2023-06-11 12:37:55
It becomes strange to write in a world that is no longer that of Nuccio Ordine or Alain Touraine, who helped us so much to ask ourselves questions about him and to understand him. Stranger still is going to a concert, that of the premiere at the Paris Opera of the orchestra of the Gran Teatre del Liceu, and that the chosen work is ‘Bluebeard’s Castle’, by Béla Bartók, A whole reflection on the convenience or not of asking questions and the risk of obtaining answers, an exercise that the two intellectuals who have left us these days practiced with determination.
The orchestra arrived at La Bastilla at noon on Saturday, and the main conductor, Josep Pons, chose to dedicate the last rehearsal to reviewing the score from top to bottom without getting too lost in details: “I don’t want to tire you out before the concert,” he said. to its musicians and vocal soloists, Irene Theorin and Bryn Terfel, headliners that ensured musical and box office success. Pons limited himself to giving some indications, most of them related to the acoustics of the room: «Some parts that we would play louder at the Liceo here we have to moderate, because the acoustics are very good and play in our favor».
Here the strings sound too loud, there a little less requinto, be careful with those horns that cover up the rest of the brass… When he gets off the podium, he tells us that the padded lining of the walls of the Liceo absorbs the harmonic sounds and results in a Acoustic too dry. He takes us to the side of the Bastille room, makes us touch the wall: «You see? What is it? Granite!” and the floor, tile and wood. There is not a single sound wave that does not bounce perfectly, contrary to what happens in the Barcelona theater.
Already at the time of the concert, the Parisian public responded to the call by filling 2,000 of the 2,700 seats of the Bastille Opera, but above all dedicating warm and prolonged applause to both the vocal soloists and the orchestra, which reaped a resounding success with a complex score, but one that fits like a glove. ‘Bluebeard’s Castle’, by Béla Bartók is one of the favorites of the main director, Josep Pons: “It is fascinating how with small gestures he explains so many things”; and Terfel certifies it: “It’s wonderful to work with a director like Pons, who knows her so deeply, I’m looking forward to working with him again.”
In just one hour, Bartók introduces us to Judith, in love with Barbazul despite the rumors that exist about the disappearances of his former wives. Arriving at the castle of the mysterious character, Judith sees seven closed doors, and is determined to find out what is behind them. She sees rivers, and Bluebeard warns her that blood runs through them; she contemplates a garden and Bluebeard makes her notice that it is watered with blood; she admires a lake and Bluebeard explains that she is one of tears. The last door hides the specters of the women who preceded it. Judith has asked, and she has gotten answers. Ordine and Touraine could have warned her that knowledge doesn’t always make us happy.
For the Lyceum, the act had a special significance, since it was about appearing in the French capital returning to their Parisian colleagues the visit made a few months ago by the orchestra of the French National Opera led by Gustavo Dudamel. In a brief speech after the concert, the president of the Fundación del Liceo, Salvador Alemany, invited them to return to Barcelona when the Liceo Mar is inaugurated, “in spring 2028”.
Two councilors from the Government traveled to Paris. That of Culture, Natalia Garriga, He stressed that this is “a very sweet moment of the internationalization of Catalan culture”, with presence in recent weeks at the Cannes festival, the successes of the writer Eva Baltasar and the tour that the National Theater of Catalonia does through France, Belgium and Romania. The Foreign Action, Meritxell Serret, He noted that “Paris is a world cultural reference point” and that therefore “today is a great day in terms of the country’s foreign action.” Among the guests gathered by the Government office in France were various ambassadors from countries such as Andorra and Poland, companies that sponsor the Lyceum and some French journalists.
For its part, the Government delegated its presence in the figure of the ambassador, Victory Round, despite the fact that the Ministry directed by Miquel Iceta is part of the Liceo’s board of trustees and contributes as many resources as the Generalitat to the institution’s accounts. The former minister José Manuel Rodríguez Uribes, now the Spanish ambassador to Unesco, was also present. You don’t have to be Ordine or Touraine to wonder about it.
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