María de Buenos Aires
Encyclopedia
María de Buenos Aires is a tango
opera
(tango operita) with music by Ástor Piazzolla
. and libretto by Horacio Ferrer which premiered at the Sala Planeta in Buenos Aires
in May 1968.
The surreal
plot centers on a prostitute in Buenos Aires
, Argentina
; the second half takes place after her death. The characters include María (and, after her death, the Shadow of María), a singer of payadas, various members of the Buenos Aires underworld, a poet narrator who is also a goblin-like duende
, several marionette
s under his control, and a circus of psychoanalysts
. Several elements of the libretto
suggest parallels between María and Mary, the mother of Jesus (in Spanish
, María) or to Jesus
himself.
While certainly not in the narrow sense an opera ballet, because the dance is tango rather than classical ballet
, it falls within the tradition of having set dance pieces integral to an operatic work.
The music draws on the nuevo tango
idiom for which Piazzolla is famous. The original idea for the story was conceived by Piazzolla's then lover, Egle Martin (though she was already married to Eduardo "Lalo" Palacios). The title role was originally conceived for Martin, but while Piazzolla was still composing the operita, he and Martin broke up after he asked her husband for her hand at Christmas in 1967. According to Martin, Piazzolla said to Lalo, "She is music, she can't belong to anybody, no she is music, she is music, and that's me." After their rift a replacement was desperately needed, but Piazzolla soon met folksinger Amelita Baltar
at the Buenos Aires nightclub "Nuestro Tiempo", formerly called "676" and once Piazzolla's home base in Argentina. Baltar's identification with the character Maria paired with her beauty and captivating stage presence made her ideal.
The piece is written for at least three vocalists (one of whom, the narrator, speaks rather than singing). For the orchestration Piazzolla augmented his current working quintet: Piazzolla (bandoneon), Antonio Agri (violin), Jamie "El Russo" Gosis (piano), Oscar Lopez Ruiz (guitar) and Enrique "Kicho" Diaz (bass); with viola, cello, flute, percussion, vibraphone and xylophone, and another guitar. Maria de Buenos Aires has often been performed with dancers as well as the musicians. There are several extant arrangements, including Piazzola's own and one by Pablo Ziegler
.
María de Buenos Aires is seldom staged, though there are occasional concert performances, often incorporating dance. One such was a semi-staged performance the Grand Thermae Villa in Rome in 2003 was recorded and has been released on DVD (Kultur Video). Other recent productions include the Norfolk and Norwich Festival in the United Kingdom (2004), the Teatro nacional de S.Joaõ (Porto) and the Opera São Carlos (Lisbon) in Portugal (2006, 2007, toured to Norway, 2007), the Gotham Chamber Opera at Skirball Center, in New York City (2008), Canberra, Australia (National Multicultural Festival, 2008) and the very successful Teatro di Capua production (2008) which has been produced in several theatres including the Hermitage Theatre in St Petersburg, Russia, Moscow (where it received two nominations in the Moscow Festival of the Golden Mask
in 2009) and the 2010 Edinburgh Festival.
A new fully staged production by Australian dance company Leigh Warren and Dancers and the State Opera of South Australia opened in Adelaide, Australia, on 15 October 2010 and performed at the Brisbane Festival in September 2011.
A new production by Quantum Theatre
in Pittsburgh, PA, with musical direction by Andres Cladera and stage direction by Karla Boos, opened 24 March, 2011.
The opera was translated to Swedish by Leif Janzon and premiered by the Piteå Chamber Opera on October 15 2011 at Acusticum in Piteå
(Sweden).
A new fully staged production by Vatroslav Lisinski Concert Hall
, Zagreb
, Croatia
, was premiered on October 22, 2011, with re-run on October 24. The performance was directed by Mario Kovač, with The Zagreb Soloists under direction of Miran Vaupotić, and Chamber Choir "Ivan Filipović" under direction of Goran Jerković. Bandoneón
was played by Aleksandar Nikolić, the recipient of Ástor Piazzolla
Award in 2008. The circus acts were performed by the circus company Circorama. The singers were Sandra Rumolino, Jorge Rodriguez and José Luis Baretto.
keepers, gathered at a black mass
resolve her death. After her death, she is condemned to a hell
which is the city itself: her Shadow, now walks the city. She has returned to virginity, is impregnated by the word of the goblin poet, and—witnessed by three Construction Worker Magi and The Women Who Knead Pasta—gives birth to a Child María, who may be herself.
