Como todo mundo (os 2,5 que leem este blog) notou, tenho evitado incluir óperas nestes posts de música vocal (com uma ou outra exceção), pois creio que a ópera é um assunto que merece tratamento numa série dedicada exclusivamente a ela. Quem sabe um dia... Então, sem mais delongas, vamos dar uma espiada em alguns compositores que têm agitado a música "erudita" nos últimos 60 anos.
Comecemos com uma obra maravilhosa e indigesta do Dimitri Shostakovich, A Excução de Stenka Razin, Op. 119, de 1964, para baixo, coro misto e orquestra, com poemas de Yevgeny Yevtushenko. O Shosta a chamou de "poema sinfônico", mas é geralmente classificada como cantata - quem quiser conhecer um pouquinho mais sobre esta obra, pode dar um conferida neste link. É uma das obras mais impressionantes do Shostakovich, e das menos conhecidas:
A versão em inglês do texto é esta aqui abaixo (essa foi a única versão não-russa encontrei), e os versos em itálico são aqueles cantados pelo coro:
In Moscow, the white-walled capital,
In Moscow, the white-walled capital,
a thief runs with a poppy-seed loaf down the street.
He is not afraid of being lynched today.
There isn’t time for loaves...
They are bringing Stenka Razin!
He is not afraid of being lynched today.
There isn’t time for loaves...
They are bringing Stenka Razin!
The tsar is milking a little bottle of
malmsey,
before the Swedish mirror, he squeezes a pimple,
and tries on an emerald seal ring-
and into the square...
before the Swedish mirror, he squeezes a pimple,
and tries on an emerald seal ring-
and into the square...
They are bringing
Stenka Razin!
Like a little barrel following a fat barrel
a baby boyar rolls along after his mother,
gnawing a bar of toffee with his baby teeth.
Today is a holiday!
Like a little barrel following a fat barrel
a baby boyar rolls along after his mother,
gnawing a bar of toffee with his baby teeth.
Today is a holiday!
They are bringing
Stenka Razin!
A merchant shoves his way in, flatulent with peas.
Two buffoons come rushing at a gallop.
Drunkard-rogues come mincing...
They are bringing Stenka Razin!
Old men, scabs all over them, hardly alive,
thick cords round their necks,
mumbling something, dodder along...
They are bringing Stenka Razin!
And shameless girls also,
jumping up tipsy from their sleeping mats,
with cucumber smeared over their faces,
come trotting up- with an itch in their thighs...
They are bringing Stenka Razin!
And with screams from wives of the Royal Guard*
amid spitting from all sides
on a ramshackle cart
he comes sailing in a white shirt.
He is silent, all covered with the spit of the mob,
he does not wipe it away, only grins wryly,
smiles at himself: 'Stenka, Stenka, you are like a branch
that has lost its leaves.
How you wanted to enter Moscow!
A merchant shoves his way in, flatulent with peas.
Two buffoons come rushing at a gallop.
Drunkard-rogues come mincing...
They are bringing Stenka Razin!
Old men, scabs all over them, hardly alive,
thick cords round their necks,
mumbling something, dodder along...
They are bringing Stenka Razin!
And shameless girls also,
jumping up tipsy from their sleeping mats,
with cucumber smeared over their faces,
come trotting up- with an itch in their thighs...
They are bringing Stenka Razin!
And with screams from wives of the Royal Guard*
amid spitting from all sides
on a ramshackle cart
he comes sailing in a white shirt.
He is silent, all covered with the spit of the mob,
he does not wipe it away, only grins wryly,
smiles at himself: 'Stenka, Stenka, you are like a branch
that has lost its leaves.
How you wanted to enter Moscow!
And here you are
entering Moscow now...
All right then, spit! Spit! Spit!
after all, it’s a free show.
Good people, you always spit
at those who wish you well.
The tsar’s scribe beat me deliberately across the teeth,
repeating, fervently:
‘Decided to go against the people, did you?
You’ll find out about against!’
I held my own, without lowering my eyes.
I spat my answer with my blood:
‘Against the boyars- true.
Against the people - no!
I do not renounce myself,
I have chosen my own fate myself.
Before you, the people, I repent,
but not for what the tsar’s scribe wanted.
My head is to blame.
