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Für das vom Wiener Literaturwissenschaftler Herbert Zeman 1979 organisierte Forschungssymposium an der kalifornischen Stanford University zum Thema „Lied and Libretto of Viennese Classicism“ wurde Ernst Krenek als Austro-Kalifornier eingeladen, die Keynote-Ansprache zu halten.
In seinem Vortrag ging Krenek auf das Verhältnis von Text und Musik ein mit besonderer Aufmerksamkeit auf Fragen des Opernschaffens. Er entfaltet seine Darstellung entlang von Überlegungen zu stilistischen Entwicklungen der Gattung von ihren frühen Anfängen über Monteverdi, Mozart bis zu Wagner, geht aber auch auf Franz Schubert und dessen weniger erfolgreiches und bekanntes Opernschaffen ein.
It gives me great pleasure to appear here at this symposium
devoted to the problems of lied, libretto and related matters as
they were reflected in the oeuvre of the
am much obliged to Professor
keynote for this meeting. The only qualification I can produce
for this distinction is the fact that I have written about twenty
operas, most of them on my own librettos, and several song cycles,
also on my own words. Evidently, I have devoted much thought to
the relationships of language and music, of word and tone. Facing
so many learned experts who gathered here coming from faraway
parts to discuss these matters in the light of the classical
period, I shall not try to delve into historical detail of which
my knowledge is negligible, but limit myself to a few remarks on
libretto and lied as seen from the vantage point of a present
day composer.
The linguistie substructure of an opera is called a
libretto, a term that carries a somewhat belittling connotation,
and not surprisingly so, for it is a diminutive derived from
the Italian word for book: libro. A libretto is just a little
booklet, a minor preparation that does not quite live up to the
specifications of literature, which tacitly implies that a self-
respecting litérateur would hardly consider writing librettos,
unless driven to it.
It seems that music, in the process of assimilating a text
in order to produce an opera somehow brings it down from the lofty
levels of literature. How, and exactly why does this happen? Every-
body that has anything to do with opera knows that the application
of music to a text extends the duration of the text to approximat-
ely the triple of the duration of the same text if spoken without
music. This is a very simple rule of the thumb that serves composers
as well as librettists and hardly needs much explanation. It is,
however, interesting to look for a moment into the aesthetical
implications of this condition.
We know that opera very early developed a tendency towards
discriminating sharply between two types of setting the words: on
the one hand the recitative, on the other hand the integrated mus-
ical form, such as aria, duet, or other kinds of ensemble singing.
As far as the time factor is concerned, the recitative section ap-
proaches most closely the natural speed of the spoken word, so
that the action carried on in those sections is hardly slower
than it would be without music, whereas in the integrated musical
forms, especially in the ensembles, action frequently comes to a
complete standstill when the singers are not even communicating
with each other, but presenting simultaneous monologues, a styl-
istic convention of opera which audiences have learned to accept
without questioning its obvious absurdity.
Opera is a particularly stylized form of dramatic present-
ation because it coordinates two time-mechanisms of entirely
ferent properties. Music acts upon time exactly in the manner of
a clock, that is to say: music measures time. Any musical process
consists of a certain number of tones, each of which begins to
sound and stops sounding at appointed moments, reckoning from the
beginning of the process. By these events the time span taken up
by the process is subdivided in a number of time units. Time is
divested of its character of a continuum and imparted a sort
of granulated texture. This may sound a little startling, because
nobody appears to experience music in this manner. And not even
the admission that the events occurring in a musical process are
far more involved and diversified than the ticking of a clock-work
would account for the essential difference between hearing time
cut into little pieces by an intricate machinery and listening to
an Adagio by Beethoven. The crucial point is that we are sure to
experience motion floating between, and intimately connecting, the
single elements of the musical process as they follow each other,
While no such motion seems to take place between the time units
carved out of the continuum by a mechanical contrivance. We speak
of a melody as moving through various pitches, of a harmonic
progression as moving from degree to degree, we speak of rhythmic
drive, and use freely a great many kinetic terms in discussing
music. It is these kinetic concepts that make music something
different from a succession of premeditated noises. But it is just
as well to realize that it is we who are fully responsible for this
interpretation of what we hear, for actually in a melody nothing
whatever moves: one tone stops sounding, and another begins to sound.
