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Wozzeck by Alban Berg, starring Peter Mattei and conducted by Yannick Nézet-Séguin. 0:00 - Start 0:50 - Act 1 36:53 - Act 2 1:12:51 - Act 3 INTRODUCTION: Wozzeck is the first opera by the Austrian composer Alban Berg. It was composed between 1914 and 1922 and first performed in 1925. The opera is based on the drama Woyzeck, which the German playwright Georg Büchner left incomplete at his death. At the time, the play was still known as Wozzeck, due to an incorrect transcription by Karl Emil Franzos, who was working from a barely-legible manuscript. Berg adapted the libretto himself, retaining “the essential character of the play, with its many short scenes, its abrupt and sometimes brutal language, and its stark, if haunted, realism...“. SUMMARY: Act 1 The soldier Wozzeck is shaving the Captain. The officer urges him to work more slowly, then tells him that he is a good man but lacks morality because he has an illegitimate child. Wozzeck replies that virtue is a luxury not meant for the poor. Wozzeck and a fellow soldier, Andres, are cutting firewood in the fields and Wozzeck is frightened by ghastly visions. Marie, the mother of Wozzeck’s child, and her neighbor Margret watch a military band pass by outside their window. Marie admires the handsome Drum Major and Margret mocks her. Alone with her young son, Marie sings him a lullaby. Wozzeck arrives and tells her about his visions, which he sees as a omen. Marie tries to comfort him, but he rushes off to the barracks. Overwhelmed by her own fears, Marie runs out of the room, leaving the child. Wozzeck visits the Doctor, who pays him for use in his pseudo-scientific research. Wozzeck again brings up his visions, which the doctor dismisses as mere imagination. On the street before her door, the Drum Major makes advances toward Marie. She resists at first, then gives in to him. Act 2 Marie is admiring the earrings the Drum Major has given her. When Wozzeck enters, she claims she found them in the street. Wozzeck is suspicious. He gives her the money he has earned and leaves. Marie is overwhelmed by remorse. The Captain and the Doctor meet in the street and talk morbidly of sickness and death. When Wozzeck passes by, they taunt him with allusions to Marie’s infidelity. Wozzeck is shocked and rushes off. Wozzeck confronts Marie with his suspicions and tries to force her to confess. He is about to hit her but she remains defiant, telling him that she’d rather have a knife in her belly than his hand on her. Two drunken apprentices amuse the crowd in a beer garden. Wozzeck enters and sees Marie and the Drum Major on the dance floor, and has another bloody vision. The same evening in the barracks, Wozzeck wakes to nightmarish memories of what happened in the beer garden. The Drum Major enters, drunk, and boasts about his conquest. The two men fight and Wozzeck is knocked down. Act 3 Alone with her child, Marie reads from the Bible, first about the adulteress who was forgiven, then about Mary Magdalene. She begs God for mercy. Marie and Wozzeck are walking together near a pond. Marie wants to hurry back but he kisses her and makes ironic remarks about her fidelity. When she attempts to escape, he draws a knife and kills her. Wozzeck is drinking in a tavern, shouting wildly, and dancing with Margret. When she notices blood on his arm, he is unable to explain and rushes out. At the pond, Wozzeck searches for the knife and throws it into the water. Suddenly he imagines that the moon will reveal his crime. He wades farther into the water to hide the knife in a safer place. The Doctor and Captain, passing by, hear him drown. Neighbor children playing in the street tell Marie’s son that she is dead. He doesn’t understand and keeps singing and playing. CAST: Conductor - Yannick Nézet-Séguin Wozzeck - Peter Mattei Marie - Elza van den Heever Margret - Tamara Mumford The Drum Major - Christopher Ventris The Captain - Gerhard Siegel Andres - Andrew Staples The Doctor - Christian Van Horn LOCATION: Metropolitan Opera.
