Mittwoch aus Licht

Mittwoch aus Licht
Opera by Karlheinz Stockhausen
Stockhausen in his garden in Kürten on Wednesday, 20 April 2005
Librettist	Stockhausen
Language	German
Premiere	22 August 2012 (2012-08-22) Birmingham Opera Company

Mittwoch aus Licht (English: Wednesday from Light) is an opera by Karlheinz Stockhausen in a greeting, four scenes, and a farewell. It was the sixth of seven to be composed for the opera cycle Licht: die sieben Tage der Woche (Light: The Seven Days of the Week), and the last to be staged. It was written between 1995 and 1997, and first staged in 2012.

History

The four component scenes were separately commissioned and premiered:

• Welt-Parlament (World Parliament) was commissioned by the
  South German Radio Stuttgart and was composed from 29 December 1994 to 5 March 1995. It received its premiere on 3 February 1996, at the Hegelsaal of the Liederhalle in Stuttgart, sung by the Choir of the South German Radio, conducted by Rupert Huber [de], with sound projection by Karlheinz Stockhausen.^[1]
• Orchester-Finalisten (Orchestra Finalists) was commissioned by Jan van Vlijmen, director of the
  Asko Ensemble
  .
• Helikopter-Streichquartett (Helicopter String Quartet) was premiered by the Arditti Quartet and the Grasshoppers on 26 June 1995 in Amsterdam, as part of the Holland Festival. Performed "fairly regularly" since its premiere, it has become "the most iconic piece of classical music from the 1990s".^[2]
• Michaelion was composed in 1997 on a commission from Udo Zimmermann for the
  short-wave receiver), Andreas Fischer (bass), Suzanne Stephens (basset horn), Marco Blaauw (trumpet), Andrew Digby (trombone), Antonio Pérez Abellán (synthesizer), and Natascha Nikeprelevic (camel assistant).^[3]

Synopsis

Wednesday is the day of cooperation and reconciliation among Michael, Eve, and Lucifer, and its exoteric colour is bright yellow.^[7] The following list of 24 "scenic features" of the whole opera is found in the preface to the score of its final scene:^[8]

1. Light spirits: Eve, Michael, and Lucifer
2. Divine principles: intuition and harmony
3. Theme: love, friendship, and cosmic solidarity
4. Ritual: beauty and art
5. Beings: humans and the guardian angel Raphael
6. Element: air
7. Sound: singing
8. Voices: soprano, tenor, and bass
9. Instruments: basset horn with flute, trumpet, trombone
10. Organ: brain, speech organ
11. Sense: sight (especially the right eye), pure reason
12. Centre: between the eyes, face, clairvoyance
13. Awareness: understanding, vision, spiritual comprehension
14. Colour: bright yellow, iridescence of all colours.
15. Scents: mastic and frankincense
16. Precious stones: yellow zircon, topaz
17. Metal: mercury
18. Flower: golden yellow rudbeckia
19. Shrub: forsythia
20. Tree:
    Japanese maples
21. Animals: dove, camel
22. Number: 8
23. Planet: Mercury
24. Symbol:

Mittwoch is in four scenes, which are preceded by a greeting and followed by a farewell.

Mittwochs-Gruß

The Wednesday Greeting consists of the electronic music from the fourth scene, Michaelion, and is played in the foyer amidst flues, winds, blowers, kites, balloons, and flying doves.^[8]

Scene 1: Welt-Parlament

The World Parliament convenes in a session above the clouds, and the subject for debate is love. As the parliamentarians arrive via transparent elevators at the top floor of the skyscraper or floating glass dome, helicopters and doves occasionally pass by in the blue sky beyond. The debate is carried on in unknown languages, with occasional lapses into intelligibility in the local language. Delegates rise to present their interpretations of love, with the President commenting on each view. When a janitor interrupts with the news that an illegally parked car is about to be towed away, the President realises it is his, and rushes out. A coloratura soprano is elected temporary President, and the debate is continued. After a final large vowel spiral, the parliamentarians synchronously declare the central theme of the opera: "World parliament Wednesday from Light, day of reconciliation, love". The session is adjourned, all rise and exit while singing further attributes of Wednesday ("day of spaces", "day of women's rights", "day of Mercury", "day of reconciliation", "day of flying", "day of new languages", etc.) on a G♭. Unsure where he should exit, the fattest bass stops, turns to the audience in embarrassment, and before leaving stutters, "Now the next scene would follow".