Even the most primitive listener, without knowing it, supplies some-
thing behind, and underneath, the tones of a melody: a kind of silent,
streaming energy, a sort of primordial force, whose subtle and im-
mensely rich motion can be estimated by correlating those points at
which it bursts forth onto the surface of audibility, these points
being the tones of the melody which we actually hear. In other words,
it is our mental powers that invest the process with the idea of a
continuum of motion after the process by its very nature had divested
time of its continuity. Thus the new artificial continuity of motion
as represented in music, takes place in time spans which, in a manner
of speaking, are lifted out of their original context within the nat-
ural continuity of real life.
Not all music is equally distant from the continuous char-
acter of ordinary time. Music that follows in rhythm and meter clos-
ely the inflection of speech is nearest to, music that rests upon
rhythmic and metrical systems of a different type is farthest remote
from the continuity of life. Our opera came into being concurrent with
the secularisation of music, that is, with the acceptance by art music
of the principles governing folk music in the Middle Ages. The modest
musico-dramatic essays of those earlier times, such as Robin et Marion, are all based on the clock-work type of music,
on the regulr distribution of accents in symmetrical periods. It is
interesting to notice that the artistically oriented composers who
made the first attempts at real opera writing tried to avoid this
influence which obviously contradicted the continuity of dramatic
action. Amfiparnasso, tried with great
ingenuity to derive whatever he could of continuity from a flexible
handling of the madrigal style; that is, technically speaking, he
mustered whatever was left in the madrigal style of free accent dis-
tribution in order to match the quick pace of the comedy. Orfeo come closest to
a kind of grafting principles of the ancient, free Gregorian decla-
mation onto the new harmonic style, and it is precisely in this re-
spect that these composers also come closest to the diction of the
Greek tragedy which they so assiduously strove to revive. However, the
future of opera lay elsewhere. It was the same
ently against his repeatedly professed doctrine, introduced more and
more metrically bound elements into his dramatic style and establ-
ished the division between recitative and integrated musical form.
And we have to admit that the tremendous attraction emanating from
opera ever since issues not from the expeditious parts of the music
which are best adapted to underscore the continuity of the action,
but from from those sections that are musically most elaborate and
bring the action virtually to a standstill.
While during arias, and especially in ensembles the visible
progress of the dramatic vehicle is interrupted
of emotion pervading the whole is intensified, which in many cases
amounts to an internal acceleration of the action, setting off its
external retardation. The reason is that the peculiar faculty of
music of throwing emotional forces into relief grows in straight pro-
portion with the amount of freedom granted to music in order to unfold
logical structures according to its own laws. In other words, the
most autonomous, most concentrated and coherent musical structure is
the most efficient and eloquent messenger of emotional energies. There-
fore it is possible in the must fully organized musical forms in opera,
which are most anti-naturalistic because of their breaking-up the con-
tinuity of real time, to depict with surprising brevity emotional
movements the magnitude of which in a medium consistent with ord-
inary time would require lengthy psychological preparation. An
emotional about-face, for instance, which might appear on the verge
of the ludicrous in a spoken dialogue, or even in recitative treat-
ment, can be made entirely convincing in a coherent musical struct-
ure in which the decisive turning point is presented as inevitable
crisis brought about through the stringent logic of the musical
process.
From all this it will appear fairly obvious that the ex-
pectations a composer entertains toward his libretto are highly
specific and in many respects different from the working principles
of the playwright so that he eventually turns to a specialist who
will adapt existing plays or make new ones according to specific-
ations. Many professional librettists were hackwriters who would
produce librettos by the ream although some of them were imagin-
ative dramatists, as, for instance,
extraordinary text for L'incoronazionedi Poppea
who worked for
and eade
ettists or, in recent times, by the composers themselves. Ever since
their own librettos, which is interesting enough, be it only because
it was
in secco recitative and integrated musical forms so that the mech-
anics of time perception that I discussed earlier were not so con-
spicuous any longer. Since music was freed of the obligatory period-
ical patterns, versification, heretofore deemed indispensable, also
became optional. It is perhaps these circumstances that in modern
times have encouraged even some writers and poets of literary fame,
such as
composers of stature. But even a libretto with freely fluctuating
diction requires such subtleties of timing that many composers feel
that only they can control them to full satisfaction.
Another point is that composers eventually have become more
aware of having their own ideas about the content of their operas
ettos. Frequently we hear a criticism of this trend to the effect
that opera is no place for expressing ideas because the words can
not be understood anyway. To some extent this argument applies to
certain developments of the operatic style in the eighteenth and
nineteenth centuries when under the influence of bel canto aficion-
ados opera was reduced to efoed
about the text - that is: nobody except the composer who even to
this day, among conductors, stage directors, singers and audiences,
seems to be the only one who consistently takes the text seriously.
