Lulu (opera)
Lulu is an opera in three acts by Alban Berg. Berg adapted the libretto from Frank Wedekind's two Lulu plays, Erdgeist and Die Büchse der Pandora. Berg died before completing the third and final act, and the opera was typically performed as a "torso" until Friedrich Cerha's 1979 orchestration of the act 3 sketches, which is now established as the standard version. Lulu is notable for using twelve-tone technique during a time that was particularly inhospitable to it. Theodor W. Adorno praised it as "one of those works that reveals the extent of its quality the longer and more deeply one immerses oneself in it."
The opera tells the story of Lulu, an ambiguous femme fatale in the fin de siècle, through a series of chiastic structures in both the music and drama alike. Introduced allegorically and symbolically as a serpent in the prologue, she survives three dysfunctional marriages while navigating a network of alternately dangerous and devoted admirers. Her first husband, the physician, dies of stroke upon finding her in flagrante delicto with the painter. Her second husband, the painter, dies by suicide when he learns that she is being married off and has been sexually exploited since childhood by the businessman, among others. This latter man, she says, was "the only one" who "rescued" and "loved" her. She convinces him to become her third husband but kills him when he becomes paranoid and violent. She escapes prison with the help of her lesbian admirer, the Countess Geschwitz, and they flee to London with her lover Alwa. But they are ruined by a stock market crash, reducing her to prostitution. One of her clients beats Alwa to death, and the next, Jack the Ripper, murders Lulu and Geschwitz.
History
Composition
Berg did not begin work on Lulu until 1929, after he had completed his other opera, Wozzeck. Thanks to Wozzecks success Berg had economic security that enabled him to embark on a second opera. But life in the musical world was becoming increasingly difficult in the 1930s in both Vienna and Germany due to rising antisemitism and the Nazi cultural ideology that denounced the music of Berg, Webern, and others. Even to have an association with someone Jewish could lead to denunciation, and Berg had studied with the Jewish composer Arnold Schoenberg. Wozzeck's success was short-lived, as theatre after theatre succumbed to political pressure and refused to produce it, Erich Kleiber's 30 November 1932 production being the last, while sets and scenery were systematically destroyed. Wozzeck was also banned in the Soviet Union as "bourgeois". Berg found that opportunities for his work to be performed in Germany were growing scarce, and in September 1935 his music was proscribed as Entartete Musik under the label Kulturbolschewismus.Despite these conditions, Berg worked on Lulu in seclusion at his lodge, the Waldhaus, in Carinthia. In the spring of 1934 he learned from Wilhelm Furtwängler that production of Lulu in Berlin would be impossible with the current cultural and political situation. It was at this point that he set the work on the opera aside to prepare a concert suite, in the event that the opera could never be performed, and also considered expanding it into a Lulu Symphony. This was his Symphonische Stücke aus der Oper "Lulu" for soprano and orchestra. Kleiber performed the piece at the Berlin State Opera on 30 November, and despite an enthusiastic reception by some sections of the audience, condemnation by the authorities prompted Kleiber's resignation four days later and departure from Germany. The reaction of periodicals such as Die Musik and Zeitschrift für Musik was particularly hostile. On December 7, Goebbels made a speech equating atonality with "the Jewish intellectual infection," while the January 1935 issue of Die Musik suggested that any reviewer who had written anything favourable about the suite should be dismissed.
In January 1935, the Russian-born American violinist Louis Krasner, who had championed Berg's work in the United States, approached Berg to commission a violin concerto. Berg was reluctant to set aside Lulu for this, but the money was welcomed, as Berg was in financial difficulties, financially and artistically ruined by the Reichskulturkammer. At first there was only a tentative agreement, but at the end of March he told Krasner he would compose it and had started some preliminary work. But it was the tragic death of 18-year-old Manon Gropius on April 22 that prompted Berg to set aside Lulu for the concerto, which he dedicated to her. The concerto was completed swiftly, between April and August of that year, but the time he spent on it prevented him from completing the opera before his sudden death on December 24.
The following portions of the third and final act were fully scored: the first 268 bars; the instrumental interlude between scenes 1 and 2; and the finale of the opera, beginning with the monologue of Countess Geschwitz. The rest of the work remained in short score with indications of instrumentation for much of it. Berg heard the Symphonic Pieces in a BBC radio broadcast from the Queen's Hall, London, on 20 March 1935, conducted by Sir Adrian Boult and produced by Edward Clark. It was the first time he had ever heard any of the music of Lulu. He did not hear these excerpts performed live until a concert in Vienna on December 11, a fortnight before his death.
