''Die heilige Ente: ein Spiel mit Göttern und Menschen'' (

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany, the country of the Germans and German things **Germania (Roman era) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizenship in Germany, see also Ge ...

: ''The sacred duck: a play with Gods and men'') is an

opera Opera is a form of History of theatre#European theatre, Western theatre in which music is a fundamental component and dramatic roles are taken by Singing, singers. Such a "work" (the literal translation of the Italian word "opera") is typically ...

with a prelude and three acts by the composer

Hans Gál Hans Gál Officer of the Order of the British Empire, OBE (5 August 1890 – 3 October 1987) was an Austrian composer, pedagogue, musicologist, and author, who emigrated to the United Kingdom in 1938. Life Gál was born to a Jewish family in ...

(his Op. 15), to a libretto by Karl Michael Leventzow and

Leo Feld Leo Feld (14 February 1869, Augsburg - 5 September 1924 Florence) was an Austrian librettist, dramaturge, stage director, and writer. He also worked as a translator for publishing companies, and was notably responsible for translating many of Cha ...

. Written in 1920–21, it was premiered in

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on 29 April 1923 under the baton of

Georg Szell George Szell (; June 7, 1897 – July 30, 1970), originally György Széll, György Endre Szél, or Georg Szell, was a Hungarian-born American conductor, composer and pianist. Considered one of the twentieth century's greatest conductors, ...

Performance history

The opera was a great success, and was immediately taken up by other German-language opera houses during the 1920s and early 1930s, including Breslau,

Weimar Weimar is a city in the state (Germany), German state of Thuringia, in Central Germany (cultural area), Central Germany between Erfurt to the west and Jena to the east, southwest of Leipzig, north of Nuremberg and west of Dresden. Together w ...

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Chemnitz Chemnitz (; from 1953 to 1990: Karl-Marx-Stadt (); ; ) is the third-largest city in the Germany, German States of Germany, state of Saxony after Leipzig and Dresden, and the fourth-largest city in the area of former East Germany after (East Be ...

Kassel Kassel (; in Germany, spelled Cassel until 1926) is a city on the Fulda River in North Hesse, northern Hesse, in Central Germany (geography), central Germany. It is the administrative seat of the Regierungsbezirk Kassel (region), Kassel and the d ...

Königsberg Königsberg (; ; ; ; ; ; , ) is the historic Germany, German and Prussian name of the city now called Kaliningrad, Russia. The city was founded in 1255 on the site of the small Old Prussians, Old Prussian settlement ''Twangste'' by the Teuton ...

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and

Berlin Berlin ( ; ) is the Capital of Germany, capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and List of cities in Germany by population, population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the List of cities in the European Union by population withi ...

. The Berlin and Breslau performances were undertaken by the director

Heinz Tietjen Heinz Tietjen (24 June 1881 – 30 November 1967) was a German conductor and music producer born in Tangier, Morocco. Biography Tietjen was born in Tangier, Morocco. At age twenty-three, he held the producer position at the Opera House in Tri ...

. The critic Hanns Gutmann enthused over the Berlin production: "The score of this opera demonstrates how the orchestra has developed throughout the 19th century and is handled with the same virtuosity as

Mahler Gustav Mahler (; 7 July 1860 – 18 May 1911) was an Austro-Bohemian Romantic composer, and one of the leading conductors of his generation. As a composer he acted as a bridge between the 19th-century Austro-German tradition and the modernism ...

and

Strauss Strauss, Strauß, or Straus is a common Germanic surname. Outside Germany and Austria ''Strauß'' is usually spelled ''Strauss'' (the letter " ß" is not used in the German-speaking part of Switzerland). In classical music, "Strauss" most com ...

". In 1929 ''Die heilige Ente'' became the first contemporary opera to be broadcast by RAVAG (Vienna Radio). However, after 1933 the

Nazi regime Nazi Germany, officially known as the German Reich and later the Greater German Reich, was the German state between 1933 and 1945, when Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party controlled the country, transforming it into a totalitarian dictat ...

in Germany banned further performances as Gál was of

Jew Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, religion, and community are highly inte ...

ish descent. An abbreviated version of the opera for children, using

chamber orchestra Chamber music is a form of classical music that is composed for a small group of Musical instrument, instruments—traditionally a group that could fit in a Great chamber, palace chamber or a large room. Most broadly, it includes any art music ...

accompaniment, was produced at Opera Köln in 2007.Anon2 (n.d.) A revival of the full opera was produced at the Berlin Sophiensaele in 2012, and then in

Theater Heidelberg Theater & Orchester Heidelberg is a theatre in Heidelberg, Baden-Württemberg Baden-Württemberg ( ; ), commonly shortened to BW or BaWü, is a states of Germany, German state () in Southwest Germany, east of the Rhine, which forms the so ...

in 2020.