We only have to remember the arguments that
with their librettists. And, of course, phonetic perceptibility of
the words is a purely technical matter, depending on sensible and
judicious orchestration on the part of the composer and patience
and relentless insistence on the part of the conductor.
a necessary condition, of course, is that operas be produced
in the language of the presumptive audience. It has been a prejudice
of long standing, fostered by the attitudes of mainly Italian voice
teachers, that operatic music is so identified with the sounds of
the original language - especially as long as this language is
Italian (on the assumption that worthwhile operas could not be
written in any other language) that any translation would destroy
the unique charm of the work. Obviously this argument has no merits
whatever. It has prevailed in this country for a long time because
it appealed to the dominating puritanic mentality that regarded
opera as a morally dubious product imported for the entertainment
of the jaded wealthy that could be tolerated at least as long as
one could not understand what those clows were singing about.
Fortunately this has rapidly changed in our time while,
curiously enough, in Europe the fad of opera in the original
languages has gained some, although insignificant ground. Of
course, an aversion of opera in translation could well be
defended by exhibiting the perfectly atrocious translations that
have littered opera houses all through the nineteenth century up
to our own time. Obviously this would not have to be so, and it
happened only because competent people found the task below their
dignity. Fortunately, this too has changed, and more respectable
writers have come to the rescue of this neglected field.
During the period to which this symposium is devoting
special attention
geniuses. The outstanding work that immediately springs to mind is,
of course, Fidelio, an opera that has remained a moving
humanitarian document not only because of some powerful music of
great emotional impact, but also because of the seriousness and
dignity of its dramatic intent. Granting this, on has to admit that
the libretto suffers from the childish and unbelievable trans-
vestite charade by which the librettist seems to have tried to
make a lofty drama a little entertaining, introducing elements of
routine intrigue. It would appear that
nature
overlook such details, unlike
individual human beings. In his Don Giovanni
cloweries do not detract from his master's abject grandeur, but
rather put it into proper perspective, much like the Shakespearean
fools who throw into relief the tragedies in which they appear.
work of sixhundred songs entertained a lifelong unrewarded love-
affair with the operatic medium. Noticing the quasi-dramatic de-
sign of many of his songs with their recitative and arioso sect-
ions one feels acutely how he must have been longing to express
himself in this style, and considering the wealth of dramatic con-
trasts, jolting surprises, and theatrical gestures that enliven
many of his lyrical creations, we do not doubt that he would have
well qualified as an opera composer. For various reasons he never
seemed to be able to face a real opportunity for testing his talents
in that direction. In the first place the
that time was totally dominated by the easy-going Italians who
furnished the glorified entertainment of routine comedy and vocal
fireworks, a backlash from the Napoleonic wars, desired by a public
recovering from past tribulations. More important probably was the
fact that
sought and found mainly in the circle of his friends, well-intent-
ioned amateurs and semi-professionals who had neither brilliant
ideas nor much original imagination and very little experience in
the uncharted
offer only very few precedents. And to reach out for the first rate
dramatic literature of the period, such as
ations of social conduct in those days, although Schubert did not
hesitate to use the poetry of these writers for his songs. One
may regret that
of better than provincial stature and distinguished literary style,
never felt tempted to produce a libretto for
and admired. But
of
ive opera project, and
inhibitig awe perhaps did not dare to approach the poet.
it is interesting that later Romantic composers who excelled in the
field of the lied did not leave any marks in the dramatic medium
either. The Corregidor
have incorporated in his Spanische Liederbuch
Although at face value the two media seem to be closely re-
lated, it appears that lied composition requires a markedly differ-
ent approach. While even the static elements of opera, the arias
and ensembles, are directly referring to preceding or forthcoming
action, the dramatic happenings that are reflected in songs, as for
instance the subject matter of a ballad, are merely narrated, as
observed from a distant viewpoint. But the majority of song texts
do not at all refer to action, but rather focus on emotional states,
ideas occupying the mind, images of nature, atmospheric vibrations
of the e, contemplation of all this, and many other intangibles.
All these manifold and fleeting concepts are lifted out of the con-
text of real time and pinned down as in an instantaneous photo-
graphic picture, as in a snapshot.