Roles
Berg specified that a number of cast members should take more than one role. Thus, the singers of Lulu's three husbands return as her clients while a prostitute: one performer each appears as the Doctor and the Professor, as the Painter and the Negro, and as Dr. Schön and Jack the Ripper. Other specified combinations are one mezzo-soprano as the Dresser, the Schoolboy, and the Groom; one tenor as the Prince, the Manservant, and the Marquis; one bass as the Animal Tamer and the Athlete, and another bass as the Theatre Manager and the Banker. Another aspect of the cast list that differs from Wedekind's original is that all characters in the two plays receive a proper name. Berg removed these names except for the five leading roles of Lulu, Schön, Alwa, Geschwitz and Schigolch. Some of Wedekind's other names have sometimes been applied to Berg's characters; for example, the Athlete is often called "Rodrigo Quast", but this name is not in the score.Berg perhaps modeled the Geschwitz role on his lesbian sister Smaragda, Dr. Schön on Arnold Schoenberg, the Painter on Richard Gerstl, Schigolch on his wife Helene's biological father, and Alwa on himself, among other semiautobiographical and allegorical elements, according to Olaf Winnecke. The physician Dr. Goll, as in Wozzeck, may represent society.
Synopsis
In the Prologue, a circus animal tamer introduces Lulu symbolically as a serpent and the other roles likewise as various "domesticated" animals.In Act 1, Lulu is being painted in a late 19th-century studio in a city like Vienna. Dr. Schön and his son Alwa, a composer and admirer, are visiting. When they leave, the Painter ravishes her. Dr. Goll, her physician husband, finds them and dies of stroke. Lulu inherits his wealth. Later in scene 2, the Painter has happily married her, but one day news of Schön's engagement angers her. Since childhood, she has been sexually groomed by the elder Schön, who is trying to discard her. The same day, the asthmatic Schigolch, who may or may not be Lulu's father or another one of her lovers, had visited them as a beggar. Schön explains these matters to the Painter so that he may properly "handle" Lulu. But the Painter reaches his breaking point, realizing that he does not know who Lulu—or "Nelly", "Eva", or "Mignon"—is. When the Painter dies by suicide, Schön blames Lulu, calling her a "murderess". In scene 3, Schön himself tries to manage Lulu by making her a dancer. A Prince plans to marry her and move to Africa. She persuades Schön to marry her instead.
In Act 2, Schön is jealous of her cadre of admirers, including the lesbian Geschwitz. He experiences paranoid delusions and hallucinations. He tries to kill Lulu, but she kills him instead. During the cinematic sequence, Lulu is tried, convicted, and imprisoned before Geschwitz helps her escape via the infirmary, having both contracted cholera together to this end. Though free in scene 2, Lulu is a shadow of her former self. Alwa still idealizes her as his muse. They flee the law to London, and her admirers follow.
In Act 3, some of them blackmail and threaten to sex traffick her, perhaps to Africa. She arranges to have one murdered with Geschwitz's help. The stock market crashes, ruining everyone. In scene 2, Lulu is reduced to prostitution as perhaps before in her childhood. Seeking money, Schigolch finds only a book of homilies in the coat of Lulu's first client, the Professor, who has discreetly paid Lulu in advance. Her second client, an African Prince, refuses to pay and beats Alwa dead. Geschwitz contemplates suicide. Lulu is so captivated by her third client, Jack the Ripper, that she waives payment. He murders Lulu and her "crazy sister" Geschwitz, who dies mourning Lulu.
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Prologue
The animal tamer appears from behind the curtain, whip in handA circus animal tamer welcomes the audience, Hereinspaziert in die Menagerie and describes the various animals in his menagerie, such as tigers, bears and monkeys. He lifts the curtain, and calls for the snake to be brought on. A stage hand carries out Lulu dressed as Pierrot, while the animal tamer describes her in biblical terms as the source of evil, fated to murder, Sie ward geschaffen, Unheil anzustiften... Zu morden – ohne dass es einer spürt., and orders her off, while inviting the audience to see what will unfold. He then retires behind the curtain, which rises on scene 1.