Author: Gabrielle Liberman

So that was it! The month finally came to an end and we performed our recital at the historic Alte Börse. I was able to perform two pieces (both by Schumanns) one was “Die stille Lotosblume” by Clara Schumann and the other was “Widmung” by Robert Schumann (which I learned a little bit later into the process than I care to admit translated to dedication).

The piece by Clara Schumann which translates to “the still lotus flower” is a very symbolic piece centering around of course a lotus flower and several other natural/organic potentially male actors. Apparently this structure was common in her pieces (especially in her art song where about one third of the compositions centered around flowers). I learned this funnily enough because of an article stemming from Princeton titled “Speech and Silence: Encountering Flowers in the Lieder of Clara Schumann” (you can find Dr. Heller in the footnotes!!) which talks about the imagery Clara utilized and its symbolism regarding gender when she discussed floral metaphors in her pieces. Namely the figures of the Moon which pours its golden rays into the bosom of the flower (somewhat reminiscent of impregnation) and the swan, which circles around the flower, gazing upon it, singing its song in which the swan wishes to fade away are the primary “male” influences according to the background the article provides. Their difference in roles (the Moon having such a profound, direct effect on the flower while the swan helplessly swims around it, its song almost fading away with it) provide an interesting juxtaposition to how Clara Schumann thought about men and their influence in a female figure’s life. In this specific piece (and apparently often in her lieder which focused on flowers, Clara would center whichever flower she chose and yet leave it un-impacted by the actions of “male” actors. What she truly meant by this choice is unclear and definitely up to interpretation.

Interestingly, I also learned from Christopher Parton’s article that Clara was gifted a flower book by Brahms, a common gift that women would use to share pressed flowers amongst each other (a sign of friendship). Some sources have said it was a subtle way for Schumann and Brahms to express their romantic interest in one another (perhaps with a pressed rose), but, similarly to Clara’s lieder, the flower book or “Blumenbuch” was definitely not a simple secret message carrier. Clara eventually filled it with flowers and titled it “Blumenbuch für Robert” and laid it upon her husband’s grave when he died.

Wow! I’ve given so much space to Clara, I may not have enough space for Robert! (Since that so rarely occurs the other way around, I think I’ll keep it this way). I think through translating and re-translating Widmung, I’ve re-interpreted it over and over again and still don’t know how to think about it. It’s such a strong dedication of love and affection but at the same time full of darkness, especially with the line “you are my grave” following sentiments like “you are my soul, you are my heart.” I honestly still have more thinking to do about how this piece really functions tonally. Is there a hint of desperation? Sickness? Or in its darkness does it really encapsulate the painful nature and backwardness of love?

TBD for now!

Gabrielle

Nearing the end of our trip, we took some time to explore Mendelssohn House before attending a Lieder recital with Columbia students. Since we only had an hour to get through the whole museum, we had to make our time count. The museum was structured into three floors: the first explored general contributions of Felix Mendelssohn tied into Leipzig history, the second featured more about his home life and his wife, Cécile, and the third focused on his sister, Fanny Hensel who was also a composer.

Before going to the Mendelssohn House, I listened to an two episodes of the podcast: Opera After Dark which gave some background on both the Mendelssohns. I really enjoy the podcast because it’s well-researched (one of the hosts also speaks on the Met Opera Guild podcast and is a musicologist) but the tone is lighthearted and silly which for opera works really well since so many opera plots are fairly insane to begin with. Going back to the Mendelssohns, the episode I listened to on Felix centered more on his personal life with topics ranging from his somewhat parasitic relationship with Fanny, attempted affair later in his marriage, and his unflattering neck beard. The museum offered a much more positive view of Felix. It detailed his contributions to Leipzig, most notably through the Gewandhaus. As one plaque described, Mendelssohn was, for a time, the Gewandhaus orchestra’s conductor whose “sense of moral responsibility impelled him to call for socially minded benefits for the members of his orchestra” which included working for the official recognition of the Gewandhaus as a municipal institution and increased salaries for his musicians. It was extremely exciting to hear some of his music as part of the museum. This largely took place in the green room, where you could even self-conduct his pieces (we did this with his Midsummer Night’s Dream) and choose how loudly each instrument should be played and even the type of venue it would be played for.