Considering the staggering number of lieder and
their frequently rapid succession in the sequence of his works, we
must ascribe to him an extraordinary sensitivity for the stimuli
emanating from a poem and triggering his creative impulse as well
as a minimum reaction time between reading the poem and conceiving
its musical Gestalt. The camera of his mind apparently was constantly
searching for poetic images and scenes that would reflect at any
given moment some facet of his personality so that he could identify
with them and immediately produce a musical quasi-negative of the
image that had kindled his imagination. The term "snapshot" which
I have just used brings to mind concept
closely associated with the concept of the form of the song cycle,
which lied
to new, spectacular life. Of course, the song, the vocal solo, the
lyrical monologue had existed since time immemorial when, long before
opera, Meister- and Minnesingers, Troubadours and Trouvères had ex-
pressed themselves in this way. It seems that opera interrupted the
tradition of the solo song when the virtuoso vocal display of the
aria absorbed the public attention. It was
vived the contemplative lyricism and expanded it into the new cyclic
form. There is in this a certain relation to the category of drama,
for here, at journey's end, certain
so much through the interplay of adversary forces, but rather as a
result of the intimate clarifying processes that the lyrical subject
was experiencing while passing through so many stations of the inner
or outer landscape, registering his reactions at any point. At least,
this is what I recognized as one of the most invigorating lessons
to be learned from the Viennese master when at various phases of my
life I felt the urge to take inventory of my problems, thoughts, and
feelings in cycles of songs.
Returning for a moment to the libretto, I should like to cast
a glance at later developments. It is obvious that the staging of
opera, as of any
of the entire project, is decisively determined by the sources and
disposition of the light available. Before the invention of electric,
or at leat gas light it was impossible to create on stage any illus-
ion of reality. The great stage designers of the Baroque, such as
trompe l'oeils
ad infinitum, and machinery suggesting
the most outlandish goings-on in heaven, earth and underground.
But atmospheric shadings and, what in German is called Stimmung,
remained elusive as long as the light was static and the orchestra
sitting on stage. Opera was a spectacle arranged for the entertain-
ment of the audience, and its artificiality was not camouflaged.
Aided by the innovations in illumination,
changed all this. The new technology made it possible to create
atmospheric nuances and to represent even miraculous happenings
as real. The orchestra disappeared into a partly covered pit so
that the reflection of its lights would not disturb the scenery
(apart from acoustical considerations.) The Gesamtkunstwerk was
designed to transport the viewer, at least as long as he was under
its spell, into the world of gods and heroes, and make him feel
that this world was real, far above his hundrum every day's life.
There is a certain irony in that just when advanced technology
allowed
med with ease and elegance, his grand-son did away with all of it
and put his shows on a bare and pitch-dark stage.
Apparently, he must have sensed the new trend that questioned
the validity of total illusion. We are again aware that all of this
is just pretense, that the show is put together for our enlight-
enment or entertainment, and we do not mind witnessing how it is
put together.
This vision of dramatic
processes taking place simultaneously on various planes and levels
and their integration with complex musical processes requires very
accurate coordinating and synchronizing all parameters, which
again recommends to some composers taking control of all aspects
of such a project and writing their own librettos. [Not beeing]
equipped with a crystal ball, I shall refrain from making any
guesses as to how it may go on from here - for such would also
be far beyond the framework of the present symposium.
When, in
poet,
his poems, he granted it because I was his friend and he had con-
fidence in me. But he said that basically did not appreciate the
fusion of his words with music because, as he put it, "you dissolve
my poem into a hash of vowels and consonants, and nothing is left
of what I wanted to say." This conversation haunted me for many
years, and eventually, in Quintina, a brief can-
tata for solo voice, with the lines:
Sprache schenkt Musik das Wort, wird stumm
im dunklen Klang, im Ton verweht ihr Sinn.
Language lends the word to music, becomes mute
in the dark sound, in tones it loses its meaning.
But, then, if music makes language mute, it says at the end of the
poem:
Es gellt aus Musik der Stummheit Schrei ins Ohr.
Der Trauer bietet Trost ihr Klang am Ende.
Absurd, prae-logisch, steht Musik am Anfang.
Out of music the cry of muteness pierces the ear.
Solace to the sorrow is extended by sound in the end.
Absurd, pre-logical, music stands at the beginning.
So much for the mystery that cloaks the relation of word and tone.
In conclusion let me say that I hope that some of these
scattered remarks may offer you a few cues for the deliberations
upon which you are about to embark. It gives me great satisfaction
that my old homeland,
such distinction in my new homeland,
the privilege of appearing here under the auspices of this
endowment.