Der Zar lässt sich photographieren
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Operas and musicals by Kurt Weill |
|
|---|---|
| Der Protagonist | 1926 |
| Mahagonny-Songspiel | 1927 |
| Der Zar lässt sich photographieren |
1928 |
| The Threepenny Opera | 1928 |
| Happy End | 1929 |
| Der Lindberghflug (with Paul Hindemith) | 1929 |
| The Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny |
1930 |
| Der Jasager | 1930 |
| Die Bürgschaft | 1932 |
| Der Silbersee | 1933 |
| The Seven Deadly Sins | 1933 |
| Der Kuhhandel | 1935 |
| Johnny Johnson | 1936 |
| The Eternal Road | 1937 |
| Knickerbocker Holiday | 1938 |
| Lady in the Dark | 1940 |
| One Touch of Venus | 1943 |
| The Firebrand of Florence | 1945 |
| Street Scene | 1946 |
| Down in the Valley | 1948 |
| Love Life | 1948 |
| Lost in the Stars | 1949 |
Der Zar lässt sich photographieren (The Tsar Has his Photograph Taken') is an opera buffa in one act by Kurt Weill, op. 21. The German libretto was written by Georg Kaiser, and Weill composed the music in 1927.
Contents |
[edit] Performance history
The opera was first performed at the Neues Theater in Leipzig on 18 February 1928. Weill had intended it to be a companion piece for Der Protagonist, though it was staged at its premiere with Nicola Spinelli's A basso porto (1894). Der Zar lässt sich photographieren and Der Protagonist were then performed together at Altenburg on 25 March of the same year.
The first American performance took place on 27 October, 1949, at the Juilliard School, New York. The first performance in the United Kingdom was at the Bloomsbury Theatre, London, on 12 March, 1986.
[edit] Roles
| Role | Voice type | Premiere Cast, 18 February 1928 (Conductor: -) |
|---|---|---|
| Angèle | soprano | |
| The assistant | tenor | |
| The boy | contralto | |
| The leader of the gang | mezzo-soprano or tenor | |
| The false Angèle | soprano | |
| The false assistant | tenor | |
| The false boy | contralto | |
| The Tsar | baritone | |
| The equerry | bass |
[edit] Synopsis
- Place: a photographic studio in Paris
- Time: 1914
An offstage male chorus chants the opera's title (and comments on the action from time to time). Angèle (the proprietress) and her male assistants, one of them a boy, have little work to do, but a telephone-call brings news that the Tsar wishes to have his photograph taken. A large box-camera is set up, but, before the Tsar arrives, four members of a gang of revolutionaries burst in. They bind and gag Angèle and her staff. Three of the gang dress up as Angèle, her assistant and the boy, and the leader of the gang, proclaiming that the revolution is imminent, conceals a gun in the camera. It will fire at the Tsar when the bulb used for taking the photograph is squeezed. The captives are put in another room, the leader hides, and the Tsar is announced.
The Tsar is dressed in a summer suit and accompanied only by an equerry. He wants an informal portrait rather than an official one. He is attracted by the False Angèle and asks to be left alone with her. She is keen to take the photograph (i.e. to "shoot" him), but he flirts with her and offers to take her photograph first. She manages to avoid being accidentally shot by the Tsar, and is finally about to press the bulb to shoot him when the equerry re-appears to report that the police have followed some assassins to the studio. The false Angèle, realising that the game is up, puts on a seductive gramophone record (the "Tango Angèle") and asks the Tsar to avert his eyes while she undresses. She and the rest of the gang escape through the window just before the police arrive with the real Angèle and her assistants, who had previously themselves escaped and raised the alarm. The gun is removed from the camera, and the Tsar, though dismayed that the real Angèle is not as attractive as the false one, finally, as the chorus again says, "has his photograph taken".
[edit] Music
The opera's music is continuous, rather than arranged in "numbers". There are big orchestral climaxes at dramatic moments but also some popular-music forms, such as the foxtrot which accompanies the entrance of the Tsar. The "Tango Angèle" was specially recorded for the first performance, and is one of the earliest examples of pre-recorded music being used on stage in a dramatic work.[1] It was Weill's first best-selling record.
[edit] Selected recordings
- Barry McDaniel, Marita Napier, Carla Pohl, Cologne Radio Symphony Orchestra and Chorus, conductor Jan Latham-König (Capriccio 60007-1)
[edit] Sources
- Hinton, Stephen (1992), "Der Zar lässt sich photographieren", The New Grove Dictionary of Opera, ed. Stanley Sadie (London) ISBN 0-333-73432-7
- Holden, Amanda; (editor), with Kenyon, Nicholas and Walsh, Stephen [1993]. The Viking Opera Guide. London: Viking, p1218. ISBN 0-670-81292-7.
The piece merits an entire chapter in Susan Cook's Opera for a New Republic: the Zeitopern of Krenek, Weill and Hindemith (UMI Research Press 1988)
[edit] Notes
- ^ Programme-note by Chris Macklin for performances of the opera at the University of York on 17-18 March, 2007.
