CAPRICCIO

Who can claim primacy in the opera? The libretto or the music? Richard Strauss poses this centuries-old question of principle at the end of his creativity at the heart of his conversational piece, “Capriccio”. Virtuously the libretto links the artistic discourse with the erotic entanglements of a countess in the Paris of Gluck's opera reform in the late 18th century. But of course how is Countess Madeleine to decide between her two suitors, poet Olivier and composer Flamand, and their arts, when in their fusion in particular the greatest beauty and supreme insight lie?

The musician grown wise with age once again draws a balance in a masterfully deceitful, narcotizing vexatious game with stylistic quotes from the entire of operatic history. But can there be something more unworldly as a self-thematization of opera on the opera stage in the belligerent Germany of 1942, in a time when the genocide of European Jews is at its worst? Director David Marton does not blend out the horror of the period of origin, and nevertheless respects the spirit of the work. His staging is a plea for the consolatory and protective power of art against the barbarity of reality.