Engelbert Humperdinck (1854-1921)
Das Mirakel (The Miracle), Pantomime in Two Acts (1911)
Sophie Klußmann (soprano), Josette Micheler (mezzo), Rundfunkchor Berlin, Kinderchor des Georg-Friedrich-Händel-Gymnasium Berlin, Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin / Steffen Tast
rec. 2024, RBB Saal 1, Berlin, Germany
Includes German libretto with an English translation
Capriccio C5543 [2 CDs: 88]
Steffen Tast and Capriccio have followed up their wonderful 2022 release of Humperdinck’s complete incidental music for Der Blaue Vogel (review) with this completely unknown score for the religious mystery play The Miracle. It is earnestly hoped that Tast and Capriccio will continue investigating the mostly unknown compositions by Humperdinck and turn this into an ongoing series. Too little of Humperdinck’s oeuvre has ever been available to a wider audience apart from the operas Hänsel und Gretel and Königskinder.
The Miracle was one of theatrical impresario Max Reinhardt’s mega-projects which was a phenomenal success in the years prior to WWI (as was Der Blaue Vogel). It had its world premiere at the Olympia Exhibition Center in Kensington (West London) in 1911 and went on to travel around Europe and the USA, drawing massive audiences wherever it appeared. Reinhardt also turned the project into a major feature film in 1912, with Humperdinck’s score played by an orchestra while the silent film was projected above it. The film had its world premiere in 1912 at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, where it became the first major film event to be presented there. It too pulled in enormous crowds of spectators. Approximately an hour of that old film still survives (it originally lasted just over 2 hours) and can be viewed on YouTube, although minus Humperdinck’s score. Having watched some of it in conjunction with writing this review I must mention that I find the high-heeled shoes that the Medieval nun wears underneath her habit to be most amusing.
The librettist of this curiosity, Kurt Vollmoeller, has hitherto been most remembered for being the writer of the screenplay for Marlene Dietrich’s 1929 sensational screen debut in Der Blaue Engel/The Blue Angel. It is now possible to understand that his later film success almost pales in comparison to the worldwide phenomenon that was Das Mirakel.
The story is essentially a twist on the parable of the Prodigal Son. In The Miracle, a sacristan nun, one Megildis, becomes tempted away from her convent life by a hedonistic minstrel and a handsome knight, after which a statue of the Madonna comes to life and assumes the nun’s place in the convent so that Megildis’ absence will not be noticed. After many troubling and dissolute experiences the nun eventually returns to the convent (with a dead child in her arms) to be forgiven by the Madonna. The statue resumes her place, and Melgildis hers among the sisters. The child’s corpse becomes a new, permanent addition to the statue.
Humperdinck’s score for this extravaganza is strewn with many beauties along its path although most of the items are on the brief side of things. Without any visuals or interspersed dialogue the tracks can seem rather tenuously connected to one another. In addition, the first scene is essentially a series of prayers intoned by a female chorus; the loss of the dramatic action that occurs between each prayer brings with it a certain tone of monotony fairly early in the work. Things don’t really quite come to life until after Megildis flees from the convent. Much of the rest of the score is well-crafted orchestral excerpts, some with a an overall impression of orchestral religiosity, while others feature more typical passages of orchestral activity, often in dance-like rhythms. As an example, one can sample the Interlude and Torch Dance to see Humperdinck’s inspiration here. The most beautiful of all the excerpts is the splendid prayer for a full chorus (the men’s voices finally arriving at the convent) for a deeply satisfying “großer Gott, wir loben dich”. It was only a year later that Humperdinck would surpass all of these achievements with his intrinsically beautiful score for the opera Königskinder, the finest of the compositions from his later years.
Steffen Tast repeats his spectacular achievement with Der Blaue Vogel, using the same choir and orchestra as before. This cannot have been an easy score to bring together and he manages to give as much of a sense of unity to the rather disunited nature of this work as it will allow. The orchestra responds with playing that sounds both warm and resonant. There is some excellent work by the brass and percussion sections in the repeated fanfares Humperdinck created. The choir has a most disciplined sound and although there are two soloists listed, their music is so brief as to not allow me to comment on their contribution. The children’s choir makes a very nice showing in music which Humperdinck adapted from well-known Christmas Carols by Mendelssohn, Praetorius and Max Reger.
The engineers have provided a rich, warm sound field, with just a hint of spatial resonance for this release. This two-disc set comes with an excellent booklet which includes a couple of historic photos of The Miracle in performance. The notes are generously informative, although curiously they barely make any mention at all of the 1912 film. To be fair to the writer, this is a recording of the 1911 stage score, so perhaps it was felt necessary not to confuse things with the later film score that was adapted from this one. I must add that having listened through the discs once, I enjoyed the experience of the second hearing all the more once I had become accustomed to the strange nature of this work. Although it may have less obvious appeal to music lovers than Der Blaue Vogel, there is much that is valuable here. There is one odd thing though: as the world premiere was given to Londoners in English, one presumes that the English title should take precedence over the German one -but let that pass. It is a small modern-day miracle to be able to welcome The Miracle onto disc in any language.
Mike Parr
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