The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Duets of Love: Duet of Hope
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Duets of Love: Duet of Distance
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Duets of Love: Duet of Despair
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Songs of Magic: Song of Words
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Songs of Magic: Song of Arches
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Songs of Magic: Song of Tides
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Recitatives of Teaching: Recitative by Thought
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Recitatives of Teaching: Recitative by Rote
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Recitatives of Teaching: Recitative by Copy
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Arias of Prophesy: Aria of Achievement
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Arias of Prophesy: Aria of Potential
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Arias of Prophesy: Aria of Retaliation
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Screams of Passion: Scream of Fury
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Screams of Passion: Scream of Hate
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Screams of Passion: Scream of Pain
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Spoken Arguments; Argument in Asking
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Spoken Arguments; Argument in Pleading
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Spoken Arguments; Argument in Begging
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Cries of Memory: The Yawn
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Cries of Memory: The Sigh
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Cries of Memory: The Scream
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Conversations of Silence: The Spontaneous Remark
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Conversations of Silence: The Lost Innuendo
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Conversations of Silence: The Hopeless Demand
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Statements of Reason: The Seduction
Track Listings (20) - Disc #2
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Statements of Reason: The Explanation
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Statements of Reason: The Argument
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Whispers of Change: Whisper of Death
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Whispers of Change: Whisper of Birth
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Whispers of Change: Whisper of Eternity
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Songs of Failure: Failure in Life
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Songs of Failure: Failure in Movement
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Songs of Failure: Failure in Action
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Orphic Hymns: Hymn of Ecstasy
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Orphic Hymns: Hymn of Catharsis
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Orphic Hymns: Hymn of Secrecy
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Silent Soliloquys: Silence of Intrigue
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Silent Soliloquys: Silence of Neglect
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Hysterical Arias: Aria of Bargain
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Hysterical Arias: Aria of Incomprehension
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Hysterical Arias: Aria of Nonsense
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Sentences of Religion: Sentence of Dogma
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Sentences of Religion: Sentence of Faith
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Sentences of Religion: Sentence of Doubt
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Shouts of Gratitude: Shout of Triumph
Track Listings (19) - Disc #3
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Shouts of Gratitude: Shout of Victory
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Shouts of Gratitude: Shout of Wonder
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Hidden Trios: Trio of Tears
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Hidden Trios: Trio of Invective
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Hidden Trios: Trio of Abandon
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Poems of Reminiscence: Poem of Miracles
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Poems of Reminiscence: Poem of Horror
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Poems of Reminiscence: Poem of Love
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Silences: Silence in Vow
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Silences: Silence in Message
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Silences: Silence in Mistake
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Mysteries: Enthusiasmos
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Mysteries: Katharsis
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Human Lies: Lie of Greed
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Human Lies: Lie of Subterfuge
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Human Lies: Lie of Self-deception
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Acts of Love: Act of Tenderness
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Acts of Love: Act of Seduction
The Mask of Orpheus, opera: 3 Acts of Love: Act of Orgy
