Glyndebourne: The Untold History Page #7

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we played it through and then

when we were in the scene,

I remember just sharing with Duncan

a little more of the tuba line

and Richard said, "Ah!"

"That's the moment where

just Octavian and Sophie

"could just melt back

into the atmosphere

"and really feel the presence

of Ochs on the scene."

Let's just play it once again

with that.

And so it's the idea of creating

a palette, orchestral palette,

where the singers feel completely

in the world of Der Rosenkavalier.

But the first kiss, you know,

Sophie never kissed anyone before

in our production and we were

really experimenting about the places

where there would be stillness.

If you play just before two

before 116...

Just that chord.

Just on this... Or whatever

chord it is, that's the beautiful

thing about music, no-one has

to know, but anyone can feel that.

I think the beautiful thing

about Glyndebourne

is the fact that it never apologises

for the rehearsal length.

This is what we do here.

It gives you an opportunity

to go to the heart

of a piece of music.

I was very happy to make my debut

here because I knew

we would have a lot of time

and, for this role, we need...

For this opera,

we need a lot of time.

Every opera and every important

thing that we do in our life

must be done with a lot

of work and determination

and this is the case with

Rosenkavalier, with the rehearsal.

Every detail was worked very hard.

SHE SINGS AN EXCERP The role of Sophie,

it's never a disappointment

when you get a perfect Sophie after

a perfect Marschallin in Act One.

With a good Sophie,

you should, really,

more or less

forget about the Marschallin

until she comes back in Act Three.

Sophie is her father's daughter,

there's a sort of feistiness,

there's a row between father

and daughter in the second act.

She backs down at the last minute

when she sees that

it's affecting his health.

But she has spirit,

she has feistiness.

Sophie is a very young girl,

she's 15.

She's innocent,

she is very clever

and, um...

she is looking forward

to be married, which is OK.

Strauss is, um...

..a master in putting the music

in the right place.

I think the role of Sophie

is written in a certain way

that it makes Sophie very young.

Strauss uses the orchestra and

the various sections and instruments

as vocalists,

every inch as much of the singers -

they play an equal part.

First of all,

the way Strauss composed operas,

he would read the libretto

and when he was reading the libretto

he would put in little scraps of

melody in the side of the column,

so...

At the Presentation of the Rose,

in Act Two,

he would think of that, or...

Something like that.

That is to say he has little

bit of themes like this...

And so forth, which he then

puts on a sort of conveyor belt

of symphonic continuity,

but for that, he has to go to

the beginning

and then compose through logically.

I suppose the cue

for orchestral illustration

of human emotions really for Strauss

comes particularly from Wagner

and the use of the orchestra

and of course the leitmotifs.

I mean, for the Marschallin,

you have this extremely short motif,

you first hear it in the passage

where the lower strings are sighing.

And... # Dee-da-dum... #

They're sighing away there,

but it's the solo wind,

you've got the oboe and then the

clarinet and then the flute going...

# Da da-dee dum

# Da da-dee dum... #

And that motif goes through

100 manifestations

of the Marschallin's

countless changing moods.

Strauss knew immediately

the importance of the linking,

of how motifs would link

material in these operas.

Of course he uses that knowledge with

his knowledge of Wagner to actually

understand how the motovic material

works in Rosenkavalier.

When they're indicating a character,

when they're indicating a mood,

it's understanding

those small, important moments

within the score as well,

whilst managing to take

that whole global approach.

Actually, the orchestra

is the storyteller.

The orchestra tells everything.

You don't know your character yet?

No. OK, so...

This is you.

A lot of people think Glyndebourne

is just about singers

and people working on the stage.

I'm just going to raise

it up and down...

But we're very lucky here

that we're able to attract

some exceptional craftspeople to

come and work here at Glyndebourne.

We have amazing props makers,

costume makers, stage crew,

people of all kinds of skills

and crafts.

And in a way I think

we add something extra

to the whole community of Sussex

by bringing these very wonderful

specialists into the community here.

Often they start here commuting

from London, then they love Sussex

and they come down here and stay.

We have 150 full-time posts

here at Glyndebourne.

But that expands to

well over 500 in the summer.

It's like a real... craft

industry here,

cos everybody's so good at it

and so wants to do it.

It's quite unusual to find

such a level of skill.

The dye shop, the men's tailoring

department, you know,

there's not one single element

which doesn't work.

Richard Jones was really keen

that we didn't end up

with a very 18th century

kind of look for everything.

Really high wigs

or all those sort of drapes.

And also to try and allow the

performers to still be themselves.

This is a smaller cut of

the fleur-de-lis print

we did for the servants, which was

basically a copy of the set,

but Nicky added fleur-de-lis

that she'd found online

and we went to a traditional

printers, locally.

So you've got random images

of fleur-de-lis on top of

Paul Steinberg's design

of the set, which then...

Jenny did the orange - we had

an orange velvet fleur-de-lis here

and lots of different trims

and tassels all in orange,

which upstairs magicked

into fabulous costumes.

THEY SING IN GERMAN

I was thinking about the fact that

you have so many people on stage,

but she still has to stand out.

And I had found a reference for

something that was very inspiring -

this is a fashion photograph -

and it was really inspiring

because it was incredibly white

and the 18th century is associated

with white skin, white wigs.

And I also wanted to really zap

the colour up against the white,

so it was like a really

extreme contrast.

And in the end I found these

19th century seed packets

that we then took to the printers.

You know, it's really toxic colour

onstage, which is absolutely spot-on.

THEY SING IN GERMAN

'It's just a lovely chance to, not

to try and modernise Rosenkavalier,

'because that's impossible.

'The difficulty is

with a role like that,

'it's fixed in people's minds

as to what they expect.'

Some of the greatest singers have

sung her and my job, I guess,

is to try to...

acknowledge that and be aware of it

but also to steer the audience

in a new direction.

She's very strong and I think that

perhaps in a lot of past productions

that hasn't come across so well

and she's become a bit of a victim

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