Scene 2: Orchester-Finalisten

Eleven instrumentalists compete for posts in an orchestra, while floating high in the air. Telescopic observation reveals a variety of airborne scenes: a cathedral roof, aeroplanes flying over the sea, ships in a harbour, etc. In the last solo, the double-bass player becomes convulsed in an obsessive-compulsive fit of scraping and groaning, until the appearance of the mysterious figure of a mummy who, with a stroke on a Chinese gong, releases the bassist from his affliction.^[9] After all auditions have been completed, a horn player unexpectedly enters the hall, playing a signal, after which all of the players fly upward in a tutti finale.

The solos are accompanied by electronic and concrete music in octophonic spatial projection, and each is associated with a particular image:

• Oboe above a cathedral
• Violoncello over an airport by the sea
• Clarinet above a harbour with passing aircraft
• Bassoon over a train pulled by a steam locomotive
• Violin above a bird reserve
• Tuba amongst flocks of birds and swarms of bees
• Flute above a kindergarten with small goats
• Trombone above a swimming pool with elephants
• Viola flying with wild geese over a railway station
• Trumpet over a
  Marrakech
  market-place, with zebras, lions, wild geese, and horses
• Contrabass above a sailing ship, with tree frogs and a beat up car
• Horn
• Orchestral Tutti

Scene 3: Helikopter-Streichquartett

The four musicians of a string quartet are first introduced to the audience by a moderator, who describes the technical details of the performance. The players then walk or are driven to four waiting helicopters, followed by video cameras transmitting back to television monitors in the auditorium.

They are then carried into the air by the helicopters, from where they play a synchronized, polyphonic composition while reacting to the sounds of the rotor blades. Their playing is also influenced by the movements chosen by the pilots. From time to time their playing comes together in the same rhythms and bowings, even though it is plain they are isolated and kilometers apart. Video cameras and microphones transmit their images (including views through the glass cockpits of the world below) and sounds to four towers of video monitors and loudspeakers in the auditorium on the ground.

After returning to the ground and concluding the composition, the musicians and pilots disembark and return to the auditorium, still followed by the video cameras. Once in the auditorium, the moderator introduces the pilots to the audience, and asks players and pilots about their experiences. Questions are also taken from the audience.

Scene 4: Michaelion

The Michaelion is a galactic headquarters where a meeting of delegates from different stars has been called in order to elect a new President. He or she must be a "galaxy operator" who can translate universal messages no one else can understand. The scene consists of three sub-scenes.

Präsidium
As the delegates arrive, the word goes round that the favourite candidate is named Lucicamel. In the auditorium, someone is listening to a short-wave radio, occasionally mimicking the sounds. After a while, he leaves.

Luzikamel
Lucicamel, who is a Bactrian camel, arrives accompanied by a trombonist dressed in white, and is greeted by the delegates. In a series of events, he presents himself to the assembly.

• "Kakabel". Lucicamel sings of Camael, the angel of the seven planets, and defecates seven differently coloured planet globes, "which emphasize MICHAEL'S light for the seven days of the week". Not all of the delegates are favourably impressed.
• "Shoe-Shine Serenade". Two tenors polish Lucicamel's left fore hoof until it shines like gold, while two other tenors do the same with his left hind hoof.
• "Pocket Trick". Lucicamel turns around and abruptly sticks one hoof into his pocket. Two tenor delegates entice him away with a large bottle of champagne and he nearly leaves, but is stopped and brought back by two altos.

