richard Strauss issued in that break with tradition with Salome, but many other works by Schreker, Braunfels and Korngold all explore the darker side of human psychology, a loss of innocence and a recognition of the ugliness and brutality that lies within humanity. Such works are often seen as a sign of the times and somewhat premonitory of the direction of the political climate, albeit dressed up in lush orchestration and extravagantly decadent plots.

The most celebrated and emblematic opera of this period is indeed Richard Strauss's Salome. Based on the play by Oscar Wilde, the Irish-British playwright would prove to be an outspoken figure in giving voice to dark hypocrisy and the depths of depravity in respectable society that were waiting to be given licence to be brought to the surface. Zemlinsky was also drawn to Wilde’s dark fairy tales, composing the short one-act opera Der Zwerg based on The Birthday of the Infanta, to be presented alongside another Wilde work Eine florentinische Tragödie (A Florentine Tragedy). As well as being an expression of those ideas about the ugly side of human nature, Der Zwerg is in some respects also filled with a sense of self-loathing felt by Zemlinsky as someone who didn't fit in with the Germanic ideal, either racially or physically.

The story is about a dwarf who is introduced into the court of the Infanta (an image inspired by Goya’s famous painting) as one of her courtiers. The dwarf however is unaware of how others see him, as he has never seen his reflection in a mirror (other than glimpses of a monster tormenting him in the flash of a blade). Having never seen himself as he is and how he looks, he considers himself a grand heroic figure. He is laughed at and ridiculed by the court, but the Infanta sees him as a plaything, indulging his delusions until he falls in love with her, only for the princess to then cruelly reveal the truth to him. The dwarf dies of a broken heart, clutching the white rose that the Infanta gave to him, but no one really feels any pity for the fool.

The history of the work and the period in which it was composed, 1922, are intriguing, inviting those interested to see in it something of Zemlinsky being rejected by Alma Schlinder, who described him as "a hideous dwarf" and then go on to marry Gustav Mahler. Zemlinsky initially asked Franz Schreker to set The Birthday of the Infanta, for which he would write the libretto (Schreker having already created a dance-pantomime Der Geburtstag der Infantin), but this developed into the similarly themed opera Die Gezeichneten with a libretto written wholly by Schreker himself. What is also interesting is that similar themes about the changing society and its troubling elements were also being explored in another art form, the German Expressionist cinema of Robert Weine's Dr. Caligari (1920) and Fritz Lang's Dr. Mabuse, der Spieler (1922), and that is the direction that director Chris Moran chooses to illustrate this production for Wexford Festival Opera as part of their 'Pocket Opera' programme.

It's a style that works exceptionally well with the nature of the work. Lavishly orchestrated, the story of Der Zwerg has a similar florid quality to Salome without Wilde's Symbolist trappings in that work, the dark fairy tale rather suiting the absurdist Gothic tone adopted here. The production even included flickering silent cinema intertitles, showing the shadow of a Max Schreck Nosferatu-like figure in shadows on the wall to reflect the idea of horror and deformity rather than dwarfism. The court are monstrously panstick painted with heavy black eye makeup and dark lipstick. As with Wilde's story it's all heightened and mannered, matching the sometimes jagged rhythms of Zemlinsky's score performed here in piano reduction by musical director Christopher Knopp.

As with any reduced score production there is no place to hide here and the singers all proved to be more than capable of delivering the intensity of the work, despite the lack of its grand orchestration. Charne Rochford in particular put across the intensity and depth of the dwarf's heroic delusion and fervent love for the Infanta. Eleri Gwilym's Infanta was perfectly characterised and sung, disdainful, detached and self-absorbed but not to the extent that she can't take time to dispense some wilful cruelty to those around her. Charlotte Baker as her attendant Ghita also came across very well as did Ross Cumming as the Chamberlain-storyteller.

