Die Tote Stadt

Erich Korngold

September 13, 2014 at 7:30pm
NEC’s Jordan Hall

Die Tote Stadt

Music by Erich Korngold

Libretto by Paul Schott (pseudonym of Erich and Julius Korngold), after the novel Bruges-la-Morte by Georges Rodenbach

Sung in German with projected English titles

Erich Korngold’s Die tote Stadt (The Dead City) tells the story of Paul, a young man torn between fidelity to the memory of his deceased wife and a growing attraction to her living look-alike. Paul enters a series of increasingly disturbing and violent visions, and the plot takes on the subtleties of a psychological thriller.

“This is proof that…opera can certainly flourish in Boston.”

–Edge

Cast and Creative

Gil Rose
Conductor

Jay Hunter Morris
Paul

Meagan Miller
Marietta/Marie

Weston Hurt
Frank

Erica Brookhyser
Brigitta, Paul’s housekeeper

Thomas Meglioranza
Fritz, an actor

Frank Kelley
Victorin, the director

Sara Heaton
Juliette, a dancer

Janna Baty
Lucienne, a dancer

Alan Schneider
Count Albert

Jonas Budris
Gaston, a dancer

New World Chorale
Holly M. Krafka, Founder & Artistic Director

Youth Chorus
Members of Boston City Singers and Cambridge Children’s Chorus
Wendy Silverberg, Boston City Singers Early Childhood Music Director

PRODUCTION STAFF

Cori Ellison … Supertitle Translator
Dan McGaha … Supertitle Operator
Karin Hartmann Ludlow … Production Stage Manager
Veronica Haakonsen … Assistant Stage Manager
Séan Swords … Assistant Stage Manager
Ryland Bennett … Orchestra Manager
Anthony D’Amico … Personnel Manager

Background

Die tote Stadt is a masterpiece of modern opera, premiered simultaneously in Hamburg and Cologne in 1920. Much admired by Berg, Puccini, and Alfred Hitchcock, this (originally Belgian) horror story was transformed by the composer and his father into an operatic libretto that mirrored 1910s Viennese art, literature, and society. Its composer was one of the stars of early twentieth-century Viennese modernism, acclaimed by Gustav Mahler as a genius, and a rare confidant to Brahms.

Read the program notes