• "Camel Dance". A little tipsy, Lucicamel and his trombone assistant dance, while he sings the names of stars and sneers at "Sirius philistines who say that Lucicameltrombonut are not musical". The delegates chuckle and make ironic and humorous comments.
• "Bullfight". Trombonut plays the part of a matador and Lucicamel plays the bull, while the delegates clap and cheer them on. Lucicamel wins, and sits down on the fallen trombonist while a podium is brought in and the women unzip the camel costume. From it emerges Luca, wearing a Zen monk's cape. He is brought a yellow robe, mask, and high, pointed hat. He is acclaimed as President and Operator, and takes his place on the podium.

Operator
As Michael's Operator, Luca listens to broadcasts received on a short-wave radio in order to provide reports in response to problems successively posed by eleven delegates, who imitate him, poorly but humorously.

• Thinki. An alto delegate's question (in German) is accompanied by a flautist in an ornate cadenza, and the Operator replies (in English), that "Leo lion galaxies ask Michael if God wants Michael, Eve, Lucifer to work together for cosmic solidarity".

• Bassetsu Trio (Carousel). Trombonut and the trumpeter are now joined by a basset-horn player. Together they play and dance in a stylized, rotating choreography as the choir receives instruction from the Operator in various styles of singing and languages (
  Kölsch, French, Zulu, Bavarian, Greek, Dutch, North German, and Chinese). A soprano from the choir sings about her home, the sun of planet Earth—"terra magica"—describing moments from Orchester-Finalisten ("I see oboes above cathedrals, I see a cello gently floating above an airport by the sea ..."). The tenors enter slowly, each holding a small book and softly singing the text "Litanei" from Stockhausen's 1968 composition cycle Aus den sieben Tagen
  .
• "Menschen, hört" ("Mankind, Hear")—Space-Sextet. The delegates are sent out to the distant corners of the universe. Six of them are each presented with one of the planet-globes to take along, and come out into the auditorium to sing a concluding sextet as they rotate clockwise around the audience. As they leave the hall, the Operator is alone on the stage and gradually fades from sight, still transforming short-wave sounds, until only the nocturnal firmament is left shining above.

The Wednesday Farewell is the electronic music from scene 2 which, like the electronic music for act 2 of Dienstag, is projected octophonically through speakers arranged at the corners of a cube surrounding the audience. Here, however, it is played "beyond mirrored visions", in the form of video projections of the eleven space-events of Orchester-Finalisten, in the foyer as the audience departs.^[8]

Press reception (staged premiere)

The premiere performances were sold out. The venue's capacity was 500 with the audience moving between the two massive halls of Argyle Works. Birmingham Opera Company fielded a 100 strong acting company of "Vick's wonderful army of talented volunteers",^[10] a trademark of the company, who performed alongside the singers and instrumentalists, and sometimes also amongst the audience, "holding the fulcrum between humour and mystery on which the whole production was so skilfully balanced".^[11] Writing in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, Jörn Florian Fuchs cited Kathinka Pasveer's musical direction as a "truly brilliant realization of the score".^[12] Agreeing with this assessment of Pasveer's accomplishment, David Fallows added that "one of the important details of any live performance of Stockhausen has always been the sheer gorgeousness of the sound projection, making its impact right from the first moments of the magically lucid Wednesday Greeting".^[13] Anna Picard concluded in The Independent that it was an "unhurried, ecstatic promenade production" and that "Stockhausen's dream was realised wittily and lovingly".^[14]