There didn't appear to be any attempt to draw any political or personal message out of the work, but Der Zwerg - much like Salome - has its own inner power and horror and works perfectly on its own terms as a strong piece of opera. There is limited opportunity for any ambitious messaging anyway in a reduced small scale production (certainly not the kind of resources seen in the spectacle of Deidamia on the National Opera House main stage the previous night), but yet again, as she demonstrated also with the Pocket Opera production of La tragédie de Carmen in this year's festival, Lisa Krügel's effective set and costume designs were outstanding.

External links: Wexford Festival Opera

Mozart - Il re pastore (Buxton, 2023)

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart - Il re pastore

Buxton International Festival, 2023

Adrian Kelly, Jack Furness, Katie Coventry, Ellie Neate, Olivia Carrell, George Curnow, Joseph Doody

Buxton Opera House - 9th July 2023

There is no good or bad when it comes to Mozart's opera works - or any Mozart really - just compositions that you can characterise as youthful work and mature work. Idomeneo and Die Entführung aus dem Serail maybe blur those lines a little, but the works on either side are certainly distinct. Not better or worse, just the work of a composer who consistently developed and found his own voice and expression with each piece. But even Lucio Silla, La Finta Giardiniera and Mitridate, Re di Ponto (written at the age of 14) are accomplished works that have proven their worth in intelligent sympathetic productions. So even though Il re pastore, is somewhat of an unknown quantity for me, there was the assurance that since its Mozart and in the hands of the Buxton International Festival, it was still going to be worthwhile.

And sure enough the 2023 BIF production confirms that this is no lesser work, and in fact might be all the more impressive for having been composed when Mozart was only 19 years of age. It's impressive also for making light work of a Metastasio libretto, which can often be quite tortuous in their plotting and rather obvious in their progression to a conclusion of conventional sentiments and moral messaging. Even the title of the opera (The Shepherd King) almost tells you everything you need to know about this opera; that it's about a king or ruler who makes mistakes - mainly in terms of who he chooses to form romantic couples (not least because not everyone is who they appear to be) - but eventually comes to see sense and rule with clemency, forgiveness and understanding. There is however a little more to Il re pastore, mainly due to how the youthful Mozart delves a little deeper into this idea and brings its characters to life.

The actual detail of the plot is very much along typical Metastasian lines, although perhaps a little less convoluted than usual. Alexander the Great/Alessandro, has just conquered Sidon which has been ruled by a tyrant, and wishes to restore its rightful ruler to the throne. He discovers that a humble shepherd Aminta, who has ambitions to marry Elisa, a woman he believes is above his station, is in fact the heir to the throne and unaware of his heritage. Despite being reluctant to leave the happy life of a shepherd, Agenore convinces him of the importance of duty taking precedence over love. Rather than depose the current queen Tamiri, Alessandro however decides that Aminta should marry her, unaware of her love for Agenore. Oh, what a foolhardy judgement! This causes a lot of anguish and recrimination in the third quarter of the opera, the second having been filled with sentiments of love and devotion for each other. Hopefully someone with sense and wisdom will resolve all this by the conclusion…

Admittedly it's not the most inspiring of tales. As predictable and as conventional as the plot is, a carbon copy of many other operatic situations dealing with rulers and the exercise of power wrapped up in a romantic melodrama, there is a little more to Il re pastore, or at least more that Mozart manages to bring to it. There are elements in the libretto relating to nature that are enhanced by Mozart's music, that elevate the work considerably. Those qualities might still go unnoticed here other than for the sympathetic production direction of Jack Furness. The set design consists almost solely of bucolic background video projections of gently flowing streams, green fields, hills with sheep and horses and vistas of skies. Nature is brought very much to the fore, so that when Agenore tells Aminta that you can't rule over others if you can rule yourself, it associates that necessity for a ruler to exercise wisdom and clemency with the importance of understanding of one's own true better nature.

That is a subject that Mozart is inclined to explore in almost all of his operas, with the exception perhaps of Don Giovanni, although there is a similar case that can be made for that. While it is fascinating to hear a youthful early work by Mozart begin to explore those ideas and find musical expression for them - albeit owing more to Haydn here than the sophistication of later works - the work has its own charm and the skill is evident in how the music is employed in service of this underlying idea of nature. Even on the level of simple arrangements and structure, the music flows beautifully, the recitative passages and da capo are kept to a minimum - at least in this production - allowing the opera to lead from one beautifully melodic aria into the next, where each character is given the time to explore and express their true nature.

