A Village Romeo and Juliet

A Village Romeo and Juliet
Opera by Frederick Delius
Librettist	Jelka and Frederick Delius
Language	English
Premiere	21 February 1907 (1907-02-21) Royal Opera House

A Village Romeo and Juliet is an opera by Frederick Delius, the fourth of his six operas. The composer himself, with his wife Jelka, wrote the English-language libretto based on the short story "Romeo und Julia auf dem Dorfe" by the Swiss author Gottfried Keller. The first performance was at the Komische Oper Berlin on 21 February 1907, as Romeo und Julia auf dem Dorfe. Thomas Beecham conducted the British premiere at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden in London on 22 February 1910. The US premiere was on 26 April 1972 in Washington, D.C.

The New York City Opera (NYCO) staged the work in 1973 for the opera's New York City premiere with Richard T. Gill as Marti, June Angela as the child Vreli, Patricia Wells as the adult Vreli, John Stewart as Sali, David Holloway as the Dark Fiddler, and Thomas Jamerson as the Three Barge Men. In his review of the NYCO production, music critic Allen Hughes wrote, "This piece has had few productions in the 72 years of its existence, and the reasons for that are not hard to find. To begin, it is, essentially, two hours of mood music for orchestra with secondary parts for singers, and the orchestra envisioned by Delius was so vast as to be impractical for conventional opera presentation. Furthermore, the staging implications were such that they could not be realized adequately in a theater depending upon physical sets and for effects."

While the opera has rarely been staged, the orchestral interlude between Scenes 5 and 6, "The Walk to the Paradise Garden", is heard separately in concerts and has been recorded many times.

Roles

Role	Voice type	Premiere cast, 21 February 1907 (Conductor: Fritz Cassirer)
Manz	baritone
Marti	baritone
Sali, son of Manz as a child	soprano
Sali, son of Manz as a man	tenor	Willi Merkel
Vreli, daughter of Marti	soprano	Lola Artôt de Padilla
The dark fiddler	baritone	Desider Zádor
Two peasant men	baritones
Three peasant women	sopranos
Gingerbread woman	soprano	Minnie Egener
Wheel of fortune woman	soprano
Cheap jewellery woman	mezzo-soprano
Merry-go-round man	baritone
Slim girl	soprano
Wild girl	mezzo-soprano
Poor horn player	tenor
Hunchbacked bass player	bass

The premiere of the English version featured Walter Hyde as Sali; Ruth Vincent as Vrenchen (Vreli); Robert Maitland as the Black Fiddler (sic); Harry Dearth as Manz; Dillon Shallard as Marti; Muriel Terry as the young Sali and the Wild Girl; Betty Booker as the young Vrenchen and the Slim Girl; Arthur Royd as the Poor Horn Player; and Albert Archdeacon as the Hunchback Bass Player.

Synopsis

The opera is in six scenes.

At the beginning of the opera, Sali, son of the farmer Manz, and Vrenchen (Vreli), daughter of the farmer Marti, are children. They are playing together one September morning on a plot of land. The Dark Fiddler is the rightful owner of this disputed land, but because he is illegitimate and thus without legal rights, he cannot exert control over the land. He appears to the children and warns them that the land must not be tilled. Manz and Marti dispute ownership of the land, and put a stop to the relationship between their respective children.

Six years later, at Marti's now run-down house, Sali and Vrenchen plan a meeting. Since their childhood, a lawsuit about the land has ruined both Manz and Marti. Sali persuades Vrenchen to meet him on the plot. The Dark Fiddler re-appears once more and invites them to join him. He also tells them that, regardless, they will meet again. Marti sees the two lovers and takes Vreli away. In trying to stop Marti, Sali injures him severely. As a result, Marti loses his reason and must be confined in an asylum. Sali returns and sees Vreli at her house, which is to be sold. The two declare their love and decide to leave together.

At a local fair, Sali and Vreli buy rings. Sali mentions an inn, the Paradise Garden, where they can dance all night, and they go there. The Dark Fiddler and some vagrants are drinking there. He greets the lovers, and suggests they join him to share a vagabond life in the mountains. Instead, Sali and Vreli decide that they cannot live such an existence, and they resolve to die together, uncompromising in their love for each other. They leave the inn and find a hay barge, which they release from the dock to begin to float down the river. As the Dark Fiddler observes them, Sali removes the plug from the bottom of the boat, and Sali and Vreli sink with the boat.

Recordings

Year	Cast	Conductor, Opera house and orchestra	Label
1948	Rene Soames, Vera Terry, Gordon Clinton, Denis Dowling, Frederick Sharp	Sir Thomas Beecham, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra and Chorus	Audio CD: EMI Classics, Cat: ?? Audio CD: Naxos, Cat: 8.110982-83
1971	Robert Tear, Elizabeth Harwood, John Shirley-Quirk, Benjamin Luxon	Meredith Davies, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra John Alldis Choir	Audio CD: EMI Classics, Cat: ?
1989	Arthur Davies, Helen Field, Thomas Hampson, Stafford Dean, Barry Mora	Sir Charles Mackerras, ORF Symphony Orchestra Arnold Schönberg Choir	Audio CD: Decca, Cat: 430 275-2
1991 1992	Dana Moravkova, Michel Dlouhy, Thomas Hampson, Katerina Svobodova, Jan Kalous	Petr Weigl movie (Video recording, using the Mackerras recording for its soundtrack)	DVD Video: Decca, Cat: B-0000-838-09
1995	Eva-Christine Reimer, Karsten Russ, Klaus Wallprecht, David Midboe, Attila Kovacs	Klauspeter Seibel, Kiel orchestra, Kiel chorus (Recording of a performance in Kiel, Germany, sung in German)	Audio CD: company?? Cat: CPO 999 328-2

References

Sources

• Anderson, Robert (July 1973). "A Village Romeo and Juliet by Delius". The Musical Times. 114 (1565): 707. doi:10.2307/956486. eISSN 2397-5318. ISSN 0027-4666. JSTOR 956486. LCCN 2004-235602. OCLC 53165808.
• Ashbrook, William (1991). "A Village Romeo and Juliet. Frederick Delius". Opera Quarterly. 8 (4). Oxford University Press: 129–31. doi:10.1093/oq/8.4.129 – via Oxford Journals Online.
• "Berlin". Foreign Notes. The Musical Times. 48 (771): 331. 1 May 1907. eISSN 2397-5318. ISSN 0027-4666. JSTOR 903090. LCCN 2004-235602. OCLC 53165808.
• Holden, Amanda (Ed.), The New Penguin Opera Guide, New York: Penguin Putnam, 2001. ISBN 0-14-029312-4
• Redwood, Christopher (1975). "Delius and Strindberg". Music and Letters. LVI (3–4). Oxford University Press: 364–70. doi:10.1093/ml/LVI.3-4.364. ISSN 0027-4224 – via Oxford Journals Online.

External links

• A Village Romeo and Juliet at Boosey & Hawkes
• A Village Romeo and Juliet A concise scene-by-scene synopsis is included in this PDF file, provided by the Naxos/Chandos label, of the booklet that accompanies their all-Delius 2-CD set (Naxos catalog item 8.110982-83) that includes the 1948 performance of this opera; all the tracks are conducted by Sir Thomas Beecham, recorded from 1946 through 1952.