Weinberg – The Passenger
Breedt; Saccà; Kelessidi; Rucinski; Doneva; Wiener Symphoniker; Teodor Currentzis
ArtHaus Musik 109179
This DVD’s booklet contains a lengthy encomium by Weinberg’s friend and muse, Shostakovich, calling The Passenger “a masterpiece, both in shape and style.” Unsurprising, as Shostakovich’s own “shape and style” pervade Weinberg’s compositions, including this one.
Mieczyslaw Weinberg (1919-1996), a Polish Jew who fled to the USSR in 1939, completed The Passenger in 1968. His memorial to Holocaust victims, among them his parents and sister, was never staged until 2010 at Austria’s Bregenz Festival, the production preserved here. It has since been performed many times in other countries.
The set is on two levels: above, a ship deck in 1960, where Lisa and her husband Walter are bound for Brazil; below, wartime Auschwitz, where Lisa had been an SS guard. On board, Lisa thinks she recognizes Martha, supposedly killed in Auschwitz. Shaken, she reveals her Nazi past to Walter – and to us, the audience, in the Auschwitz scenes where most of the opera unfolds. Here, extended passages of poignant lyricism are punctuated by brutal orchestral outbursts and the onstage brutality of the guards.
Did Martha really survive, or is the veiled, silent passenger an apparition of Lisa’s haunted conscience? In the opera’s epilogue, alone on stage, an unveiled Martha sings
“… never forgive … never forget …”
If not quite “a masterpiece,” with its well-sung, effective music and potent drama, The Passenger will surely wrench guts and jerk tears. A bonus documentary provides details about Weinberg and this unforgettable production.
