People crowded the theaters in 1984 to watch the movie Amadeus, and once again the name Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was on everyone’s lips, the wunderkind. Even the scientists of the time said that listening to Mozart would make babies grow up smarter and an entire generation of mothers sat around with headphones on their bellies. It was Two Hundred Years after the Premiere of Mozart’s opera Idomeneo
I’m bored to death during Act I, and yes I’m still writing about Mozart and Idomeneo. It is written in the traditional Opera Seria style of the time and everything just feels predictable: There is a set up and action followed by a song that expresses how they feel about the set up and action, and that formula repeats until towards the end of the First Act.
For me, Idomeneo is the work where we see him go from the boy with potential to Mozart the myth (writing music without corrections). The leap he makes is written in the score of the opera and things start to get very exciting.
I begin to hear the precocious genius frustrated by the constraints of the past and he begins to twist and stretch against the bonds holding him back. Suddenly the elements begin to intertwine and overlap and rather than feeling separation, the music is unified and wonderful. It is Mozartian, and he knows it.
An anecdote in the playbill describes the evening when Mozart introduced his wife Constanze for the first time to his father. They had not spoken to in a while. The evening must have went well because she describes them all performing the quartet from this opera together, Mozart being so emotionally effected that he left the room in tears.
I loved the Met’s production with the giant stone Neptune making me think of the famous manhole cover from Roman Holiday.
The overture is wildly dramatic and like a lot of overtures could stand on its own as a concert piece.
So What is Idomeneo all About?
After the Trojan war Idomeneo is stranded on a an island and promise if he is rescued he will sacrifice the first person he sees, unfortunately it is his son, Idamante. Idamante is brave and in the end is given the crown by Idomeneo to rule with Illa.
Notes on the Production:
Composer…………………… Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Idamante…………………….. Kate Lindsey
Ilia………………………………. Ying Fang
Idomeneo…………………….. Michael Spyres
Elettra………………………….. Federica Lombardi
High Priest…………………… Issachah Savage
Voice of Neptune…………… Scott Conner
Cello…………………………….. Kari Jane Docter
Fortepiano……………………. Dimitri Dover
Conductor…………………… Manfred Honeck
Met Opera
10/09/22