Going into the Mendelssohn House, I knew there were mixed accounts of the relationship between Fanny and Felix. Fanny was the oldest of the Mendelssohn children, born 4 years before Felix. She was also a composer and played piano and Felix supported her composition — but only in private. Felix and Fanny lived in Germany in the same era as Clara Schumann (and actually were good friends with the Schumanns later in life) and during that time, a woman would play piano as an erudite hobby to imply higher social status, not as a career. This was a notion that impacted both Clara and Fanny (albeit in different ways). Both Felix and his father discouraged Fanny from showing her compositions in public and under her name. One of the most hotly debated issues arising from this is that Felix would play his sister’s pieces under his own name. Some, erring on the more favorable side of the debate will say that this was a way for Felix to get his sister’s music out there, even if she couldn’t take credit for it. Others argue that he purposefully stifled her public exposure out of sexism and a fear of competition. I believe both arguments have evidence backing them. For example, the first is supported by the fact that when Felix played for Queen Victoria and she requested one of Fanny’s lieder (“Italien”), he confessed to his sister having composed it. On the other hand, while Felix supported Clara Schumann’s public performance and composition career, he suppressed Fanny’s, leading one to wonder why his response towards his sister was so different. Was he intimidated by her? Did he see her innate talent as a threat? Overall, the relationship between the two siblings was quite positive, with Fanny speaking highly of him and occasionally depending on his praise to continue composing. In some of her letters (she wrote so many, that on her floor of the Mendelssohn house, there was a whole room dedicated to them), she confessed that if Felix didn’t believe her compositions were worthwhile, she would stop composing altogether. However, despite their close relationship, occasionally Fanny rebelled and played her own music much later in her life.

The Mendelssohn family also had an interesting relationship with religion, namely Judaism. Their grandfather, Moses Mendelssohn, was a “preeminent Jewish philosopher of the German Enlightenment” (Library of Congress) in a period where Jews were largely marginalized. Given the challenges of being Jewish and social/economic advancement during that time, the Moses Mendelssohn family children (the generation before Felix and Fanny) practiced different faiths. Of the six, two remained Jewish, two converted to Catholicism, and two converted to Protestantism. One of the two who embraced Protestantism was Felix and Fanny’s father, Abraham. There’s so much more to say on this topic, but this post is becoming quite long and I could write a whole book on this, so I’ll stop here for now.

Can’t wait to keep learning about the Mendelssohns and their beautiful music!

Gabrielle

https://www.loc.gov/collections/felix-mendelssohn/articles-and-essays/felix-mendelssohn-and-jewish-identity/

Oper Leipzig take #2: Mozart’s Don Giovanni. After a thematically confusing (occasionally disturbing) performance of Pique Dame, I can safely say Oper Leipzig redeemed itself with its performance of Don Giovanni. Having read the original play the opera is based on (actually a Spanish work called “Don Juan Tenorio y convidado de piedra) in my Spanish Literature class in high school, this was a very full circle moment for me. Before we read the play aloud, we chose roles, none of which we were briefed on beforehand. I played Don Juan (who became Giovanni) and by the end of the play my character had slept with 3 women, killed one of their dads, and then been killed by his ghost. Suffice to say, it was a lot to take in.

When I saw the chance to see Don Giovanni, I jumped on it, along with Vito and Lucien! The standout singers in our opinions were Don Ottavio (Dalla sua pace, one of his arias, made me tear up) and Donna Anna, who had an incredibly powerful and resonant voice. Luckily for us though, every singer across the board was fantastic and perfectly cast to their character. I especially loved the directorial choice made with regards to Leporello. He was dressed as a Doordash delivery guy when he first entered which made his carrying out of all of Don Giovanni’s ridiculous tasks even more absurd (and surprisingly, it wasn’t too cheesy of an effect)! Then, every time I passed a bike with a food delivery package, I chuckled thinking about Leporello (pretty good marketing).

The set design also made this production incredibly special. I’ve attached the best photo I took of it on this post to give you an idea of the layout. Basically the stage was designed to resemble Don Giovanni’s mansion with plenty of secret passageways and hidden entrances. Getting to see the multiple characters in their respective rooms during the opera was really well blocked to not be too much for the eye but just enough that if you focused on one character, you would look back at the others and be occasionally surprised by their new task. One strong example of this was when they surreptitiously replaced the stone bust depicting Donna Ana’s dead father with the real live singer so that the statue miraculously came alive! The lighting during any of the ghost scenes was really exciting as well — the whole stage was covered in this smoky green hue that we only got to see twice in the whole run — causing the effect to not feel overused.

From a more political standpoint, I think the piece dealt with themes of sexual assault against women well. Part of that is of course derived from the original libretto, but I appreciated how differently the characters of the three women (Ana, Elvira, and Zerlina) were portrayed (with some being more stereotypically innocent than others) and yet eventually unified in their efforts against Don Giovanni.

All in all, I absolutely loved the production and it’s now one of my favorite operas!

PS: Watch Amadeus if you haven’t already!