Roles

Synopsis

''The satirical plot envisages bored Chinese gods amusing themselves by exchanging the identities of two of the characters. The eponymous duck brings matters to a happy resolution.''Haas (2014). The duck-breeder Yang is taking a duck to the palace when he falls for the charms of Li, the wife of the mandarin. The duck is meanwhile stolen, and the mandarin condemns Yang to death. However, the gods transpose their brains; Yang (now the mandarin) commutes the sentence which would now fall on the mandarin (in Yang's body), and also takes the opportunity to pour scorn upon the gods. In anger, the gods reverse the personality switch. The duck now reappears and the (restored) mandarin, considering this a miracle, offers to raise Yang to the nobility. Yang however has had enough of changes, and prefers to seek his fortune in the wide world.

Orchestration

The opera is scored for a large orchestra, with triple

woodwind Woodwind instruments are a family of musical instruments within the greater category of wind instruments. Common examples include flute, clarinet, oboe, bassoon, and saxophone. There are two main types of woodwind instruments: flutes and Ree ...

and

brass instrument A brass instrument is a musical instrument that produces sound by Sympathetic resonance, sympathetic vibration of air in a tubular resonator in sympathy with the vibration of the player's lips. The term ''labrosone'', from Latin elements meani ...

s, a range of

percussion instrument A percussion instrument is a musical instrument that is sounded by being struck or scraped by a percussion mallet, beater including attached or enclosed beaters or Rattle (percussion beater), rattles struck, scraped or rubbed by hand or ...

s, and an onstage band of

trumpet The trumpet is a brass instrument commonly used in classical and jazz musical ensemble, ensembles. The trumpet group ranges from the piccolo trumpet—with the highest Register (music), register in the brass family—to the bass trumpet, pitche ...

trombone The trombone (, Italian, French: ''trombone'') is a musical instrument in the Brass instrument, brass family. As with all brass instruments, sound is produced when the player's lips vibrate inside a mouthpiece, causing the Standing wave, air c ...

kettledrum Timpani (; ) or kettledrums (also informally called timps) are musical instruments in the percussion family. A type of drum categorised as a hemispherical drum, they consist of a membrane called a head stretched over a large bowl traditionally ...

gong A gongFrom Indonesian language, Indonesian and ; ; zh, c=鑼, p=luó; ; ; ; ; is a percussion instrument originating from Southeast Asia, and used widely in Southeast Asian and East Asian musical traditions. Gongs are made of metal and ...

and

bell A bell /ˈbɛl/ () is a directly struck idiophone percussion instrument. Most bells have the shape of a hollow cup that when struck vibrates in a single strong strike tone, with its sides forming an efficient resonator. The strike may be m ...

References

Notes Sources * Anon1 (n.d.)
"Die heilige Ente"
i
''The Hans Gál website''
accessed 17 January 2015. * Anon2 (n.d.)
"Hans Gál, Die heilige Ente"
i
''Universal Edition'' website
(in German), accessed 17 January 2015. * Gál, Hans (1923)
''Die heilige Ente: ein Spiel mit Göttern und Menschen''
( piano score), Vienna and Leipzig,

Universal Edition Universal Edition (UE) is an Austrian classical music publishing firm. Founded in 1901 in Vienna, it originally intended to provide the core classical works and educational works to the Austrian market. The firm soon expanded to become one of t ...

, (in German). Accessed o
''Internet Archive'' website
17 January 2015. * Gál, Hans (2014). ''Music Behind Barbed Wire: A diary of Summer 1940''. London: Toccata Press. * Gruhl, Boris Michael (2012)
"An allem ist die Ente Schuld – Hans Gáls vergessene Oper „Die heilige Ente“ wird in den Berliner Sophiensaelen wiederentdeckt"
i
''neue musikzeitung'' website
(in German), accessed 17 January 2015. * Haas, Michael (2014)
"Hans Gál and his Sacred Duck"
o
''Forbidden Music'' website
accessed 17 January 2015. {{DEFAULTSORT:heilige Ente, Die Operas 1923 operas Operas by Hans Gál Operas set in China German-language operas