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Hans Werner Henze's Adagio, Fugue, and Maenad's Dance in US Premiere at Boston Symphony Orchestra

Apr. 01, 2006

Hans Werner Henze composed his opera The Bassarids on commission from the Salzburg Festival in 1964-65. The one-act music drama that Henze and his librettists, W.H. Auden and Chester Kallman, fashioned from Euripides' The Bacchae has been hailed for the "accuracy and vitality with which Henze posits the age-old conflict between Spirit and Eros, reason at war with libido."  Now, American audiences can hear some of the great music from that landmark score in a new work that Henze prepared in 2004-2005 on commission from the German Radio Symphony Orchestra, titled Adagio, Fugue, and Maenad's Dance.  Christoph von Dohnanyi, who led the first production of The Bassarids in 1966 and the world premiere of this new concert work in September 2005 in Hamburg, brings it to the Boston Symphony Orchestra for three performances April 27-29. 

The music Henze chose to adapt for his concert work is from the "third movement" of his opera and, as Thomas May points out in his note for the Boston Symphony Orchestra program book, it is music that truly "distills the essence of the opera. This sequence follows King Pentheus' encounter with Dionysus, who, disguised as a stranger, arouses the celibate Pentheus into a fever pitch of desire to learn what really happens during the Dionysian rites." Henze's music aptly illustrates the events as they unfold, with the music of the Maenad’s dance (a Maenad is a female adherent of Dionysus) especially effective in its striking use of polyrhythms and vibrant percussive effects. 

Boston Symphony Orchestra Artistic Administrator Anthony Fogg comments:

The Boston Symphony has enjoyed a close relationship with Hans Werner Henze over many years. He was composer-in-residence at Tanglewood for two seasons - an association that led to acclaimed performances under Seiji Ozawa of his 7th symphony and the commissioning and premiere in 1993 of the 8th symphony. We were delighted when Christoph von Dohnányi — a conductor long associated with Henze's music — suggested  the newly-crafted Adagio and Fugue from the The Bassarids for his concerts in Boston this spring.

 

For more details about Adagio, Fugue, and Maenad's Dance at the Boston Symphony Orchestra, please visit www.bso.org. For further information about Hans Werner Henze and his music, please visit www.schott-music.com.

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