Tango music
Tango is a style of ballroom dance music in 2/4 or 4/4 time that originated among European immigrant populations of Argentina and Uruguay . It is traditionally played by a sextet, known as the orquesta típica, which includes two violins, piano, double bass, and two bandoneons...
opera
Opera
Opera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery, and costumes and sometimes includes dance...
(tango operita) with music by Ástor Piazzolla
Ástor Piazzolla
Ástor Pantaleón Piazzolla was an Argentine tango composer and bandoneón player. His oeuvre revolutionized the traditional tango into a new style termed nuevo tango, incorporating elements from jazz and classical music...
. and libretto by Horacio Ferrer which premiered at the Sala Planeta in Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires is the capital and largest city of Argentina, and the second-largest metropolitan area in South America, after São Paulo. It is located on the western shore of the estuary of the Río de la Plata, on the southeastern coast of the South American continent...
in May 1968.
The surreal
Surrealism
Surrealism is a cultural movement that began in the early 1920s, and is best known for the visual artworks and writings of the group members....
plot centers on a prostitute in Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires is the capital and largest city of Argentina, and the second-largest metropolitan area in South America, after São Paulo. It is located on the western shore of the estuary of the Río de la Plata, on the southeastern coast of the South American continent...
, Argentina
Argentina
Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...
; the second half takes place after her death. The characters include María (and, after her death, the Shadow of María), a singer of payadas, various members of the Buenos Aires underworld, a poet narrator who is also a goblin-like duende
Duende (mythology)
A duende is a fairy- or goblin-like mythological creature from Iberian, Latin American and Filipino folklore. While its nature varies throughout Spain, Portugal, Spanish and Portuguese-speaking America and the Philippines, analogues from other cultures include the Danish-Norwegian Nisse, the...
, several marionette
Marionette
A marionette is a puppet controlled from above using wires or strings depending on regional variations. A marionette's puppeteer is called a manipulator. Marionettes are operated with the puppeteer hidden or revealed to an audience by using a vertical or horizontal control bar in different forms...
s under his control, and a circus of psychoanalysts
Psychoanalysis
Psychoanalysis is a psychological theory developed in the late 19th and early 20th centuries by Austrian neurologist Sigmund Freud. Psychoanalysis has expanded, been criticized and developed in different directions, mostly by some of Freud's former students, such as Alfred Adler and Carl Gustav...
. Several elements of the libretto
Libretto
A libretto is the text used in an extended musical work such as an opera, operetta, masque, oratorio, cantata, or musical. The term "libretto" is also sometimes used to refer to the text of major liturgical works, such as mass, requiem, and sacred cantata, or even the story line of a...
suggest parallels between María and Mary, the mother of Jesus (in Spanish
Spanish language
Spanish , also known as Castilian , is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several languages and dialects in central-northern Iberia around the 9th century and gradually spread with the expansion of the Kingdom of Castile into central and southern Iberia during the...
, María) or to Jesus
Jesus
Jesus of Nazareth , commonly referred to as Jesus Christ or simply as Jesus or Christ, is the central figure of Christianity...
himself.
While certainly not in the narrow sense an opera ballet, because the dance is tango rather than classical ballet
Ballet
Ballet is a type of performance dance, that originated in the Italian Renaissance courts of the 15th century, and which was further developed in France and Russia as a concert dance form. The early portions preceded the invention of the proscenium stage and were presented in large chambers with...
, it falls within the tradition of having set dance pieces integral to an operatic work.
