Korngold dream sequence...

Guys, guys...wait...what.....

So, here we go. Jonas Kaufmann is singing the role of Paul in Korngold's Die tote Stadt at the Bavarian State Opera, starting on 18 November. And Kirill Petrenko is conducting, and Marlis Petersen is Marietta and if the announcement on Twitter hadn't been accompanied by a slightly worrying cartoon, I'd have fallen off the proverbial chair. One has of course been hoping for years that Kaufmann might do this. (One might even have mentioned such a hope when interviewing him five years ago, just in case - if he was already thinking about it by then, the cards were not revealed.) But gosh, I hope I'm not dreaming.

This video introducing the production suggests that director Simon Stone could well do it proud. (And indeed - update - a Die tote Stadt fan on Twitter tells me he has attended Stone's production in Basel and that it was "the best I've ever seen".) "We must go through the dark times so that we can see the light again," Stone says. "That's what's so great about the piece." Kaufmann meanwhile points out that the work contains just about everything that happened in opera between 1850 and 1950, which makes it "pretty difficult".

This opera, with its extended dream sequence, has in the past been an occasional magnet for 'dirctoritis': I've never quite recovered from witnessing Olaf Bär having to sing the Pierrot Tanzlied dressed in a black basque, angel wings and high heels. It's a work with a lot of heart and a lot of heartbreak; it carries a strong message about love and loss that was all too pertinent in the wake of World War I when the opera was premiered. That was, I'm convinced, one reason for its extreme popularity in the inter-war years - though its generous, atmospheric score and powerhouse roles for the lead singers might just explain something too. 

Speaking of dreams, yesterday I logged on to the Deutsche Oper Berlin site to see if they were doing their hugely successful production of Korngold's Das Wunder der Heliane again, and it suggested to me that they were, in late April and early May, and I even checked T's calendar to see if he'd be free to go and see any of the performances together, and he wasn't. Then I checked back later - only to find it had completely disappeared. Dream sequence again (or just last year's website)? At least that production is due out on DVD in May. Pre-ordering is available, even if tickets are not. 

Meanwhile in the US, the whole of the Bard Festival is built around Korngold this summer. Not least among the treats on offer will be the US staged premiere of Das Wunder der Heliane, conducted by the marvellous Leon Botstein. The festival also contains a concert performance of Die tote Stadt, a rare performance of the Piano Concerto for Left Hand, the Piano Quintet, the Symphony in F sharp, the Passover Psalm and much, much more. Music by Korngold's contemporaries, peers and mentors sets the context, spanning the worlds from Heliane to Hollywood with much in between.

Korngold now has what he has needed the most: top-level international advocacy. With Leon Botstein at Bard, Kaufmann, Petersen and Petrenko in Munich and Christoph Loy in charge of Heliane in Berlin, there's no doubt about the take-up, the appeal and the power. But there's only one thing missing: a real presence in the UK's opera world. One staged production of Die tote Stadt has come to Covent Garden, ever, many years ago. And that was that - which is frankly nuts. Perhaps Korngold is perceived as too European for one lot of Brits and too American for the others. It's time this changed. Thxbi >books plane to Munich<. 

A lost concerto from Hungary, 1942: world premiere ahead

Barnabas Kelemen, the brilliant young violinist from Budapest, wrote to me recently with an astonishing story. On 2 May at Carnegie Hall, New York, he is giving the world premiere of a violin concerto by the Hungarian composer Mihaly Nádor, who died in the Holocaust in 1944. It is part of a powerful programme from the American Symphony Orchestra under the conductor Leon Botstein: entitled 'Hungary Torn', it features world and US premieres of several works by Hungarian composers, including the US premiere of Dohnányi's Szeged Mass.

The Nádor Concerto dates from two years before its composer's tragic death. I asked Barnabas to tell us more about it...


JD: Barnabas, how did the Violin Concerto by Mihaly Nádor come to light? And how did you come to be giving its world premiere?

BK: I got a phone call from my dear friend, the viola player Peter Barsony, who said that after years of research he had found several interesting pieces from Hungarian composers who suffered under the regimes of the first part of the 20th century. One of the most interesting was the Violin Concerto by Mihály Nádor, who died in the Holocaust in 1944 and finished his concerto in 1942. The manuscript was found in the Hungarian National Széchenyi Music Library. Leon Botstein, the concert's conductor, is always interested in this kind of repertoire, finding interesting music that hasn't been played, but is really worth learning. And they asked me would I be interested...? And I very much was and I'm just more and more enthusiastic about the piece!

JD: What is the music like? What do you enjoy most about it? Do you think it is a work that might enter the general concert repertoire now?

BK: The greatest thing about this concerto, first, is that it's a real masterpiece. It's about 30 minutes long and there wouldn't be any part that I'd like to cut out or change! Nádor himself was a violinist, but mainly he was an operetta and film-music composer. He also composed several concert works. The piece is full of post-romantic colours, with Nádor's own voice: very virtuoso, with some interesting new ideas for violinists, many inspired by the Mid-European/Hungarian styles. They say that as he finished the first movement in Munich he wanted to premiere it, but at the end he had to confess that it was too difficult for him and he wasn't able to play it! Truly the Violin Concerto is equally as difficult as any of the greatest romantic violin concertos, if not more virtuoso than some. I think if we compare the piece to violin concertos by Goldmark, Walton, Elgar and Korngold, then Nádor has the chance to be part of this - though no one has heard it, so let's wait until the world premiere and the reactions...

JD: Do you think there are many more pieces by him waiting to be rediscovered and performed?

BK: Nádor was one of the best operetta and variete compsers of the early 20th century after Lehár and Imre Kálmán, with some great compositions for some of the famous movies of the '30s in Hungary. He was a student of the Ferenc Liszt Music Academy, where I happen to teach chamber music after being a violin professor for seven years. After learning and world-premiering his great Violin Concerto I will surely look into his repertoire what else I could play (indeed, premiere) as his concerto was a wonderful, great adventure in this style for me. Not many violinsts can get to know a masterpiece in this style first in the world and bring it to a premiere in Carnegie! It's a real honour that Leon Botstein and the American Symphony Orchestra asked me to play this concert in the Carnegie Hall, where I had the chance to play a recital 60 years after another Hungarian masterpiece had been premiered there by Yehudi Menuhin, the Solo Sonata by Béla Bartók. This piece was also on my recital's program in 2004.

JD: Do you have any plans for further performances or a recording? 

BK: I'm seriously thinking about both the further performances of the Nádor Violin Concerto and a recording, but first I'd like to perform the piece. I can't wait to hear the orchestration, not only from looking at the score. Hungary must take the Hungarian premiere very seriously!