I can see, sentencing myself:
I was halfway against things,
when I ought to have gone to the very end.
No, it is not in this I have sinned, my people,
for hanging boyars from the towers.
I have sinned in my own eyes in this,
that I hanged too few of them.
I have sinned in this, that in a world of evil
I was a good idiot.
I sinned in this, that being an enemy of serfdom
I was something of a serf myself.
I sinned in this, that I thought of doing battle
for a good tsar.
There are no good tsars, fool...
Stenka, you are perishing for nothing!
Bells boomed over Moscow.
They are leading Stenka to the place of execution.
In front of Stenka in the rising wind
the leather apron of the headsman is flapping,
and in his hands above the crowd
is a blue ax, blue as the Volga.
And streaming, silvery, along the blade
boats fly, boats like seagulls in the morning...
And over the snouts, pig faces, and ugly mugs
of tax collectors and money changers,
like light through the fog,
Stenka saw faces.
Distance and space was in those faces,
and in their eyes, morosely independent,
as if in smaller, secret Volgas
Stenka’s boats were sailing.
It’s worth bearing it all without a tear,
to be on the rack and wheel of execution,
if sooner or later
faces sprout threateningly
on the face of the faceless ones...
And calmly (obviously he hadn’t lived for nothing)
Stenka laid his head down on the block,
settled his chin in the chopped-out hollow
and with the back of his head gave the order:
'Strike, ax...'
Off rolled the head, burning in its blood,
and hoarsely the head spoke: 'Not for nothing...'
And along the ax there were no longer ships-
but little streams, little streams...
Why, good folk, are you standing, not celebrating?
Caps into sky-and dance!
But the Red Square is frozen stiff,
the halberds are scarcely swaying.
Even the buffoons have fallen silent.
Amid the deadly silence
fleas jumped over
from peasants’ jackets onto women’s robes.
The square had understood something.
The square took off their caps,
and the bells struck three times seething with rage.
But heavy from its bloody forelock
the head was still rocking, alive.
From the blood-wet place of execution,
there, where the poor were,
the head threw looks about like anonymous letters...
Bustling, the poor trembling priest ran up,
wanting to close Stenka’s eyelids.
But straining, frightful as a beast,
the pupils pushed away his hand.
On the tsar’s head, chilled by those devilish eyes,
the Cap of Monomakh, began to tremble,
and, savagely, not hiding anything of his triumph,
the head burst out laughing at the tsar!
All right then, spit! Spit! Spit!
after all, it’s a free show.
Good people, you always spit
at those who wish you well.
The tsar’s scribe beat me deliberately across the teeth,
repeating, fervently:
‘Decided to go against the people, did you?
You’ll find out about against!’
I held my own, without lowering my eyes.
I spat my answer with my blood:
‘Against the boyars- true.
Against the people - no!
I do not renounce myself,
I have chosen my own fate myself.
Before you, the people, I repent,
but not for what the tsar’s scribe wanted.
My head is to blame.
I can see, sentencing myself:
I was halfway against things,
when I ought to have gone to the very end.
No, it is not in this I have sinned, my people,
for hanging boyars from the towers.
I have sinned in my own eyes in this,
that I hanged too few of them.
I have sinned in this, that in a world of evil
I was a good idiot.
I sinned in this, that being an enemy of serfdom
I was something of a serf myself.
I sinned in this, that I thought of doing battle
for a good tsar.
There are no good tsars, fool...
Stenka, you are perishing for nothing!
Bells boomed over Moscow.
They are leading Stenka to the place of execution.
In front of Stenka in the rising wind
the leather apron of the headsman is flapping,
and in his hands above the crowd
is a blue ax, blue as the Volga.
And streaming, silvery, along the blade
boats fly, boats like seagulls in the morning...
And over the snouts, pig faces, and ugly mugs
of tax collectors and money changers,
like light through the fog,
Stenka saw faces.
Distance and space was in those faces,
and in their eyes, morosely independent,
as if in smaller, secret Volgas
Stenka’s boats were sailing.
It’s worth bearing it all without a tear,
to be on the rack and wheel of execution,
if sooner or later
faces sprout threateningly
on the face of the faceless ones...
