# A Renewed Fascination With "Doktor Faust"



## Xavier (Jun 7, 2012)

I've known and loved Busoni's great opera for years (via the Leitner recording) and I even got the chance to attend the Met premiere in 2001. Recently I acquired Kent Nagano's 3 CD version which includes the traditionally omitted spoken prologues and epilogue and have fallen in love all over again. Of course the only issue is that it has never made it beyond the periphery of the repertoire. Why?

Here are the usual explanations:



> *"The music is considered difficult for the listener, not that its expressive language is particularly advanced for its time. Rather, the whole has an intellectual air about it, with often dark and deep music, music lacking in catchy tunes and snappy rhythms. It mostly evolves in a dreamy atmosphere, supported by an orchestration that's by turns glowing, menacing, scintillating, and opaque, and by writing that's dominated by abundant counterpoint and strange harmonic twists. At times it seems to embrace several styles: Wagner might seem to emerge here, or Hindemith there, or even Bach in a few places. It seems to anticipate Stravinsky, from his Symphony of Psalms and suggests much else. One can assess there is a curious dichotomy here: the music is easy on the ear, but difficult on the mind. Furthermore, the opera has an episodic character that might befuddle some listeners/viewers" (Robert Cummings)
> *





> *"Despite moments of dramatic force and musical beauty, the general style of DF is so compressed, so complex in both its dramatic and harmonic implications, and so rooted fundamentally in the late German Romantic sound-world that the opera is unlikely to become part of the standard repertoire" (Grout and Williams)*





> *"It is a drama on a spiritual plane far removed from the normal operatic level, and it will remain one of those operas which are revived and presented only at rare and solemn intervals" (Edward Dent) *


Two questions:

1) Have you ever come across any rabid admirers of _Doktor Faust_?

2) Of the great trio of lone operas -- _Mathis der Maler_, _Doktor Faust_ and _Palestrina_ -- which one do you think has a better chance of moving further away from the "ivory tower" seclusion and closer towards the mainstream?


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

Even amongst the hoity-toi circle of those who really love and follow opera, underneath whatever social stripe they may be or wear, the vast majority are major drama kings and queens ~ like the drama high, the tunes just continuing acoming along one after the next, histrionic display and histrionic / vocal musical display.

What chance does a quietly 'interior' opera have amid that crowd?

BTW, the existence of Cardillac makes Mathis der Maler not the sole opera of Hindemith's output.

I've heard only orchestral excerpts from the Busoni, remember a pleasant 'modernist' somewhat 'neoclassical' sound, (I recall thinking, 'pleasant / 'kool', but not being startled or riveted enough -- a period curiosity) and It think the comment you've quoted on the music itself quite apt... there was more 'vital' and fresh in a similar vein at the time or from other pens earlier on.

Then there is that Faust analogy. It's mileage worth to me is several paragraphs, like an Aesop Fable, and it should be that succinct because it takes no longer for anyone to get the analogy of the fable, or the moral conclusion. Set in a later than primitive time, I find it nearly impossible to suspend disbelief, that anyone could possibly believe or pretend to believe there was any devil of any sort and that one could sell one's soul to such an entity for that which one personally wished to have.

Instead of the two or three paragraphs the tale should occupy, instead we get epic long novels (Thomas Mann's) and hours long operas based upon this much later than myth or Aesop, fabricated tale with a very simple point, taking just hours or chapter upon chapter to unfold.

Bluntly, no matter how well written the libretto, the premise is so paper thin and nearly ridiculous it does not merit any extended treatment to present. 

"Bad Book = Far Less Than Great -- to -- Really Boring Night, at the Theater."


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## guythegreg (Jun 15, 2012)

PetrB said:


> ... the hoity-toi circle of those who really love and follow opera, underneath whatever social stripe they may be or wear, the vast majority are major drama kings and queens...


OMG! Nailed to the wall. :lol:


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## quack (Oct 13, 2011)

Selling your "soul", yourself, or "selling out" for short term gain is one of the fundamental tales of human existence. To dismiss the plot as shallow is to ignore how vital the story has been, right from its folk story origins to the present day. They might not all be called Faust but the same basic story is retold over and over in new ways every year. Condemning it for the supernatural or religious aspect of the devil character misses the point of the story, just as a belief in the existence of aliens isn't essential to watching an alien invasion movie. An immortal soul is incidental to the plot, unless you believe your personality, principles and morals are god-given. I suppose you get out of a story what you put in, if you see the Faust story in terms of religious bogeymen then it might be hard to appreciate.

I have the Leitner and i've heard the Nagano, i'd probably get other versions if they were made. I very much doubt Faust or the other operas you mention are headed for mainstream repertoire any time soon, mainstream is already a crowded field of a few overplayed operas. But I would say Faust would have the best hope, due to the universality of the story. Palestrina may be about challenging unbending authority and taste but it's not deposing Aida's spectacle or Tosca's drama.

I've always enjoyed rather slow-burn, reflective operas which go easy on the pyrotechnics, focusing instead upon the human failings at the heart of the drama. Pity poor Petr who seems to have fallen in with the bad crowd of cresendo-core opera lovers, they hardly represent all opera listeners. Just been listening to a fairly stupid Mercadante opera which is 90% drama, backed up with an abundance of cymbals to hammer the point. Could make an interesting work of under an hour if shorn down to its slow arias.


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## Bardamu (Dec 12, 2011)

I certainly understand why Doktor Faust is held in such high regard by knowledge critics yet the Opera by Ferruccio Busoni which is dearest to me is Arlecchino, ovvero le finestre.
A masterpiece in my eyes (well ears...) that put the characters from Commedia dell'Arte in a play that highlight the cruelty of life with unmatched bitter irony.
Good music too, with callback to more classical tunes but without being just a fruitless parody and as always a great and intellectual libretto by the author.








Xavier said:


> Of course the only issue is that it has never made it beyond the periphery of the repertoire. Why?


Because it was never meant to be popular from the start and there is nothing wrong with it.



> At times it seems to embrace several styles: Wagner might seem to emerge here...


Ah ah, if Busoni could read this line, he would be very enraged.



PetrB said:


> Then there is that Faust analogy. It's mileage worth to me is several paragraphs, like an Aesop Fable, and it should be that succinct because it takes no longer for anyone to get the analogy of the fable, or the moral conclusion. Set in a later than primitive time, I find it nearly impossible to suspend disbelief, that anyone could possibly believe or pretend to believe there was any devil of any sort and *that one could sell one's soul to such an entity for that which one personally wished to have*.
> 
> Instead of the two or three paragraphs the tale should occupy, instead we get epic long novels (Thomas Mann's) and hours long operas based upon this much later than myth or Aesop, fabricated tale with a very simple point, taking just hours or chapter upon chapter to unfold.
> 
> Bluntly, no matter how well written the libretto, the premise is so paper thin and nearly ridiculous it does not merit any extended treatment to present.


Busoni's Faust ask for "Il Genio dammi e tutto il suo tormento" (the genius and all of its torment).
A request expected by Busoni.

Just because a tale have a fantasy setting that doesn't mean it can't argue about deep human conditions.


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