I am preparing to conduct Werther for the first time, the opera in four acts by librettists Édouard Blau, Paul Milliet and Georges Hartmann, set to music by Jules Massenet after a difficult creation process followed by an equally complicated history of first performances.

The idea of basing a libretto on the famous Die Leiden des jungen Werther, Goethe’s 1774 epistolary novel, which had enjoyed extraordinary success all over Europe in the pre-Romantic age, was a courageous one, particularly in terms of Massenet’s artistic style and the final years of the nineteenth century in which it had developed, and above all of the literary and social influences which the young Goethe’s tale had generated over the course of a century, when the composer approached it after others had attempted in vain to do the same.

The idea of basing a libretto on the famous Die Leiden des jungen Werther, Goethe’s 1774 epistolary novel, which had enjoyed extraordinary success all over Europe in the pre-Romantic age, was a courageous one, particularly in terms of Massenet’s artistic style and the final years of the nineteenth century in which it had developed, and above all of the literary and social influences which the young Goethe’s tale had generated over the course of a century, when the composer approached it after others had attempted in vain to do the same.

I am enchanted by Werther for different reasons, mainly because, as Massenet had noted, ‘Dans la partition de Werther, l’orchestre représente symboliquement le principal personnage’. The “main character”, the orchestra, impressively amplifies the emotions of the characters thanks to an unusual use of instruments. An example of this is Charlotte’s aria, ‘Va! Laisse couler mes larmes!’, which makes use of a saxophone. But it is the entire orchestral nuance of Werther which shapes a tragedy with unmistakably French sensitivity, filtered and enhanced by elements reminiscent of Tchaikovsky, Schubert and Schumann. The references to Wagnerian language, particularly the harmonic composition and the central motifs are more subtle but do not detract from the originality and compactness of Massenet’s masterpiece, so French and yet so universal, tragic and moving, lyrical and dramatic. The central role of the tenor makes Werther someone ‘other’ than Goethe’s original, colouring his brief life with passion, beauty, altruism and nostalgia for the tragic loss of youth along with all its dreams. The beauty of the music does everything else, resulting in the poignant emotional involvement of the audience with the protagonist.

📷 Andrea Ranzi / TCBO