Philip Glass; Landestheater Linz; Bruckner Orchester Linz - Philip Glass : The Voyage: An Opera in Three Acts
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Music CD Cover
Artist: Philip Glass; Landestheater Linz; Bruckner Orchester LinzComposer: Philip Glass
Conductor: Dennis Russell Davies
Orchestra: Bruckner Orchester Linz
Performer: Landestheater Linz
Edition: Music CD
Format: Import
CD Release Date: 2006-06-20
Music Label: Orange Mountain Music
Soundtracks:
Music CD 1
- Prologue
- Act I Scene I
- Act I Scene 2 Part 1
- Act I Scene 2 Interlude
- Act I Scene 2 Conclusion
- Act I Scene 3
- Act II Scene 1
- Act II Scene 2
- Act III Scene 1
- Act III Scene 2
- Act III Scene 3 And Epilogue
Free Music Notes for Philip Glass : The Voyage: An Opera in Three Acts
Free Music Review: A Masterpiece in the Grand Opera Tradition
Hit: 5 Stars
Philip Glass' The Voyage, which premiered at the Metropolitan Opera in New York City in 1992, is a grand and truly great opera. It should be in the standard repertoire of every opera theatre in the world, and this recording by OMM, serves it superbly well.
The multi-layered libretto, by David Henry Hwang analyzes the search for knowledge as a basic human need, exceeding limitations, but with a cost to oneself or to others. The prologue with a wheelchair-bound scientist introduces the quest with a graphic description of physical limitations from which the questioning mind seeks liberation. The next four scenes (Acts one to three and an Epilogue) alternate imagery of space travel, where the cost is to oneself, and Columbus' voyage, where the cost was mostly to others.
In the first space travel section, Act I, explorers crash land on earth. The theme of four crystals is introduced which appear to represent components of human society. Three of these are technology or science, arts, and religion or spirituality. The fourth, curiosity or the quest for knowledge is saved for the spaceship commander. In her encounter with cave-dwelling earthlings, a colonial encounter is examined from both sides, as the commander and the earthlings each wonder what the other will want from them and how they will be treated. Each fears they will be overwhelmed by the other.
The second exploration of the space travel theme comprises Act III, which takes place 600 years after Columbus' voyage, 100 years after the opera's premiere. The lineup of world leaders attending the launch may have seemed odd in 1992, but 14 years later it seems prescient. The final scene of act III, after the spaceship launch, is particularly poignant, and demonstrates how superb music can universalize and convey the depth of emotion suggested by the text. In this scene, as the astronauts say farewell to their loved ones, who they know they will never see again, they come to realize and then accept what the quest for knowledge is costing them.
Act II and the Epilogue deal with Columbus' accomplishment and its effects in a more meditative tone. Dialogues between Columbus and an apparition of Queen Isabella account for most of these two sections. In these, Isabella plays the devil to Columbus' Faust, tempting his vanity and later rebuking him for the massive suffering to which it led. But Columbus has the last word. He rejects the notion that pride was his only motivation, affirming the human desire for knowledge to which he clings as he dies, his final voyage.
The score is one of Glass' best, maintaining the dramatic force with shifts of mood and a stunning variety of orchestral colours. One example is the repeated motion of the waves in Act II that intensifies the monotony and frustration of the long voyage before land is finally sighted. The conducting by Dennis Russell Davies brings out the fullest potential, from the crashing climax of Act 1 to the sublime calm that ends the opera. Ruth Bormann as the Commander is particularly outstanding among the fine cast.
No previous exposure to Glass' music is needed to appreciate this accessible operatic masterpiece. But the experience becomes richer with each hearing of the music and each reading of the text.
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