Moses und Aron

No one will finish watching Romeo Castellucci's 2015 Paris production of Arnold Schönberg's final opera—left incomplete on the composer's death in 1951—and be humming its melodies, because there are none: the music is in 12-tone, serialist mode. The libretto is also challenging, centering on the “lost in translation” effect that inevitably occurs when transcendent truth, represented by God's direct message to Moses (an extended Sprechstimme role), is translated into terms intelligible to man by Moses's more articulate brother Aron (a fearsomely difficult tenor part). The incredibly complex two-act score is brilliantly performed by Thomas Johannes Mayer (Moses) and John Graham-Hall (Aron), backed by the orchestra and chorus of the Opéra national de Paris under Philippe Jordan. What will be memorable to most, however, is Castellucci's vibrant imagery, beginning with a reel-to-reel tape machine hung high above the action, representing the burning bush as it spews reams of tape down on Moses below and a series of words flash onto a scrim set between the stage and the audience. Later, when Aron fashions the golden calf to respond to the Israelites' demand for a concrete deity, an actual ox is escorted onto the stage, only to be doused, like the writhing dancers, with thick black ooze. Add to that the sudden blaze of red as the Nile is turned to blood, along with climbers scaling the stage flats, and this becomes a spectacle that adds layers of meaning—and ambiguity—to the music. Presented in Dolby Digital 5.1 and PCM stereo on DVD, and DTS-HD 5.1 and PCM stereo on Blu-ray, this is an admittedly difficult work, but one well worth experiencing in a production this inventive. Recommended. (F. Swietek)