Actions for music
Rodney Milnes
The collaboration between Edward Bond and Hans Werner Henze on a commission from the Royal Opera could hardly fail to be stimulating, provocative infuriating, marvellous, silly and thus, I suppose, successful. As Heath's cartoon in the Spectator a fortnight ago suggested, there is nothing the bourgeoisie enjoys more than being insulted in the theatre. Insulted they were and at any number of levels, though not always the ones intended. Bond seems to me by far the most important dramatist working in Britain today. His anger does not banish compassion, nor does his his awareness of global horror preclude hope. Henze, one of today's most technically brilliant composers, has embraced the somewhat woolly cause of world revolution, though who are we to censure one whose first twenty years were spent in Germany between 1926 and 1946? Together they have written an 0-level programme note about culture, revolution and the working classes and, saints be praised, an infinitely more interesting opera—however defiantly they may sub-title We Come to the River 'Actions for Music'.
Bond's libretto is as rich in imagery as its syntax is clear and its action disturbing; Henze's music. to a certain extent, and his production to a far greater one, muddies it. The action concerns the victorious General in a civil war (Bond) or revolution (Henze) in an imaginary empire; he recommends the appointment of a strong governor for the conquered province. The General is told he is going blind. As a result, he sees the suffering he has caused, and on the battlefield pleads for the life of the scavenging widow of the deserter he has had shot. The governor assumes he has gone mad and has him incarcerated in a lunatic asylum. (That, to put things in perspective, should put paid to any possibility of a production in Moscow.) In the second act both rebel soldier and governor beg the General to act as figurehead in their respective movements, but he is too much the prisoner in his private hell. The soldier assassinates the governor, then kills his wife, children and himself. The peculiarly androgynous emperor sees the General as guilty by association, and orders his eyes to be put out. At the moment of physical blindness, he sees his victims—deserter, scavengers, soldier, the resurrected dead. As the lunatics smother the General for destroying their fantasies of escape, the victims sing a slow marching-song of triumph.
What seems so admirable about Bond's plays is that there are no villains : he knows the darkness of man's soul too well to allow any easy answers. At first sight, there are no villains in The River, but there are in the
production: the governor, a black-suited, Anthony Eden-hatted monster from some ancient socialist demonology, his Edwardian entourage, even the General himself, whose blind-sight conversion cannot earn him redemption ; he is studiously ignored by his victims and left a sprawled, rag-covered heap at the end. The god of world revolution is as stern and unforgiving as Jehovah, with whose followers the new left has so equivocal a relationship.
Two small details, possibly irrelevant: in Bond's libretto a soldier-guard swears angrily at the deserter: 'I'll enjoy making a hole in you tomorrow.' This line is omitted in the libretto as printed by Henze's publishers. A misprint perhaps ? (It is sung on stage however.) The stage direction for the execution of the scavenging Young Woman reads simply 'They [the soldiers] shoot her'. In the production she is dispatched by a filthy officer. With its emphasis on the remoteness of evil authority—its visual references historical, its musical symbols no more threatening than the Eton Boating Song—it looks as though Henze's left is, as so often, still re-fighting the last century's battles. Authority is not remote in today's shrinking world, and there is little in The River to comfort the restless shades of Mrs Dora Bloch or the sad, sad cripples of Luanda. May they not be counted as victims in Henze's book ?
Marxism, Schmarxism, what does it matter so long as he can write for the theatre? And despite one or two purely physical problems, he can, as forcefully as any composer working today. Designer Jurgen Henze (his brother) has devised three acting areas on the extended operahouse stage, and there are three separate orchestras, two of them on stage level. Neither the sight-lines nor the sound-lines work in certain parts of the stalls (an ideological gesture ?). In Felsenstein's house, seats from which you couldn't see were simply not sold. Bond's sixteen scenes are reduced to eleven by Henze, and many are played simultaneously. This plays havoc with the opening, which is simply incompre
hensible, and elsewhere key words in the text are covered by something happening on another part of the stage. There are two big triple-actions : in Act 1 the preparations for the execution of the deserter, a crucial dialogue between the General and the young Woman, and a wholly irrelevant fatigue squad; in Act 2 a cabinet meeting, the soldier deciding to assassinate the governor, and the soldier's wife and family waiting anxiously at home. Both ensembles build to a stunning theatrical climax, but far too much is lost in the process both here and elsewhere. The old operatic ensemble represented a pause for amplification, for emotional recharging; I know of no other case where decisive action is thus obscured.
But at other times the interaction between the three acting areas is most dramatically plotted, and there are countless episodes where Henze's skill in writing for the stage is breathtaking—as, for instance, when the soldier tells the General what is happening in the outside world to a simple but telling orchestral figure that grows ever more urgent as the General fails to react. The. scenes for the Governor's Edwardian entourage—all twittering coloratura and brass-band bombast—show Henze in his most engaging satirical vein. There is much beautiful writing for the mad people and for the emperor—most of it slow-moving; there is a danger of the dramatic pace, so masterfully controlled in the first act for all its confusion, sagging here. The orchestral writing, for a bewildering combination of archaic and modern instruments, is as colourful as only Henze knows how, and David Atherton's control of the multi' spatial forces is beyond praise. Various liftings, from Bach.to Weill, are used to good purpose, and Henze's English word-setting seems faultless.
The care and devotion that have gone into the production constitute a major triumph for the Royal Opera. There are 127 named roles, each one expertly filled. Norman Welsby (General) has to cope with the heaviest orchestration (I fancy a sturdier baritone than his is needed) but he does what he can; as his Pentheus showed, he is adept at suggesting spiritual torture on stage. Josephine Barstow (Young Woman), Anne Wilkins (Old Woman), Deborah Cook (chief twitterer), Raimund Herincx (gover nor) and Valerie Masterson (wife) are all quite excellent. As the soldier, Gerald English gives a stunning exhibition of vocal expressiveness and complete verbal clarity. Gary Kettel's frenzied percussion cadenzas fully earned him a round of applause at the first two performances. This is a major work, however mallY reservations one may nurture about its politico-aesthetic message. Mine could be summed up by the ending, with the ensemble of victims gazing dewy-eyed into the middle distance to sing the only trite lines in thee libretto. How less potent an affirmation e!' faith it seemed than Len mending that chair in Saved. Bond understands Man and loves him; Henze still finds room for hate.
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