Opera librettos don’t really have a good reputation, a few librettists like Lorenzo Da Ponte and Hugo von Hoffmansthal are respected but often the libretto is either derided or not even mentioned when talking about opera. Its no wonder since the story is most often just a framework to give the work form, the real point being communicated by music. Phillip Glass realized this and deals with the problem by doing away with the liner story completely replacing it with meditations on the subjects work, philosophy and illuminating moments. When Mr. Glass jumped into public view with Einstein on the Beach this seemed as much a part of Minimalism as the music. I thought the combination was potent when I first saw Satyagraha in 1981 and still found it moving and effective when I saw at The Met on Monday.
Satyagraha has been translated as a compound of two Sanskrit words meaning, according to the Met Playbill as truth force or holding on to truth. The libretto is indeed in Sanskrit and is made of excerpts from the Bhagavad Gita and other sources that illuminate the opera’s subject - the ideas of peace, human rights and self respect that transformed Gandhi and through him Indians in South Africa and India and eventually others around the world, specifically Martin Luther King Jr. This may sound very static but I found the combination of the music played by a small orchestra of strings and woodwinds (with a single electronic keyboard), the production and words to be very effective. The music the first score Glass wrote for traditional rather than electronic instruments, when I first heard it I was amazed at the increased interest the traditional instruments add to the minimalist style. As conducted by second generation Glass specialist Dante Anzolini the music was meditative in just the way the opera demands. Its not that it doesn’t move its that it moves you in ways too subtle to think about but just right for feeling. The flutes and bassoons were particularly effective; they have been noticeably effective all season. The Chorus and soloists performed the music like theve been singing it all their lives. Richard Croft as Gandhi used his gentle tenor voice with true grace. I know some people are offended by Glass’s music but that is hard for me to understand since it works so well for me.
The production was by Phelim McDermott of the Improbable Theater Company was created jointly with The English National Opera and has already played successfully in London. While the production is respectful to the subject matter it is also fanciful in many places. I especially liked a bit when coat hangers came down from the ceiling as Gandhi, his supporters and the Indian workers took off their European closees, put them on the hangers leaving them in their traditional Indian garb. This scene simply said more both musically and theatrically than a more traditional opera ever could. If the first two acts were kind of George Grosz meets Julie Taymor, which ain’t bad, The last act, called King, was especially moving. As the act unfolded an actor mutely portrayed Dr. King giving his famous speech at the Washington Mall. Film of the event was also projected on the back of the stage. As the scene went on the window grew large enough to fill the entire back of the stage. In its way it reminds us that what started as a personal journey by one man grew to affect the whole world. In many was this production at the Met was done better than the one I saw in Brooklyn in 1981, but by far the best difference is that apartheid doesn’t exist in South Africa anymore.
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