JÜRI REINVEREPEER GYNT OPERAFROM THE PLAY BY HENRIK IBSEN

JÜRI REINVERE

With the international acclaim of his first opera Puhdistus (Purge), premiered at Finnish National Opera in 2012, Esto-nian-born composer Jüri Reinvere gained his reputation as one of the most faithful, yet versatile composers of our time.

Not only a composer but also the librettist of his own operas, his works and life have been shaped by three essential fac-tors: his childhood in an occupied country within the Soviet Union, his developing years in Finland and in Stockholm, and by his private teacher Käbi Laretei, pianist and novelist, and, most importantly, through the presence of her former husband, Ingmar Bergman; an environment which brought Reinvere close to the Nordic theatre tradition and has influ-enced him as a composer, a thinker and as a writer in the most personal way.

Among others, he composed Opposite Shore, a radio opera, Northwest Bow, Written in the Sand, Four Quartets I, Requiem and Norilsk the Daffodils, most of these based on his own poetry, written originally in English, using different musical genres in unpredictable ways in an assessment of humanity and its polarities.

Reinvere has been described as a “true cosmopolitan with Estonian roots” by Sofi Oksanen, on whose bestseller his opera Purge was based. In addition to his music, he has last year written contributions as political essayist for the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, as well earlier for radio, TV and various publications in Germany, Finland, Sweden and Estonia - all of them in multiple languages.

Sibelius Academy, Finland (2005) Warsaw Chopin Academy of Music, Poland Tallinn Music High School, Estoniaawarded locally and internationally: e.g. International Rostrum of Composers (2000 & 2006)*1971 in Tallinn; based in Berlin, Germany

www.reinvere.de

PEER GYNT

“Our western culture is on the road downwards, together with all its outsourcing and delusional life - and yet we do nothing but dwell on the beauty of our symbols”, Peer Gynt says morosely in the new opera, and yet never gives up hope. Hope for redemption, somehow, somewhere.

He has been true to his goals and engaged in lurid ventures, achieving the ultimate diamond: success. He’s the symbol now. And then, there’s a saying, one cannot become a great businessman if one hasn’t gone bankrupt three times: twice financially and once personally. Our Peer Gynt, being utterly true to Ibsen, returns home, personally bankrupt.

There we are, with all our glorious past and its heroes – and it’s all there is: hopeless, the industry has been squandered away, a dormant superdragon has been born, we have become weak. But what does it take to hope, not to give up one’s living? When Ibsen’s and Kierkegaard’s Solveig redeems Peer, will our Solveig be able to do so – when, at the same time, the music of Grieg accompanies our daily lives and our symbols run wild, on the rampage?

Peer Gynt is an exact embodiment of an Occidental man -he is powerful and he’s content, and yet he is unfulfilled and has become contrite. He is a great businessman, and like all great businessmen he understands – in order to be one, one needs to see success only as a resource for something else. But what is there, behind the maze of goals and greed, who stands at the gate? A woman, trying to redeem him from himself, or if she cannot do so, who can redeem one from offenses, which have been affecting millions?

www.peergynt-opera.net

PEER GYNTPeople need symbols. They need allegories for everything…

And I can offer them.

HERR TRUMPETERSTRÅLESomeone who concocts how to make money from people’s falsity will certainly be successful.

VON EBERKOPFFalseness – is the only potential business in the world.

You make no profit from dealing with goods.

MONSIEUR BALLONGoods are for beginners. Merchants! Kiosk keepers!

VON EBERKOPFThe world’s so poor that is believes in just those: kiosk keepers.

People come and buy knickknack – and grow warm thinking they are rich.The world is full of booths. Booths, small, large – but booths,

one booth is fighting with another and with a third and a fourth.In the end everyone is drained out.

LIBRETTO (EXCERPT)

HERR TRUMPETERSTRÅLENot the big ones though…!

VON EBERKOPF…the big ones?

…First the British offended the Americansbecause the Americans offended the Chinese.

The Russians were offended by the Chinesewho offended the Germans because the Americans offended the British

because the Germans offended the Frenchby offending the Russians!

PEER GYNTSuch luck to be Norwegian!

VON EBERKOPFYes… when I look at them I think:

You Norwegians keep such good house!

PEER GYNTOne’s got to think of one’s self.