Rupert Christiansen gave the production 4 out of 5 stars in The Telegraph, but he dismissed its third scene Helicopter String Quartet which he felt was "a banal gimmick, wasting an obscene amount of money and fuel to generate only a hideous amount of pointless noise". Christiansen cited Stockhausen's "bonkers sense of humour" as "a saving grace" of the production.^[15] Nick Richardson, writing in the London Review of Books, disagreed about the Helicopter Quartet, describing it as "fantastic on Thursday night, particularly at take-off, the strings' vigorous tremolos locking with the throb of the rotor blades and the warm, bass hum of engine".^[16]

Gisela Schwarz wrote in the Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger that Graham Vick had ably captured Stockhausen's diverse religious views without dismissing them as merely esoteric.^[17] Stephen Pritchard's review for The Observer concluded that the production was "undoubtedly" worth the reported £920,000 expense of the production:

This repertoire pushes the musicians to their absolute limits; the score may appear random but it's extraordinarily controlled and tightly organised, with passages of exquisite tranquillity. The message is resolutely warm, heartfelt and loving, moving in and out of language, space and time. It's a major achievement.^[10]

Mark Swed summed up his view of the production in the Los Angeles Times by writing, "the event was astonishing for the soul and simply beyond belief".^[18]

Auxiliary works

In addition to the opera itself, various parts of which may be performed separately, there are four independent pieces made in different ways from versions of the Mittwoch formula:

• Europa-Gruss, Nr. 72, for winds (1992/1995/2002), originally conceived as the "greeting" for Mittwoch but replaced with the electronic music from Michaelion
• Trumpetent, Nr. 73, for four trumpets (1995)
• Mittwoch-Formel, Nr. 73½, for percussion trio (2004)
• Klavierstück XVIII (Mittwoch-Formel), Nr. 73⅔, for synthesizer (2004)

Gallery

• 
  Debate in Welt-Parlament
• 
  Dissent in Welt-Parlament
• 
  Dan Bates (oboe) in Orchester-Finalisten
• 
  Karin de Fleyt (flute) and Jonathan Rees (cello) in Orchester-Finalisten
• 
  Cello solo (Jonathan Rees) in Orchester-Finalisten
• 
  Clarinet solo (Vicky Wright) in Orchester-Finalisten
• 
  Bassoon solo (Amy Harman) in Orchester-Finalisten
• 
  Violin solo (Debs White), with Bridget Carey, viola, in Orchester-Finalisten
• 
  Trombone solo (Andrew Connington) in Orchester-Finalisten
• 
  Trombone solo (Andrew Connington) in Orchester-Finalisten
• 
  Trumpet solo (Bruce Nockles) in Orchester-Finalisten
• 
  Contrabass solo (Jeremy Watt) in Orchester-Finalisten
• 
  Elysian Quartet members Laura Moody and Vincent Sipprell, being introduced by DJ Nihal before the Helicopter String Quartet
• 
  First helicopter lifts off in the Helicopter String Quartet
• 
  Jennymay Logan, second violin of the Elysian Quartet, Helicopter String Quartet, 23 August 2012
• 
  Vincent Sipprell, viola of the Elysian Quartet, Helicopter String Quartet, 23 August 2012
• 
  Michaelion, moment 50: Lucicamel, playing the bull, wins the "bullfight" and sits on Trombonut, playing the torero
• 
  The Operator (Michael Leibundgut) with short-wave radio, in Michaelion
• 
  Moment 76: The Operator (Michael Leibundgut), with Marco Blaauw (trumpet), Fie Schouten (basset horn), and Stephen Menotti (trombone, concealed), 23 August 2012
• 
  Moment 76: The Operator (Michael Leibundgut), with Marco Blaauw (trumpet, in the shadows), Fie Schouten (basset horn), and Stephen Menotti (trombone), 23 August 2012

Discography

No integral recording of Mittwoch aus Licht has yet been released, although all of the components have now appeared. The SWR broadcast the whole opera in October 2003 using selections from the first six of the following CD releases plus the 1998 Bayerischer Rundfunk recording of the dress rehearsal of Michaelion.

Filmography

References

Cited sources

Further reading