That is brought out also in the minimalist and deceptively hands-off nature of the production. The director, Jack Furness takes time to ensure that each of the characters have the opportunity to express themselves, the women in particular being rather fiery in nature, creating some entertaining exchanges that play to the dynamic of the central part of the work. He also stages the moment when each of the protagonists become aware of Alessandro's misguided intentions for their marriages by having them appear on the stage reading a missive and reacting in horror and despair. At every stage the sentiments are attuned to the music, sometimes playful, sometimes darker - but never too dark - and despite the overwrought nature of some of the scenes, never employing farce or stooping to make light of it.

Mainly however, it's left to the projections behind a bare stage to play out in accordance with the music and those underlying sentiments. There's multiple-angle footage of a gently flowing stream while words of love and commitment are expressed, a battered stone tower looms over a vista of hills and lakes for Alessandro, each of the chosen screens subtly alerting the audience not so much to the nature of the wider world surrounding the characters but more an insight into their inner world. It serves also to bring out that essence of nature that is suggested in the libretto and title, that a Shepherd King is needed to look after his flock. And even in a world where we are no longer ruled by kings, the underlying idea in Il re pastore of the danger of rulers out of touch with ordinary people and detached from their own true nature is one that is still relevant.

And one that is very much in evidence in the music. The musical performance of this early Mozart opera was an absolute delight, as it always is when you hear Mozart played with a lightness of touch by a smaller chamber ensemble. Adrian Kelly, conducting and providing accompaniment for the recitative on fortepiano, navigated the Northern Chamber Orchestra through the work, alert to the subtle changes of expression, creating an authentic period-like sound. Bright, youthful voices are essential for this kind of Mozart work and, sung in the original Italian, the singing performances were uniformly excellent in their handling of some challenging arias. The most entertaining performances came from Ellie Neate's Elisa and Olivia Carrell's Tamiri, both playing up the betrayed women roles that Mozart would specialise in with Don Giovanni. Katie Coventry's trouser role of Aminta was perfectly judged, Joseph Doody commanding as Allesandro and George Curnow brought great character to Agenore.

No one is going to reclaim Il re pastore as a neglected work, but even the earliest of Mozart's operas have a certain charm and beauty that deserves revisiting and exploring. Thankfully that's what the Buxton International Festival is rightly renowned for, and Adrian Kelly and Jack Furness take that opportunity in this production to show that this is a work that has more than just curiosity value.

Links: Buxton International Festival

Donizetti - Viva la Diva (Buxton, 2022)

Gaetano Donizetti - Viva la Diva

Buxton International Festival, 2022

Iwan Davies, Stephen Medcalf, George Humphreys, Jenny Stafford, Richard Burkhard, Elliot Carlton Hines, Raimundas Juzuitis, Joseph Doody, Olivia Carrell, Quentin Hayes, Lauren Young

Buxton Opera House - 18th July 2022

Buxton is known for reviving rare and little-known operas in their annual festival, but there is also always a tremendous variety to the musical offerings. This year was no exception. There was a rare Rossini, a new contemporary opera by Tom Coult, a Sondheim musical Gypsy, Jonathan Dove's Mansfield Park, a baroque opera in Johann Hasse's Antonio e Cleopatra and a comic opera by Donizetti that, for me at least, is known only by reputation. Another thing Buxton do well is farce, whether it's Mozart (La Finta Giardiniera) or Britten (Albert Herring), they recognise that humour is an essential part of opera, that there are times when it shouldn't be taken so seriously, but at the same time, comedy has a way of revealing truths that may be difficult to broach in any other way. 

