Sunday Classics flashback: "Soon death is sovereign" -- more of Berlioz' "Roméo et Juliette"

Verona: "Ancient hatreds, dormant, have surged as if from hell"

by Ken

There was so much to cover last week, introducing Berlioz' "dramatic symphony" Roméo et Juliette in the company of another Berlioz Shakespeare adaptation, the opera Béatrice et Bénédict, that I think tonight and tomorrow night we need to do a little retracing and consolidating and contemplating.

In order to round out the relatively brief Part I, in which, as I pointed out, Berlioz basically tells the whole story, before telling it all again in Parts II and III, we need first to add just a bit more music to what we covered in last Friday's preview as well as the Sunday main post. By Sunday, you may recall, we'd gotten our protagonists as far as the aftermath of the great festivities at the Capulets': Juliette, alone on her balcony, thinking herself alone, confiding her love to the night; and the lurking Roméo taking that great leap of faith and revealing himself and his love. All that's left in Part I is Roméo rejoining his Montague relations and friends, and being roundly ridiculed for his pale, dreamy state. His friend Mercutio ventures that he has been visited by the fairy queen Mab.

Finally it's left to the small chorus (14 voices, you'll recall Berlioz asked for) to encapsule the rest of the action ever so briefly. "Soon death is sovereign," they warn, and then foretell the great reconciliation among the Veronese which again we read the composer explaining seemed to him appropriate.

The section is so brief that I thought we might hear several performances, even if the geographical range is from Boston to Boston to Cleveland. Believe it or not, we're hearing the entire tenor part, which is why we'll encounter singers on records we'd hardly ever expect to hear in a live performance. I have a distinct order of preference among our three tenors (a Frenchman, an Italian, and an American, you'll ntoe); I wonder whether other listeners will share it.

BERLIOZ: Roméo et Juliette, Op. 17:
Part I conclusion, Recitative and Scherzetto

RECITATIVE AND SCHERZETTO (solo tenor with semi-chorus)

Recitative

TENOR and SEMI-CHORUS: Soon Romeo's
pale dreaminess
puts all his friends in a state of mirth.

TENOR: "My dear," says the elegant Mercutio,
"I wager
that Queen Mab has visited you."

Scherzetto

TENOR and SEMI-CHORUS: Mab! The messenger,
slender and feathery,
she has for chariot a nutshell,
TENOR: which a squirrel fashioned;
the fingers of a spider
wove her harness.
TENOR and SEMI-CHORUS: In the nights, the fairy, with this tiny train,
gallops madly through the brain of a page
TENOR: who dreams of impish trickery
or tender serenading
TENOR and SEMI-CHORUS: in the moonlight under the tower.
And following her outing
TENOR: the little queen alights
TENOR and SEMI-CHORUS: one the bronzed neck of a soldier.
TENOR: He dreams of cannonades
and lively thrusts . . .
The drum! . . . the trumpet! . . . he wakes up, and then
swears, and prays, swearing all the while,
TENOR and SEMI-CHORUS: then falls asleep again
TENOR: and snores with his comrades.

TENOR and SEMI-CHORUS: It's Mab who made this whole bacchanal!
It's also she who, in a dream, dresses
the girl
and escorts her to the ball.
TENOR: But the cock sings, day shines,
Mab flees like a lightning bolt
TENOR and SEMI-CHORUS: in the air.

Narration (semi-chorus)

SEMI-CHORUS: Soon death is sovereign.
Capulets, Montagues, chastened by their sorrows,
are reconciled finally into abjuring the hatred
that caused the flow of so much blood and tears.

Jean Dupouy, tenor; New England Conservatory Chorus, Boston Symphony Orchestra, Seiji Ozawa, cond. DG, recorded October 1975


Cesare Valletti, tenor; New England Conservatory Chorus, Boston Symphony Orchestra, Charles Munch, cond. RCA/BMG, recorded Apr. 23-24, 1961


Kenneth Tarver, tenor; Cleveland Orchestra Chorus, Cleveland Orchestra, Pierre Boulez, cond. DG, recorded May 2000


NOW TO PULL THE WHOLE OF PART I TOGETHER

We first heard the agitated opening of the piece in last Friday's preview, in which we heard the extensive orchestra-only excerpts recorded by Carlo Maria Giulini and the Chicago Symphony. Now we're ready to put the whole part together, via Arturo Toscanini's famous 1947 NBC Symphony Roméo, which can be downloaded for an amazing $2.97 ($.99 cents for each of the three files containing the work's three parts).

Roméo et Juliette, Op. 17:
Part I (complete)

INTRODUCTION

Combat and tumult -- [1:36] Intervention of the Prince

PROLOGUE

Narration (semi-chorus with solo mezzo-soprano)

[4:27] SEMI-CHORUS: Ancient hatreds, dormant,
have surged as if from hell.
Capulets, Montagues, two enemy houses,
have crossed swords in Verona.