The music draws on the nuevo tango
Nuevo tango
Tango Nuevo - either a form of music in which new elements are incorporated into traditional Argentine tango, or an evolution of tango dance that began to develop in the 1980s...
idiom for which Piazzolla is famous. The original idea for the story was conceived by Piazzolla's then lover, Egle Martin (though she was already married to Eduardo "Lalo" Palacios). The title role was originally conceived for Martin, but while Piazzolla was still composing the operita, he and Martin broke up after he asked her husband for her hand at Christmas in 1967. According to Martin, Piazzolla said to Lalo, "She is music, she can't belong to anybody, no she is music, she is music, and that's me." After their rift a replacement was desperately needed, but Piazzolla soon met folksinger Amelita Baltar
Amelita Baltar
María Amelia Baltar, known as Amelita Baltar is an Argentine tango singer who became famous in the early 1970s as a vocalist for composers and bandoneónists Ástor Piazzolla and Horacio Ferrer...
at the Buenos Aires nightclub "Nuestro Tiempo", formerly called "676" and once Piazzolla's home base in Argentina. Baltar's identification with the character Maria paired with her beauty and captivating stage presence made her ideal.
The piece is written for at least three vocalists (one of whom, the narrator, speaks rather than singing). For the orchestration Piazzolla augmented his current working quintet: Piazzolla (bandoneon), Antonio Agri (violin), Jamie "El Russo" Gosis (piano), Oscar Lopez Ruiz (guitar) and Enrique "Kicho" Diaz (bass); with viola, cello, flute, percussion, vibraphone and xylophone, and another guitar. Maria de Buenos Aires has often been performed with dancers as well as the musicians. There are several extant arrangements, including Piazzola's own and one by Pablo Ziegler
Pablo Ziegler
Pablo Ziegler is an Argentine composer based in Buenos Aires and New York City. He is currently the leading exponent of nuevo tango, thanks to the skills and reputation he gathered while working extensively as Ástor Piazzolla's regular pianist from 1978 until the maestro's retirement for health...
.
María de Buenos Aires is seldom staged, though there are occasional concert performances, often incorporating dance. One such was a semi-staged performance the Grand Thermae Villa in Rome in 2003 was recorded and has been released on DVD (Kultur Video). Other recent productions include the Norfolk and Norwich Festival in the United Kingdom (2004), the Teatro nacional de S.Joaõ (Porto) and the Opera São Carlos (Lisbon) in Portugal (2006, 2007, toured to Norway, 2007), the Gotham Chamber Opera at Skirball Center, in New York City (2008), Canberra, Australia (National Multicultural Festival, 2008) and the very successful Teatro di Capua production (2008) which has been produced in several theatres including the Hermitage Theatre in St Petersburg, Russia, Moscow (where it received two nominations in the Moscow Festival of the Golden Mask
Golden Mask
The Golden Mask is a Russian theatre festival and the National Theatre Award established in 1994 by the Theatre Union of Russia. The award is given to productions in all genres of theatre art: drama, opera, ballet, operetta and musical, and puppet theatre. It presents the most significant...
in 2009) and the 2010 Edinburgh Festival.
A new fully staged production by Australian dance company Leigh Warren and Dancers and the State Opera of South Australia opened in Adelaide, Australia, on 15 October 2010 and performed at the Brisbane Festival in September 2011.
A new production by Quantum Theatre
Quantum Theatre
Quantum Theatre is a professional theatre company that produces experimental productions in non-traditional performance spaces around the Pittsburgh area. Founded in 1990 by Karla Boos, the company aims to incorporate influences from world culture and the international theatre scene. The theatre...
in Pittsburgh, PA, with musical direction by Andres Cladera and stage direction by Karla Boos, opened 24 March, 2011.
The opera was translated to Swedish by Leif Janzon and premiered by the Piteå Chamber Opera on October 15 2011 at Acusticum in Piteå
Piteå
Piteå is a locality and the seat of Piteå Municipality in Norrbotten County, Sweden. The town has 22,650 inhabitants out of a municipal total of 41,000 in 2008.- Geography :...
(Sweden).
A new fully staged production by Vatroslav Lisinski Concert Hall
Vatroslav Lisinski Concert Hall
Vatroslav Lisinski Concert Hall is a large concert hall and convention center in Zagreb, Croatia. It is named after Vatroslav Lisinski, a 19th-century Croatian composer. The building has a big hall with 1841 seats and a small hall with 305 seats. A large lobby doubles as an exhibition...
, Zagreb
Zagreb
Zagreb is the capital and the largest city of the Republic of Croatia. It is in the northwest of the country, along the Sava river, at the southern slopes of the Medvednica mountain. Zagreb lies at an elevation of approximately above sea level. According to the last official census, Zagreb's city...