And calmly (obviously he hadn’t lived for nothing)
Stenka laid his head down on the block,
settled his chin in the chopped-out hollow
and with the back of his head gave the order:
'Strike, ax...'
Off rolled the head, burning in its blood,
and hoarsely the head spoke: 'Not for nothing...'
And along the ax there were no longer ships-
but little streams, little streams...
Why, good folk, are you standing, not celebrating?
Caps into sky-and dance!
But the Red Square is frozen stiff,
the halberds are scarcely swaying.
Even the buffoons have fallen silent.
Amid the deadly silence
fleas jumped over
from peasants’ jackets onto women’s robes.
The square had understood something.
The square took off their caps,
and the bells struck three times seething with rage.
But heavy from its bloody forelock
the head was still rocking, alive.
From the blood-wet place of execution,
there, where the poor were,
the head threw looks about like anonymous letters...
Bustling, the poor trembling priest ran up,
wanting to close Stenka’s eyelids.
But straining, frightful as a beast,
the pupils pushed away his hand.
On the tsar’s head, chilled by those devilish eyes,
the Cap of Monomakh, began to tremble,
and, savagely, not hiding anything of his triumph,
the head burst out laughing at the tsar!
Do outro lado do planeta - estilística e geograficamente - apesar de mais ou menos da mesma época (1971), vem outro exemplo de música "indigesta" que eu adoro, a Rothko Chapel, do americano Morton Feldman, composta para a "capela" de mesmo nome, uma espécie de "Templo da LBV" localizado em Houston, no Texas:
Quer mais um exemplo dessa mesma época? Que tal o espetacularmente impressionante Requiem für Einen Jungen Dichter: Lingual für Sprecher, Sopran und Baritonsolo, Drei Chöre, Elektronische Klänge, Orchester, Jazz-Combo und Orgel, (Réquiem para um Jovem Poeta: "Lingual" para narrador, soprano, barítono, três coros, sons eletrônicos, orquestra, grupo de jazz, e órgão) de 1969, que, além dos textos normais dos réquiens, também utiliza textos de Ésquilo, Joyce, Pound, discursos de Mao, Hitler, citações dos Beatles, Tristão e Isolda, e uma infinidade de outras citações, muitas vezes ininteligíveis. Violento, trágico, assustador, revoltado, politico até o último segundo de música, é uma trilha sonora perfeita para o século XX:
(Se alguém quiser providenciar uma tradução competente dos poemas, eu agradeço!)
Outra obra importante dessa época (de 1970), é Sicut Umbra, do serialista italiano Luigi Dallapiccola, para mezzo-soprano (mas a ouviremos com um contratenor) e 12 instrumentos, com poesias do Espanhol Juán Ramón Jiménez:
Já que hoje estamos ouvindo obras particularmente "intragáveis" das décadas de 60 e 70, vamos logo enfiar o pé na jaca e terminar o post com Lux Aeterna, do romeno György Ligeti, de 1966:
Sim, existe um texto sendo cantado!:
Lux aeterna luceat eis, Domine,
um sanctis tuis in aeternum,
uia pius es.
Requiem aeternam dona eis, Domine;
et lux perpetua luceat eis
um sanctis tuis in aeternum,
uia pius es.
Requiem aeternam dona eis, Domine;
et lux perpetua luceat eis
Mas ouvir Lux Aeterna sempre me faz lembrar de uma outra peça estilisticamente bastante similar, apesar de muito menos "extrema", Voices of Nature, também para coro feminino (com vibrafone, mas sem texto), do Alfred Schnittke, de 1972:
Bom... era meu intuito terminar com o assunto "séculos XX e XXI" neste post, mas, como sempre, acabo dando rédeas ao meu cérebro, que não para de me dar sugestões. Resultado? Não consegui passar da década de 1970... É melhor, então, pararmos por hoje e tirarmos um cochilo de algumas semanas, para digerirmos essa refeição pesada. Mesmo tendo deixado de lado Nagasaki (também do Schnittke), Il Canto Sospeso (do Luigi Nono), Pour la Paix (do grego Iannis Xenakis), e muitas outras "indigestibilidades hecatombísticas", já temos música suficiente para horas e horas de horror... Prometo que tentarei apresentar coisas mais leves no próximo post. Tentarei; se conseguirei, não sei.
