Search - Franz Schubert, Helmuth Rilling, Stuttgart Bach Collegium :: Schubert: Lazarus

The "Unfinished" Oratorio ....

Giordano Bruno | Wherever I am, I am. | 07/19/2010

(5 out of 5 stars)

"The genre of oratorios first appeared in Counter-Reformation Italy as a "counter" to the popularity of secular opera; they were intended as sacred dramas - operas in the oratory - and were at times staged with sets, costumes, and a modicum of dramatic action. It's not at all clear whether Franz Schubert (1797-1828) had any specific hopes of performance in mind for his religious drama "Lazarus", whether as a concert oratorio or an operatic staging. In fact, it's not at all clear whether Schubert knew where he was going with the work, which he apparently abandoned in the middle of the second of three acts. Like much of Schubert's music, Lazarus survived by the merest of chances, and in two fragments discovered in different places at different times. So we have almost a proverbial "good luck - bad luck" joke: we're tremendously lucky that the unfinished music survived at all, but hideously unlucky that it's unfinished. What we have is sublime, the very most affective 'dramatic' music Schubert ever composed, more moving and more lovely than any of his several neglected operas. There are more "unfinished" masterpieces among Schubert's oeuvre than the famous Unfinished Symphony. This truncated Lazarus has nevertheless become part of the active repertoire, with semi-frequent performances and several solid recordings of it on the market.



Composed in 1820, with a metrical libretto from 1788 by August Niemeyer, Lazarus may have in fact been commissioned by a church. It has all the markings of a drama for the Lenten season, when in Vienna all theaters would have been closed. The first-act manuscript includes stage directions, blocking of the singers, even mise en scène: "The garden of a rustic house. Maria and Martha, Lazarus's sisters, bring their ailing brother out of the house and gently lay him down upon a flowery lawn beneath a shady palm tree." The libretto goes on to tell of the most miraculous of the miracles of the Biblical Jesus before his crucifixion. However, Jesus is not a character in the drama; the tale is told indirectly. The singing characters are the two sisters and Lazarus, plus Jemima (who also tells of being resurrected), Nathanael, Simon, and A Disciple, all supported by chorus. Frankly, the libretto is an odd piece of German Baroque, reminiscent of Klopstock. Unless you can read German, you needn't worry about it, since the CD notes don't include translation. The music WILL deliver all the 'meaning' anyone might hope for. Schubert was not an orthodox Christian believer, by the way ... a deist perhaps, or a genuine scoffer ... so his intention in this music was to portray the most powerful of human, humanistic emotions in the face of death.



This 1996 performance, by the Bach-Collegium Stuttgart, is one of the most impressive accomplishments of conductor Helmuth Rilling, whose recordings of Bach seldom impress me nearly as much. Rilling has a fine cast of seven vocal soloists here, including basso Matthias Goerne, three tenors, and three sopranos. The music is proof that Schubert could write for large ensembles, symphonically, even before he turned to the composition of his greatest symphonies. It has all of Schubert's melodic wonder, his glad pathos and his heart-rending joy.



And then ... what a surprise! Nowhere on the cover is it revealed that the second CD in a "completion" of Lazarus commissioned by Rilling from the contemporary Russian composer Edison Denisov! If I were Denisov, i would feel extremely 'disrespected'! Denisov was a worthy choice, I think, an exciting composer in his own right. His completion is NOT an imitation of Schubert's style; it's not a 'romantic' piece at all but rather fully committed tonal-but-dissonant modernism. And it's rather good - plangently expressive and rich in musical complexity. But it's utterly jarring in juxtaposition to the Schubert. Whereas the First Act of this bifurcated Lazarus revels in beauty and sustenance of life, Denisov's Third Act barges through grief and premonition of death -- exactly the contrary of what the Lazarus myth is supposed to be communicating. These are two unreconcilable pieces of music, one a sublime masterwork and the other 'pretty darned good' but they deserve to be heard separately."