How else for example, can you look upon the complicated business writing an opera to satirise the process of putting on an opera? That's what Viva la Diva (alternatively known as Viva la Mamma, based on Donizetti's Le convenienze ed inconvenienze teatrali) is all about, and typically Buxton - recognising that they aren't exactly Glyndebourne, Salzburg or one of the very important opera festivals - do it very much their own inimitable and self-effacing way (while also making fun of Glyndebourne and Salzburg). The temptation of what you can do with an opera about the problems that can arise trying to put on an opera are too much to resist and the BIF go out of their way to make it feel 'at home', recognisable not just to the opera world trapped in its own little hermetic bubble, but as something that exists very much in the world of culture and arts funding, business dealing and political favours.

Not only does director Stephen Medcalf not resist but he takes it much further, and before we even get to the rehearsal room in Act I there are an extra highly entertaining 20 minutes of a prologue added to cover the auditions for a production of the opera seria Romolo ed Ersilia for the 2022 High Peak Opera Festival. Donizetti's original work, adapted from plays by Simeone Antonio Sografi on the theatrical world, are consequently greatly reworked in a new English version by Kit Hesketh-Harvey. This brings it right up to date and introduces several more levels of humour to the proceedings, where even the person doing the surtitles has a few observations of his own to impart about his role in the whole process of putting on an opera. It's a very clever idea that introduces the characters and warms the audience up for what will follow.

It's a wonderfully witty colloquial and contemporary translation/resetting/rewriting of the opera, right down to renaming the characters, including Vanamaka Zonnendanz as a Czech mezzo, a Mr B.S. Merchant as the director, Conn Chetham as the dodgy impresario, and Huw Watt as the conductor. The rehearsal room also has local resonances and references, there are a few in-jokes thrown in and extemporised for the current high temperatures (it was 37°C outside). It's a laugh a minute if you can keep up with the pace as the jokes are flying out. Donizetti's opera evidently provides the basis for this, providing an insight into the whole creative and performance process as well as the personalities involved, and the director Stephen Medcalf swears that nothing in the Buxton production is entirely made up, but has a basis in the reality that he has experienced in his career.

Viva la Diva may not be anything more than an amusing satire that pokes fun at the personalities involved and their mannerisms, but it's just as clever and layered as Ariadne auf Naxos - if clearly not as musically sophisticated as Richard Strauss - predating it by almost a century. If you are going to play a comedy like this as a farce, the success rests just as heavily on the performers being willing to put everything into it, and that was very much the case here. That goes right down to the conductor Iwan Davies taking part, demonstrating a comic temperamental impatience with his singers, and by extension this involvement undoubtedly fed into the bright, lovely music performance by the Northern Chamber Orchestra.

It would be indelicate to name any of the personalities being satirised - they were broad enough that everyone could make their own mind up about who the acting-up Prima Donna most resembles (and I'm sure insiders will know a few of their own), but Jenny Stafford was marvellous, darling. We got a spot on performance from Lithuanian bass baritone Raimundas Juzuitis as Haakan Czestikov. Although his exaggerated thick Russian accent dialogue wasn't always easy to make out, his threatening presence and singing were excellent. We didn't get enough of Joseph Doody as the temperamental Italian tenor or Lauren Young as the Czech mezzo, but both were excellent. Quentin Hayes as Ray, Olivia Carrell as Alexa and Richard Burkhard as the impresario also lived up to their roles very well, but evidently George Humphreys, done up like a pantomime dame as Agatha, la Mamma, dominated proceedings. As usual the singers and 'singers' here get all the credit, but you have to acknowledge the contributions by the chorus, actors and other creatives so important in a team effort like this, even though as usual they don't even get a name check in a review.

Having said that it would be remiss not to mention the superb set design by Yannis Thavoris which added another element of satire at extravagant Regietheater productions. I actually thought it was a very convincing and workable concept for 'Romolo ed Ersilia'. Maybe not so much the Schmirnoff rocket, but I could see this working for Bregenz. I can't imagine where they got the funding for such an extravagant set at a festival in a little spa town on the edge of the Peak District, or rather I have a better idea now of the kind of business arrangements and deals that are made to get a show like this on the road. I just hope the cast and musicians got paid for this one.

Links: Buxton International Festival