Glyndebourne: The Untold History Page #2

---

Adolf said, "Well, you could speak

to my brother, Fritz."

Christie and Busch finally met

in the January of 1934 in Amsterdam

and it was a strange

meeting by all accounts.

Fritz expounded at great

length about his beliefs

in music, in singing, in what

he wanted to achieve,

in not wanting to use big names,

wanting to seek out new talents

and so on, and apparently John

sat there, seemed to be asleep.

So Fritz believed.

Then he got up and went, "Yes, that

was very interesting - thank you."

And left.

And Fritz was left apparently

thinking, "Well,

"I don't think anything is going

to come of that," and of course

a week or so later, got the letter

saying, "Right - let's start."

NEWSREEL:
Here, members of the cast

were discussing the score

for the night's performance.

The music, too, was under

the direction of

one of the original team -

Dr Fritz Busch.

His influence was

so very civilised and humane.

As a German,

he had the discipline

and the absolute method.

When Busch arrived at Glyndebourne,

the tables were set out

and polished, his ruler and his

red pencils and even his red ink,

which, to my horror - he used to

write on musical scores in red ink

to show that it was for all time.

Fritz Busch suggested this whole

notion of having a producer,

which was completely alien

because there was no such role in

the British opera world at the time.

Fritz Busch had worked with

Carl Ebert in Berlin

and so he contacted Carl.

Carl Ebert was one of the leading

figures in 1920s German theatre.

He was not Jewish,

but since he was to the left,

he was regarded as

a persona non grata

and when the opera house he was in...

the director of was the opera house

that Goebbels took control

of as the Gauleiter of Berlin,

so he was basically removed.

Carl Ebert thought the idea was

completely mad, but came over

anyway to meet with John Christie

and had a look at the theatre,

discovered there was no fly tower,

so all the scenery changes

involved pulling everything out

onto the grass outside the theatre,

but realised that what they

were going to get out of this,

because they sat down the three

men and talked about the budget,

they talked about what

their principles were

and what they wanted to achieve

and they realised

they were going to get

the rehearsal period they needed,

the concentration, the devotion

to producing the best

possible opera

and they both signed up for it.

This man's idea was a real new one.

He said, "I would like to

give my country, in this specific

"kind of art, the kind of perfection

which is unknown up to these days."

And he said, "I want to give my

country something on my expenses."

That made me really quiet -

I shut my mouth and said, "Well,

"if somebody really wants to

sacrifice

"quite a fortune for this reason,

"then I have to contribute

with all my strength,"

and so did my friend Fritz Busch,

too.

And they revolutionised

opera in this country.

And introduced a lot more

drama into opera.

Before that, the singers hadn't

needed to act

and there was no demand for that.

Ebert and Busch brought dramatic

intensity into the operas.

The most important thing, of course,

is to improvise the words.

Really feel that it's the first time

she is dictating a letter,

she had only generally in mind

what she wanted to say,

so let's have it again - come on.

SHE SINGS:

All the visions are coming

from outside,

I'm nearly haunted by visions

to see how people move, what

kind of facial expression they have,

what kind of gestures they have.

I rush up and down,

I make the gestures,

I time carefully the steps,

how to go in, how to go out.

The position of the singers

must be to see the conductor.

Our singers have to be together,

they can see that they

belong to each other.

He was in himself a natural actor,

so he could show very clearly

to the artists what he wanted.

He always had great respect

for the musical requirements

and Busch made sure he did.

They'd speak in German together.

Carl was as good as gold.

Like all producers,

he'd try and get away with it,

but Busch was very firm about it.

Is it possible if I say

we can come in a little earlier to

establish the mood before

we actually start singing?

Excellent idea.

And suddenly going with your cue.

Before the war, this wasn't really

an operatic country.

When we had opera, it was brought in

to the Royal Opera House,

Covent Garden, very short seasons.

There was a wonderful small company,

the Carl Rosa,

which went around the "provinces",

but there wasn't an operatic

tradition.

It was Glyndebourne really

with the tutelage,

with the direction of Carl Ebert

and Fritz Busch.

Glyndebourne created truly

professional opera in this country.

This was Ebert's creation.

Carl Ebert and Fritz Busch basically

set the tone for everything that

Glyndebourne was to become, which

was not the best that we can do,

but the best that can be done

anywhere, and that was John

and Audrey's motto for Glyndebourne.

Out of the initial meeting

between Fritz Busch

and John Christie in Amsterdam,

they confirmed a two-week season to

start on 28 May 1934, with six

performances of Le Nozze di Figaro

and six performances

of Cosi Fan Tutte.

Rudolf Bing was contacted -

he had worked with both Busch

and Ebert previously.

He was asked to hunt out

the European continental singers

while Busch himself came

over to this country

and auditioned all of the British

singers, including Audrey Mildmay.

There was no assumption that

because she was the boss's wife,

she was automatically

going to get a role.

She had to go through the same

process as everyone else.

And that's how it all began,

in 1934, and she sang

the role of Susanna in The Marriage

of Figaro on May 28, 1934.

The first night was sold out, pretty

much, which, considering they were

charging 2 a seat, which was a lot

of money in anyone's terms -

almost overnight they achieved

exactly what they had set out to do.

They had timed their performance

so that people had an hour

and a half interval in the middle,

they could have their dinner,

stroll in the gardens, look at

the views, soak up the atmosphere

and enjoy absolute

international class opera.

And the critics of the time,

they went away absolutely

bemused by what they had seen.

But they all, to a man, appreciated

that they had seen something

completely new and different

and special.

The second night...which was

the first night, of course,

only seven people came.

So the opera house itself sat

just over 300, it was very,

very empty and then the reviews

really hit the streets

and after that, it was sold out

every single night.

So after a repertoire that was

Mozart-based,

1938 saw the introduction

of Don Pasquale and Macbeth

and then in 1940, they planned a

repertoire that would have included

Carmen, but of course war broke out

and so everything was abandoned.

Glyndebourne itself was made

Rate this script:0.0 / 0 votes