However, these bloody disorders' course
has been halted by the Prince,
threatening death to those who, despite his orders,
would again have recourse to the justice of swords.

[5:20] In these instants of calm a ball is given
by the old head of the Capulets.

[5:33] MEZZO-SOPRANO: Young Romeo, bemoaning his destiny,
comes to wander sadly around the entrance to the palace,
for he's madly in love with Juliet, the daughter
of the enemies of his family.

[6:01] SEMI-CHORUS with MEZZO-SOPRANO:
Noise from the instruments, melodious singing
emerge from the salons where gold shines,
arousing dancing and joyous cries.

[6:16] [Music from the ball is heard.]

[6:53] SEMI-CHORUS: The ball is finished, and when all the noise dies out,
under the arches can be heard
the exhausted dancers singing as they go off in the distance.
Alas! and Romeo sighs,
for he has had to leave Juliet!

[7:36] Suddenly, in order to breathe again that air that she breathes,
he vaults over the garden walls.

[7:47] Already on her balcony snow-white Juliet
appears, and believing herself alone until daybreak,
confides her love to the night.

[8:18] Romeo, trembling with a restless joy,
[8:23] reveals himself to Juliet,
and from his heart fires break out in their turn.

STROPHES (mezzo-soprano solo with semi-chorus)

[8:53] First transports that no one forgets,
first declarations, first vows
of two lovers.
Under the stars of Italy,
in that warm air without breezes,
which distant orange blossoms scent,
where the nightingale
wastes away with long sighs.

[10:06] What art, in its chosen tongue,
could describe your heavenly delights?
First love, are you not
more exalted than all poetry?
Or rather are you not, in our mortal exile,
that poetry itself
of which Shakespeare alone had the supreme secret,
and which he took with him
[SEMI-CHORUS joining in] to heaven?

[11:50] Happy children with hearts on fire!
Joined in love by the chance
of a single look,
hide it well under the shadow of flowers,
that divine fire that sets you ablaze,
ecstasy so pure
that its words are tears.

[13:06] What king could match the transports
of your chaste delights?
Happy children! and what treasures
could purchase a single one of your sighs?
Ah! savor for a long time that cup of honey,
sweeter than the chalices
from which God's angels, jealous of your delights,
draw happiness
[SEMI-CHORUS joining in] in heaven!

RECITATIVE AND SCHERZETTO
(solo tenor with semi-chorus)

Recitative

[14: 56] TENOR and SEMI-CHORUS: Soon Romeo's
pale dreaminess
puts all his friends in a state of mirth.

TENOR: "My dear," says the elegant Mercutio,
"I wager
that Queen Mab has visited you."

Scherzetto

[15:20] TENOR and SEMI-CHORUS: Mab! The messenger,
slender and feathery,
she has for chariot a nutshell,
TENOR: which a squirrel fashioned;
the fingers of a spider
wove her harness.
TENOR and SEMI-CHORUS: In the nights, the fairy, with this tiny train,
gallops madly through the brain of a page
TENOR: who dreams of impish trickery
or tender serenading
TENOR and SEMI-CHORUS: in the moonlight under the tower.
And following her outing
TENOR: the little queen alights
TENOR and SEMI-CHORUS: one the bronzed neck of a soldier.
TENOR: He dreams of cannonades
and lively thrusts . . .
The drum! . . . the trumpet! . . . he wakes up, and then
swears, and prays, swearing all the while,
TENOR and SEMI-CHORUS: then falls asleep again
TENOR: and snores with his comrades.

TENOR and SEMI-CHORUS: It's Mab who made this whole bacchanale!
It's also she who, in a dream, dresses
the girl
and escorts her to the ball.
TENOR: But the cock sings, day shines,
Mab flees like a lightning bolt
TENOR and SEMI-CHORUS: in the air.

Narration (semi-chorus)

[17:03] SEMI-CHORUS: Soon death is sovereign.
Capulets, Montagues, chastened by their sorrows,
are reconciled finally into abjuring the hatred
that caused the flow of so much blood and tears.

Gladys Swarthout, mezzo-soprano; John Garris, tenor; Chorus, NBC Symphony Orchestra, Arturo Toscanini, cond. Recorded live, Feb. 9 and 16, 1947


IN TOMORROW NIGHT'S SUNDAY CLASSICS PREVIEW --

We forge back onward into Parts II and III of Roméo, with more Berlioz in store for Sunday. Okay, I'm not absolutely sure exactly what at this precise moment. So sue me. I'm thinking maybe Harold in Italy (another Berlioz "symphony," though a much more nearly recognizable one, except for the pesky business of the viola solo), maybe with (or then again maybe without) some surprises.

SATURDAY MORNING UPDATE -- CHANGE OF PLAN:

There's just too much music for "review" to dump it all into another "flashback." So let's do something of a "preview" nature for tonight, and then finish up with Roméo -- and that includes going into the great finale of reconciliation -- in Sunday's post. Then maybe we'll visit Italy with Harold next week.


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