Wozzeck Highlights Plight of Poor
By Bae Keun-min
Staff Reporter
Austrian composer Alban Berg's first opera ``Wozzeck'' will be staged for the first time in Korea from June 14 to 17 at the LG Arts Center in Seoul.
The National Opera of Korea will produce the avant-garde opera based on the unfinished drama ``Woyzeck'' by German playwright Georg Buchner (1813-1837). The opera will be the initial piece for the troupe's ``My Next Opera'' series.
The opera ``Wozzeck,'' which premiered in 1925, is considered to have signaled the modern era of opera. It tells of the inevitability of hardship and brutal exploitation of the poor. The difference in name between the opera and the play resulted from a mistake by a German music book publishing company.
Famed director Yang Jung-ung from Yohangza Theater Company will orchestrate the production. Yang won international recognition with a Korean rendition of William Shakespeare's ``A Midsummer Night's Dream.''
``Although it has been 200 years (since it was written), `Woyzeck' is still considered the most contemporary piece with its open text and structure. It drew plaudits whenever and wherever it was staged in any form of performance,'' Yang said in a press conference last week at a Seoul hotel.
``I will make an image opera with many meanings, in which you will find fun in watching the performers' movements,'' Yang said. ``To let each audience member understand the text with their individual backgrounds, I will not define a certain time and region for the piece and use minimal stage settings.''
Choreographer Hong Sung-yop, head of Dance Theater ON will team up with Yang to organize detailed movements for the singers and dancers for each scene.
``I found a vocalist usually has his or her distinctive body movements. He or she shows them in each opera without differentiation based on character,'' Hong said in the conference. ``I will make performers show characteristics of each role through body movements.''
The opera revolves around a soldier, Franz Wozzeck, and his live-in girlfriend Marie. The gentle soldier is bullied by his captain and subjected to bizarre medical experiments by an army doctor. He tries hard to bring bread to the table for his girlfriend and son. However, he kills his girlfriend out of jealousy when he finds she is having an affair with a Drum Major.
While watching the first production of the play in 1914, Berg (1885-1935) decided to write an opera version of the play left incomplete by Buchner at his death. Taking 15 scenes from the unordered fragments of the original play, Berg adapted the libretto of three acts himself.
The opera is different from traditional operatic forms focusing on arias or trios. Dialogue rather than arias lead the piece. Each character has leitmotifs, musical phrases connected to the characteristics of each role. Abstract instrumental music, just as sound effects do in other forms of the arts, creates an inner coherence in each scene.
Baritones Oh Seung-yong and Kim Jong-hwa will take turns to perform Wozzeck, while mezzo soprano Kim Sun-jung and soprano Lee Ji-eun will share the role of Marie. The TIMF Ensemble and the National Opera Chorus will participate in the production.
Tickets cost 10,000 won to 90,000 won. For more information, call 1588-7890 or (02) 2005-0114.