Gabrielle

If you know me, you know I love coffee. However! I am not addicted to caffeine. How can this be? I grew up drinking coffee since I was 6 years old (maybe when I was 6 it was mostly milk, but it was still my job to brew the coffee every morning). My mom began drinking coffee when she was 5. While this may not be normal for most American families, my mom’s side of the family is Colombian, and there’s much less stigma related to coffee there. Plus, it’s typical to add cinnamon! This practice did not turn into a caffeine addiction because due to having ADHD, I actually experience the opposite effect from coffee — it makes me sleepy and calms me down. So, if I don’t drink coffee in the mornings I don’t really feel a difference at all because after all, it’s always been more of a social and cultural activity for me.

Okay! That was a lot, But that background brings me here, to Germany, where I have quickly fallen in love with the culture of “Kaffee and Kuchen” on Sundays. I like the idea of one day each week being a Ruhetag, and as someone who’s not very religious, I appreciate how it’s done in Germany. Businesses except for cafes and ice cream places are closed, and the expectation is that you’ll sit (preferably outside) with friends and family and exchange gossip or “Kaffeeklatsch.” Clearly from having read about and listened to Bach’s coffee cantata, coffee and coffeehouses have held important social roles for quite a while. In fact, how long coffeehouses have been around is fairly fascinating to me (and maybe this is just an amazement of how much older many buildings in Europe are than in the US), but Cafe Riquet (where our one on one German sessions are being primarily held) was founded in 1745 — a year before Princeton was founded! When I decided to first check it out on my own, I felt a bit like a fish out of water after realizing that I was the only person with a laptop out, working. To be fair, this was on the holiday we had off, but I still haven’t seen too many people working in coffeeshops when I walk around town (which is quite often). While working in a coffee shop is definitely my happy place, it’s caused me to wonder how the same exact spaces are treated in different geographic locations. I wonder what it must feel like to go to a US coffeeshop on a Sunday (or any day) and see almost everyone with their headphones in, bent over their computers. It does stress how we as Americans can be quite individualistic and perhaps more antisocial than other regions where rest time is more built into the weekly schedule.

Wondering where these traditions all began, I decided to read a bit more about German Kaffee und Kuchen. I began by reading an article from the Goethe Institute called “The Culture of Coffee.” It starts with an interesting account from a student named David who grew up in Germany and left to attend the University of Minnesota for college. He remarks that in contrast to to-go cups in the US, many german coffee places serve you your drink on a porcelain cup which means you’d have to take your time and finish your drink before you leave the coffee house, forcing you to slow down. He also remarks that coffee is treated as more of a stimulant in the US (students would drink it to perform better in class, feeling a dependency on caffeine) whereas coffee in Germany was drank more for enjoyment or as a social activity.

Next, the interviewer speaks with a local expert in Berlin: Jochen Hintze, the owner and founder of JOcaffè Rösterei und Maschinen, which is a shop roastery. He notes that his favorite aspect (aside from the coffee and a good Kenyan roast) is the way that people who live in the same neighborhood get to know each other through the coffee shop. In my experience, I have almost never met someone new at a coffee shop and stayed in touch. Places like Small World and Sakrid function more for maintaining pre-existing relationships or running into friends which has its own positive aspects, but I find it interesting that meeting new people seems to be more associated with coffee shops in Germany.

Next, Hitze begins explaining that another term for Kaffee und Kuchen is ‘Konditoren gehen’ because the tradition used to be centered on visiting a cake shop called ‘Konditorei,’ getting a slice of cake, and having a cup of coffee. He also talks about the shift in coffee culture from the mid-80s to the arrival of Starbucks in Germany. Surprisingly, he describes it as a positive shift in bringing back coffee culture as it encouraged people to leave their houses to get a cup of coffee.

Upon return to the US, I will definitely continue enjoying Ruhetag on Sundays and inviting my friends out to Kaffee und Kuchen perhaps at Small World, perhaps somewhere else.

https://www.goethe.de/prj/tbp/en/bpa/cul.html

On Saturday night, a group of us went and saw Tchaikovsky’s Pique Dame (The Queen of Spades) at Oper Leipzig. The opera house itself was very grand, with four separate coat checks on the entry floor! The outside of the building was light gold or buttery yellow, and the inside was warm-feeling with various shades of beige and gold intermixed.

