New York Philharmonic's Le Grand Macabre

Alan Gilbert To Conduct New York Premier

By: Susan Hall - May 20, 2010

Alan Gilbert the music director of the New York Philharmonic, wants to bring more opera to the New York Philharmonic’s programs. Of course, he notes, the music must have wonderful textures for the orchestra to perform. No one writes texturre like Ligeti.

Doug Fitch was admitted to Harvard after he took his puppet Abercrombie to the college interview. Apparently Abercrombie did all the talking and Harvard was impressed. Now we have a chance to see his puppets in action.

One of many images we may see in Le Grand Macabre at Avery Fisher Hall.

Ligeti, composer of The Grand Macabre

Alan Gilbert, conductor
Douglas Fitch, designer and director
Moderated by New York Philharmonic Artistic Administrator, John Mangum
Stanley Kauffman PenthouseAvery Fisher Hall
New York Philharmonic
Performances May 27, 28 and 29. 


One of the most anticipated events this spring is the New York Philharmonic’s production of Le Grand Macabre, designed and directed by Douglas Fitch and produced by Edouard Getaz.  The production is created by Giants Are Small.  

Fitch was an arts tutor in conductor Alan Gilbert’s college dorm. Gilbert loved the marvelous cabaret Fitch created in the basement of the dorm, and that was the beginning of a beautiful friendship.  Gilbert and Fitch now collaborate to what promises to be wonderful effect in the upcoming New York premier of  Gyorgy Ligeti’s only opera.

Ligeti’s other compositions are familiar to film goers in the scores of Space Odyssey 2001, The Shining and Eyes Wide Shut.  Gilbert teases with his name.  Ligeti-split.  Accent on the first syllable.  

Fitch is familiar in the Berkshires as an acclaimed director and designer of operas for the Festival of Contemporary Music at Tanglewood in 2006.

The subject of this opera, Gilbert reports, is whether or not little people amount to a hill of beans in this crazy world.  Robert McKee, the formidable teacher of aspiring film writers and all those who would create stories, recommends redemptive endings.  Without spoiling the show, which begins with a comet’s incipient strike on earth, earth does survive in Le Grand Macabre.

Gilbert has a light touch describing the music, but the deep origins of Ligeti’s wonderful texture may enhance pleasure.  The classical, romantic and modern periods of music were a flyover for Ligeti.  Traveling back, he landed in 15th century Holland and the territory of Flemish composer Johannes Ockeghem, whose sense of indeterminacy was abandoned by other composers for five hundred years.  The Ockeghem effect was in part achieved by foregoing cadences.  No A-men endings here.  

Ockeghem’s work gives a clue to the incredibly beautiful and dense sounds Ligeti calls forth.  Relying on counterpoint, Ligeti inspired by Ockeghem overplays countless lines to develop a dense cobweb of sound.  In case you wonder why you love Ligeti’s music, there it is. Yet you don’t have to think about this to enjoy.  

In Le Grand Macabre, Ligeti actually dips into the flyovers with references to Bach, Beethoven.  When Gilbert mentioned the Beethoven passage, he turned to moderator Mangum, and asked him to play the phrases.  Mangum immediately directed the sound man to a specific track and location.  Gilbert shook his head.  “When am I ever going to stump you?”    

Listeners won’t be lost in a new musical world with Mangum as guide.  Ligeti provides signposts, but you are left to interpret their tone.    

Gilbert has chosen to perform Ligeti’s revised version of the opera.  Like Casablanca, to which Gilbert refers, Ligeti chose to have his characters sing in the revision.  They declaimed in the first version.  Ilsa in Rick’s bar goes: “Da-dy-da-dy-da-dum, da-dy-da-dee-da-dum,” something similar to version one.  But Sam singing “As Time Goes By” is the version two take.

Characters’ names tip their essence:  Nekrotzar is the voice of death; Gepopo is the chief of police, a soprano.  Piet the Pot, a wine taster, doesn’t spit it out.  He might answer, when asked his nationality, “I am a drunkard.”  

Using videos as visuals in opera greatly reduces costs.  So do screen projections.  This year the New York City Opera’s production of Esther successfully used screen projections to evoke the lush oriental world of Xerxes.  

Fitch’s illustrations will be created on stage right next to the conductor’s podium and projected onto a 25 foot oval screen above the orchestra.  No longer is the production billed as semi-staged.  

Video visuals are not only cheaper to produce.  They are the preferred form of the YouTube generation.  Staid older opera goers who saw Le Grand Macabre in Europe, often found themselves sitting next to seventeen-year-olds with motor cycle helmets in their laps.  The Ligeti is opera for all ages.  

Unfortunately, because we were sworn to secrecy by Gilbert and Fitch, the impish, evocative events they have in store during the performance cannot be revealed, under penalty of death.  Surprised you will surely be if you’re lucky enough to get a ticket.

The lecture came to an end with the performance of Ligeti’s Poeme Symphonique for 100 Metronomes.  Its premier broadcast by Dutch television was abruptly replaced by a soccer match when the TV producers realized what was about to happen.  Wound down metronomes are wound up one turn by the conductor directing 10 assistants.  

Gilbert had no trouble getting volunteers.  His assistant, a clarinetist Joseph Rosen, had heard Ligeti in a chamber recital and couldn’t wait to hear more.  Fortunately the ‘score’ for the Poeme Symphonique is a single page of text, i.e. “wind the metronome.”  Gilbert dragged out the score for Le Grand Macabre, which he reports takes a forklift to hoist.  

The Poeme Symphonique is a wonderful piece.  It gives the feel of raindrops on a roof, even if the sun is shining.  It was created when Ligeti got involved with the Fluxus movement, to which John Case and Yoko Ono belonged.  Some critics think this was a detour for Ligeti.  Gilbert obviously joins those who see it as a funny house mirror reflection of Ligeti’s true aesthetic.   

Robert McKee would love this opera.  He teaches U-turns as critical to story telling.  Casablana is often cited as a prime example of U-turn upon U-turn.  They are not easy to produce.  One phrase leads you to expect another.  It is not provided, but you still say, aha, and continue.  Ligeti’s lines are like this, often punctuated with a cry, a groan, even an aha.  

McKee was once asked to become part of a movie production that had already appropriated much of his work.  Lawyers advised him not to get involved, but his twenty-five year old son said, “Do it Dad.  You’ll be a movie star.”

Ligeti already has movie star wattage and will bring Gilbert, Fitch and the New York Philharmonic along in his wake.  We have something more to look forward to.  Ligeti is just like any other man, only more so, or so Rick says.