Bartók: Herzog Blaubarts Burg for chamber ensemble - op. 11, for chamber ensemble

Béla Bartók’s Herzog Blaubarts Burg (Duke Bluebeard’s Castle) is one of the most troubling psychological dramas in all opera. It probes the deepest personal issues and it commands our fullest concentration. But what if this most personal drama could be realised/performed in a real castle or situation that represents Duke Bluebeard’s actual home, and we, the audience, could be witnesses in that very space? This possibility became the starting point and motivation for me to create this chamber version.

The tradition of creating smaller scale versions of works for large forces was particularly prevalent in the early Twentieth Century, most notably with Schönberg’s "Verein für musikalische Privataufführungen" ("Society for Private Musical Performance"). By making more easily realisable versions of contemporary masterworks of the time, these arrangers and re-creators also enabled us to ‘get closer’ to certain elements of the music, and certainly to redefine and rehear the music, its textures and its harmony. In the case of Mahler’s music, we could even hear those Viennese Café Orchestras!

This chamber version of Duke Bluebeard’s Castle attempts to create a legitimate view of Bartók’s opera by making it possible for the intimacy of the drama to be brought closer to the audience. It also affords opportunity for younger and perhaps lighter voices to take on the two roles of Bluebeard and Judith.

There are seven doors, and I wanted to symbolise this with seven instruments in the ensemble. However, this proved impossible. To sacrifice a double bass would rob the music of the deepest sonorities in the essential string section, and I needed all else.

The ensemble uses instruments we easily associate with Bartók’s own chamber music and/or orchestral sound world. The string quartet medium is obvious, here with that additional double bass. The clarinet features in Contrasts, Bartók’s only chamber work that draws together three families of instruments. The horn however is important in the context of the opera and in terms of symbolism. While the feline tones and characteristics of the clarinet arguably represent Judith, the horn can arguably represent the Duke, with all the associations such an instrument can evoke - not least the hunt! However, Bartók continually weaves a two-part dialogue in his opera between woodwind and horns. As work on this chamber version progressed, it became my personal intention to use these instruments in this symbolic way.

The harp features heavily in many of Bartók’s scores, as does the piano (Bartók’s own instrument). In this score, it was the version for harp that was originally conceived, but the piano can make an alternate that has important artistic integrity (and we can remember that Bartók composed a piano quartet and piano quintet). Piano and harp parts differ, so, in effect, there are two chamber versions within this physical score. (It is not meant for both harp and piano to be used simultaneously, as that would imbalance the overall textures.)

Bartók’s symphonic orchestration is generally transparent and clearly defined, so the textures transfer relatively easily to chamber forces. However, the fifth door troubled me, until I tackled it. And then the musical material seemed to find its way to this ensemble quite smoothly.

Paul Max Edlin 2018