This imposing score, from British composer Sir Harrison Birtwistle, mixes electronic effects with traditional instruments and voices in a retelling of the Orpheus and Euridice legend. Birtwistle achieves greater dramatic b... more »readth than the Monteverdi and Gluck versions--but it is highly splintered storytelling. Up to three different singers play a single character in a fearsomely complex libretto by Peter Zinovieff, printed here with eye-crossing diagrams of the opera's structure. Onstage, the piece may communicate on some intuitive level like Einstein on the Beach, but when heard and not seen, Orpheus can be as bewildering as blueprints to a hydrogen bomb. The music is unusually expansive for Birtwistle with long-breathed electronic bass lines. Momentous plot turns have an almost Wagnerian monumentality. But much else sounds like obscure noodling, and there's little theatrical heat, demanding far more of its listeners than it gives. --David Patrick Stearns« less
This imposing score, from British composer Sir Harrison Birtwistle, mixes electronic effects with traditional instruments and voices in a retelling of the Orpheus and Euridice legend. Birtwistle achieves greater dramatic breadth than the Monteverdi and Gluck versions--but it is highly splintered storytelling. Up to three different singers play a single character in a fearsomely complex libretto by Peter Zinovieff, printed here with eye-crossing diagrams of the opera's structure. Onstage, the piece may communicate on some intuitive level like Einstein on the Beach, but when heard and not seen, Orpheus can be as bewildering as blueprints to a hydrogen bomb. The music is unusually expansive for Birtwistle with long-breathed electronic bass lines. Momentous plot turns have an almost Wagnerian monumentality. But much else sounds like obscure noodling, and there's little theatrical heat, demanding far more of its listeners than it gives. --David Patrick Stearns
CD Reviews
Astonishing, Amazing - a Masterpiece
Chad Witt | 04/22/2000
(5 out of 5 stars)
"Quite simply put, The Mask of Orpheus is not only one of the truly great operas of the twentieth century, but also one of the truly great masterpieces in 20th century music. At times gentle, at others violent, Mask is always lush. Every note is amazing music. True, a little is lost since we're not able to actually see the opera - but the libretto is very extensive and those with any imagination whatsoever will be able to realize the piece in their own minds.Birtwistle is on familiar territory here for those of you familiar with his other work: rituals, labyrinths, questions, quests, repetition, changes, examination, minute detail. And for those of you not familiar with his music, this piece will take you on a totally remarkable ride. With each listen it astonishes me more and more.As an aside, I bought this over a year ago but was going out of town, but I brought it along, first hearing it in the desert, in the middle of nowhere and was totally overwhelmed by what I heard - the love affair hasn't ended. Very much modern music, but as I said, always lush and astonishingly beautiful. Do not under any circumstances miss out on this piece - I'm listening to the last act now and few operas have affected me in the same way, Wagner's Parsifal, Berg's Lulu and Luigi Nono's Prometeo being the others. Few operas work 100% - The Mask of Orpheus does. Birtwistle hooks you completely within the first 3 minutes of the piece, the end of the first track. Within a minute of the second track, he grabs you and doesn't let go. It is in every sense, a remarkable journey from a remarkable composer."
Mask(s) of Orpheus
Adam | Bellingham, WA | 04/06/2002
(4 out of 5 stars)
"I am a huge fan of Birtwistle and an opera buff in general, which means I'd like to give a whole-heartedly positive response to this work, but I do have some qualms. First off, the libretto is simply too austere for its own good. It is always fun to incorporate archetypal imagery into a new approach to mythic topics, but when EVERYTHING represents something else, it's impossible to get one's head around it. That is especially true of the 17 arches, and the ordering of 100+ set pieces in threes. The opera world has known works of incredible formal construction (Berg's operas, and Birtwistle's own Punch and Judy, for example) that did not require one's study to comprehend the work at hand. Berg even wished that the structures of Wozzeck and Lulu would be ignored. My only other qualm is that some of the electro-acoustic music drones to some length without any relief. (I have the same complaint about what little I have heard of Stockhausen's Licht. Luckily, this work does not suffer from the main conceit of Licht: an egocentric mythologizing of the composer's own autobiography. On the other hand, this work is certainly tremendously unique. If mind-bending post-modern music drama sounds delicious to you, this should provide hours of amusement and consternation. And perhaps I will stumble upon the key to this ambitious but frustrating opera. The performances and sound quality are first-rate, and the libretti and notes, while giving Finnegans Wake a run for its money in terms of comprehensibility, are certainly in great abundance. Happy listening."
Birtwistle's Underworld
David Herter | Seattle, WA United States | 12/01/1998
(4 out of 5 stars)
"The Mask of Orpheus -- like HB's masterpiece The Triumph of Time -- is obsessed with ideas of procession and precession; the listener moves through a musical landscape that is itself in motion, constantly revealing different angles of its terrain -- usually with great vividness. In Orpheus, we add a dramatic dimension, treated in similar fashion. The myth is continually shattered and reassembled around us, recited and sung, mimed, finally collapsing into another, wholly invented language in the third act. What gives this opera its peculiar power is the immensity, and to some extent the insanity, of its design. As drama it can be overlong and not entirely involving (especially without a visual element), but as landscape it creates a singular experience -- interludes for synthesizers evoke the presence of ancient times and Otherness (and are alone worth the price of the CD); the second act, with its metaphorical/literal depiction of the arches of the Underworld, becomes an echo chamber of myth, and a dwelling place; while the third act, with its invented language, is less opera than drug trip, reminiscent of Russell Hoban's novel Riddley Walker."