I’m someone who likes to go into shows somewhat blind. With opera, I tend to only read the synopsis and maybe listen to a few of the main songs before seeing the work because usually a bit more context is necessary for foreign-language pieces (especially since this was my first Russian opera). Funnily enough, because of having read the Met’s synopsis, I almost felt more confused during the opera since the director made so many choices that differed from the original version. The Queen of Spades is based on a story by Alexander Pushkin, which follows a man named Hermann (an engineer in the Imperial Russian army) who watches the other officers gamble every night but never gambles himself. When Count Tomsky relays a story of his grandmother, the Countess, Hermann learns of her gambling success and how she used the secret of the three winning cards. He becomes obsessed with learning her secret. This comes into conflict with his love for Lisa, a woman he initially does not know the name of but whom he has fallen in love with, since she is the Countess’ granddaughter and engaged to Prince Yeletsky. The opera ends in tragedy as Hermann’s dual obsessions with his love for Lisa and the secret of the cards result in the death of the Countess, a broken engagement between Lisa and Prince Yeletsky, Lisa’s death by drowning, and eventually his own. Having been tricked by the ghost of the countess, who tells him his three lucky cards are the 3, 7, and ace, he bets ridiculous sums of money on them only to find that the final card is not the ace at all, but the queen of spades. Having lost everything in pursuit of this fortune, he shoots himself, believing that the queen of spades is an amalgamation of the Countess herself, taking her revenge.

Throughout Oper Leipzig’s production, there were several notable variations that threw me off, given my preexisting knowledge of the plot. Some changes I liked or was at least intrigued by, while others contrasted too sharply with the libretto. Other directorial choices I felt were over the top, simply done for shock value. I have many thoughts about this production, and now I will pretend to be a weathered opera critic, unabashedly sure of her opinions. 

Beginning with the set, I enjoyed most of the set design and usage of space. The curtain rose to reveal a rocky, graveyard-esque terrain that I heard several others describe as appearing like the surface of the moon. For a darker opera, it set the tone well, and throughout the show was well-utilized to portray all types of spaces (different bedrooms, a gambling house, the streets of St. Petersburg, etc.) 30 or so minutes into the opera, it was revealed that the stage could rise, revealing a fully-furnished room underneath the ground. I did not like how the set was used in Act II – frankly, I really didn’t like much about Act II in general. It began with a scrim (a gauzy fabric draped over the main area of the stage) where an image of the underground set was projected. Partway into the Act, during one of the arias, the stage rose again and the room underneath was shown. Now, projected onto the scrim were the actions of Hermann sneaking into the Countess’ room. This effect was cool at first, but it went on for almost the entire act and the illusion was shattered as the physical actors weren’t in time with their holographs. It also wasn’t clear what purpose this doubling of the scene served at all. My favorite use of the set was in Act III, where the aboveground layer was converted into a gambling house and a square rim of lights was set above the scene. I felt like Act III was the strongest act in terms of set usage – there just wasn’t as much going on which was a relief since many choices were so left field, they became distracting and took away from the music.

In terms of costuming, I didn’t love how either Hermann or Lisa was portrayed. Hermann often looked ragged with a stained shirt and wild hair, and his unappealing portrayal through the show made me very unsure of how to consider the love story between him and Lisa – despite being the main tenor role his character was very unsympathetic. I understand that Hermann is considered half-hero and half-antihero, and I would have understood a production fully leaning into the antihero angle, but an antihero is still not a villain, and I felt like it wasn’t made clear enough how we as the audience were supposed to feel about Hermann who was almost fully portrayed as a villainous character throughout. Especially in contrast to Prince Yeletsky who sings of his love of Lisa and his hope to be more than just a husband to her, Hermann seemed especially revolting as he repeatedly ignores Lisa’s please to leave her room, threatening to kill himself. Lisa herself was very nicely clothed in a fur robe when she’s first introduced but then for the entire rest of the show is in this strange jeans and gauze slip combination that looked neither elegant nor practical. Funnily enough, the only time Hermann is dressed nicely is in Act III when he enters the casino wearing a tuxedo with his hair slicked back. Yet, this image is immediately juxtaposed by the libretto where the other men sing of how ill and ragged Hermann looks. It could have been an interesting decision to make the only time Hermann looks put together as what is supposed to be his most repulsive moment and have the audience wonder what else it was about his demeanor that looked so sick (perhaps he looks sick with obsession – a fair assumption to make since it is written into the score that the men are supposedly frightened of his mad, confident demeanor while he gambles), BUT given the sheer number of directorial choices that felt half-baked, I didn’t feel like this was done with well thought out intentions. 

I realize I have written so much and still have a lot to say, so maybe I will add a part 2 later!

Immer eine Kritikerin,

Gabrielle

This is a photo taken of the ceilings of the Nikolaikirche and Thomaskirche during our walking tour yesterday.  Both were very grand although the Nikolaikirche even more so. It even had balconies with their own pews! Can’t wait to see concerts in both.