, Croatia
Croatia
Croatia , officially the Republic of Croatia , is a unitary democratic parliamentary republic in Europe at the crossroads of the Mitteleuropa, the Balkans, and the Mediterranean. Its capital and largest city is Zagreb. The country is divided into 20 counties and the city of Zagreb. Croatia covers ...
, was premiered on October 22, 2011, with re-run on October 24. The performance was directed by Mario Kovač, with The Zagreb Soloists under direction of Miran Vaupotić, and Chamber Choir "Ivan Filipović" under direction of Goran Jerković. Bandoneón
Bandoneón
The bandoneón is a type of concertina particularly popular in Argentina and Uruguay. It plays an essential role in the orquesta típica, the tango orchestra...
was played by Aleksandar Nikolić, the recipient of Ástor Piazzolla
Ástor Piazzolla
Ástor Pantaleón Piazzolla was an Argentine tango composer and bandoneón player. His oeuvre revolutionized the traditional tango into a new style termed nuevo tango, incorporating elements from jazz and classical music...
Award in 2008. The circus acts were performed by the circus company Circorama. The singers were Sandra Rumolino, Jorge Rodriguez and José Luis Baretto.
Synopsis
The ill-omened María, born "one day when God was drunk" in a poor suburb of Buenos Aires, heads to the center of Buenos Aires, where she is seduced by the music of the tango and becomes a streetwalker. Thieves and brothelBrothel
Brothels are business establishments where patrons can engage in sexual activities with prostitutes. Brothels are known under a variety of names, including bordello, cathouse, knocking shop, whorehouse, strumpet house, sporting house, house of ill repute, house of prostitution, and bawdy house...
keepers, gathered at a black mass
Black Mass
A Black Mass is a ceremony supposedly celebrated during the Witches' Sabbath, which was a sacrilegious parody of the Catholic Mass. Its main objective was the profanation of the host, although there is no agreement among authors on how hosts were obtained or profaned; the most common idea is that...
resolve her death. After her death, she is condemned to a hell
Hell
In many religious traditions, a hell is a place of suffering and punishment in the afterlife. Religions with a linear divine history often depict hells as endless. Religions with a cyclic history often depict a hell as an intermediary period between incarnations...
which is the city itself: her Shadow, now walks the city. She has returned to virginity, is impregnated by the word of the goblin poet, and—witnessed by three Construction Worker Magi and The Women Who Knead Pasta—gives birth to a Child María, who may be herself.
External links
- Entire Operita with Ballet, with Sandra Rumolino as Maria
- Dei, a video recording. Ensemble: Seattle Chamber PlayersSeattle Chamber PlayersThe Seattle Chamber Players are a chamber ensemble focused on contemporary music, founded in 1989 in Seattle, Washington, U.S. In January 2004, the group was awarded the ASCAP/Chamber Music America Award for Adventurous Programming....
, soloists: Pablo Zinger (USA), Leonardo Granados, tenor (Venezuela); Alexander MitenevAlexander MitenevBorn in St. Petersburg Alexander Mitenev began playing music at the age of nine. Before his 16 Alexander had already made a lot of appearances in Russia and obtained Dmitry Likhachev Scholarship.1997 he was accepted to State Academy of Art in St...
, bandoneon (Russia) http://www.gzt.ru/culture/2006/12/03/220003.html Russia). - de Buenos Aires, a video recording. Astorpia Tango Quintet
- Fuga y misterio (Fugue and Mystery), a video recording. Ensemble: Kremerata BalticaKremerata BalticaKremerata Baltica is a chamber orchestra consisting of young musicians from Baltic countries . It was founded by Gidon Kremer in 1997.The name is a pun on camerata, the general word applying to various chamber music groups....
, soloists: Gidon KremerGidon KremerGidon Kremer is a Latvian violinist and conductor. In 1980 he left the USSR and settled in Germany.-Biography:Kremer was born in Riga to parents of German-Jewish and Latvian-Swedish origins. He began playing the violin at the age of four, receiving instruction from his father and his grandfather,...
, violin (Latvia); Andrei Pushkarev, vibraphone ( http://www.calperfs.berkeley.edu/presents/information_desk/program_notes/2006/pn_gk_az_ap.pdf Ukraine).