OPERAImage 1: Ingrid’s WeddingImage 2: The Magic ForestImage 3: A Lonely Hut on the Hillside

Image 4: The Journey – MoroccoImage 5: The Journey – RomeImage 6: The Journey – EgyptImage 7: Homecoming – Nocturnal Funeral

PREMIERENorwegian National Opera / Oslo Opera HouseDirector: Sigrid Strøm ReiboStage and Costumes: Katrin NottrodtLight: Rainer CasperChoreography: Oleg GlushkovOslo Opera Soloists, Choir, Ballet and OrchestraMusical Director: John Helmer FiorePremiered in Norwegian translation

ORDERING INFORMATION:

Fennica Gehrman Oy Finland www.fennicagehrman.fi

additionallyBoosey & Hawkes (UK, British Commonwealth, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, USA, Canada)Schott Music International (France, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Benelux, Hungary, Japan, China)

FIRST ACT SECOND ACT

CAST & ORCHESTRATION

PEER GYNT -- Tenor

ÅSE -- MezzosopranoELDERLY SOLVEIG --

INGRID -- High Soprano GREEN WOMAN -- A NURSE --ANITRA --THE DEAN’S WIFE --

YOUNG SOLVEIG -- Lyrical Soprano ANOTHER NURSE --SOLVEIG’S APPARITION --

THE PRIEST -- Cavalier BaritoneMONSIEUR BALLON -- EXECUTIONER --MINISTER HUSSEIN --THE DEAN (ELDERLY PRIEST) --

THE TROLL KING -- BassbaritoneBUSINESSMAN VON EBERKOPF --HERR PROFESSOR BEGRIFFENFELDT --A GRAVEDIGGER --

SMITH -- TenorMR. TRUMPETERSTRÅLE -- HUHU-- ELDERLY SMITH --

BOGEY -- Countertenor CHESHIRE CAT --

Choir, Children’s Chorus:WEDDING GUESTS, FOREST CREATURES, BANDITS & CHILD SOLDIERS, SLAUGHTERED PEOPLE, MOURNERS

Soloists from Chorus:A GREEN CHILD -- Child Soprano

6 BRIDESMAIDS -- 4 Sopranos, 2 Altos3 FAIRIES & 3 OTHER CREATURES --6 BIRDCRIES/FOREST WHISPERS (off stage) --2 ECHOES (off stage) --3 RAINDROPS & 3 LIGHTNING SEEDS --

A GIRL IN THE SLAUGHTERHOUSE -- Soprano

SOLVEIG’S FATHER -- Baritone A ROBBER CHIEF -- A YOUNG PRIEST --

3333/4331/Timp+4/2Arpe/Pf,Syn,Cel(1)/Tape/Archi

Duration 2h 20’ (plus one intermission), language: German

This is more a musical reflection on the characters in Sofi Oksanen’s bestselling novel than a straight adaptation […] In writing his first opera, Estonian composer Jüri Reinvere has made a number of deft choices. Oksanen’s 2008 novel Purge contains all the right elements for the big stage: love, jealousy, betrayal, violence, memory, regret. […] Mercifully, Reinvere makes no attempt to set the book to music; his Purge is much more a musical reflec-tion on Oksanen’s characters. He has completely deconstructed the story and created a series of fragmentary confessions. As an opera, Purge is unashamedly traditional in form and construction, with arias, ensembles, choruses, and the full weight of a 20th-century symphony orchestra. Reinvere lets the strings scamper and the percussion thud to indicate fear and danger, and vocal lines soar with love or yearning. But he stops short of literalism. When guards lead the women off, there is an abrupt dissociation, and the strings float off into a dizzy trance. By putting us inside a mind that shuts off in self-defence at the onset of brutality, Reinvere tells us more than any amount of thrusting orchestral violence ever could. […] FINANCIAL TIMES (UK)

A “Purge” worthy of a homage. […] Like straight out of Kalevala…SVENSKA DAGBLADET (Sweden)

This touches the core of the [operatic] genre. The last scene reaches Wagnerian dimensions… The end of “Purge” is one of the most beautiful I have ever seen…KIRKKO JA KAUPUNKI (Finland)

[The opera] the most important that has been written in a long timeHUFVUDSTADSBLADET (Finland)

The music of Reinvere […] reveals hidden layers of the original novel. […] it is a neo-expressionistic musical drama which, in contrast to preceeding famous examples, contains more fresh air, more quiet, more colour, more lyricism.SIRP (Estonia)

www.purgeopera.wordpress.comPhoto Reinvere: Johannes BussPhoto Ibsen: Gustav BorgenPhoto PURGE at Finnish National Opera: Stefan Bremer

JÜRI REINVERE’S PURGE (2012) - PRESS CLIPPINGS