Excellent Modern Opera
S. C Rice | 08/21/2001
(5 out of 5 stars)
"The Mask of Orpheus is one of the best examples of modern opera. In libretto and score, this work stands with Wozzeck, an ideal example of the music and aesthetics of its time. It rewards repeated listenings and is generally profound. In retelling the old tale of Orpheus and Eurydice, `Mask...' fragments the tale into various accounts. There are parallel versions of the story that run simultaneously. Characters are represented by more than one actor or actress. In fact, Orpheus dies thrice over the course of the opera, as the opera examines his possible fictitious or factual fates. The fragmentation of the storyline is very discerning in examining the modern person's view of the past; in a time of so much historical revisionism (what philosophers have called a `disruption of the Western metanarrative'), the fragmented story shows us our own flawed view of the past and our anxiety in attempting to discern truth. Ultimately, one of modern music's central themes is almost always the discernment of truth and its importance. The music in the Mask of Orpheus is craftsmanly and durable. The third act presents us with some absolutely stunning moments. As the lives of the characters fragment with our perception of them, the musical ideas converge and disintegrate. The anxiety and mystery in this music is something that I have returned to as a guide in my own compositions periodically. Some of the timbres that Birtwistle has created are utterly novel. The electronic sounds, such as the voice of Apollo and the `auras,' are extremely arresting. Much of the percussion writing is of the highest caliber. I would recommend this opera to anyone interested in modern music or modern opera."
Tough Nut - Tasty Kernel
Klingsor Tristan | Suffolk | 08/23/2005
(5 out of 5 stars)
"OK. So Harry Birtwistle is tough, I know. But perseverance, especially in this piece, reaps copious rewards.
This is a huge opera - not particularly in length or even in the forces demanded, but in ambition. It starts with the very birth of language and song, a musical creation myth as potent as the beginning of Rheingold, and takes us through a dramatic narrative that deals in the nature and meaning of myth and memory while telling the story of Orpheus and Euridice. Or, rather, the stories. For the Mask of Orpheus continually takes different views of the myth, different versions of the story as handed down by the folk traditions, and sets them against each other to reflect on one another.
Cold and intellectual, then? Not at all. I have never sat through the end of the second Act - either in the theatre or listening at home - without a tear or two. Act 1 includes an aria with flute obbligato as ravishing and purely beautiful as anything in Birtwistle's output (at least before The Second Mrs. Kong). That Act ends with the terrifying ululations of the Oracle of the Dead - truly scary. The dramatic impact of the second Act as Orpheus moves from arch to arch across to the Land of the Dead (what a curiously inexplicable but potent image those arches are) reaches a towering and thrilling climax. The musical tides of the third Act move inexorably in and out, gathering power and emotional coherence as they evolve.
As for the electronic music, that is wonderfully integrated into the fabric of the piece. The Voice of the god Apollo is, as it should be, imposing and mesmeric. The interludes (representing other mythological stories that reflect on and elaborate the main narrative and which are mimed/danced in the theatre), these grow organically and seamlessly out of the main musical fabric. And they are music, pure and satisfying, not distortions of other things or mere sound-collages. It's just that they were created on the machines at IRCAM and not on the machines we know as conventional musical instruments.
Does the performance live up to the piece, then? Certainly does! Maybe no-one will bring quite the intensity to Orpheus 1 that Philip Langridge did in the premiere performances - but, then, that's true of most of his work. This is a recording of a live semi-staged concert performance at the Royal Festival Hall - maybe not the kindest acoustic for this piece, especially for the singers - but all the performers acquit themselves heroically and show real dedication to what is, I believe, one of the great operas of the second half of the last century.
Try it. Then try it again. You could get hooked on 'difficult' music.
Track Listings (25) - Disc #1