Monthly Regular Meeting October 2022 (The 205th Meeting of Opera Research Group)
Waseda Institute for Research in Opera and Music Theatre (WIROM), Comprehensive Research Organization, Waseda University
- Time and Date: October 1st (Sat.) 2022, 16:30-18:00 (JST)
- Format: Online meeting (Zoom)
– Registration is required by September 28th (Wed.). Please fill out the following Google-Form:
-The invitation e-mail via zoom will be sent to the registrants on September 30th. (Currently closed.) - Presenter: OKAMOTO, Yoshiko
- Affiliation, Position: Kobe University, Lecturer
- Title: “Japanese Scenes in the Opera Taifun Composed by Theodor Szántó”
- Language: Japanese
- Abstract
This presentation focuses on an opera titled Taifun (“Typhoon”) (1924), which is based on a drama of the same title that was written by Hungarian playwright Melchior Lengyel (1880–1974). The original drama was first performed in 1909, and was followed by numerous productions worldwide. The opera is a tragedy depicting a Japanese bureaucrat who resides in Paris; it was composed by Theodor Szántó (1877–1934) and premiered in Mannheim in 1924. Szántó was a Hungarian pianist and composer who studied in Vienna and Budapest and then in Berlin under Busoni. Although his works are rarely played today, he created various compositions influenced by folk songs in Hungary and Japan, and, as a virtuoso pianist, he also transcribed several works by other composers such as Stravinsky and Bach. This paper first overviews the works and activities of Szántó and then analyzes several scenes that include Japanese elements, comparing them to the original drama, and cites critiques from Hungary. In this way, it reveals how the opera was received by the audiences in the context of the history of Hungarian operas and which images of Japan were prevalent in Europe from the turn of the century to the interwar period.
- Profile of Presenter:
Yoshiko OKAMOTO is a lecturer in the Graduate School of Intercultural Studies, Kobe University, Japan. She received her M.A. in 2010 and Ph.D. in 2014 from the University of Tokyo, and her doctoral thesis is on Bartók’s Duke Bluebeard’s Castle. Her main interest is in Bartók’s stage works and their relationship to literature. She recently published “Images of the Friendship with Bartók: From Béla Balázs’s Recollections” in Hungarian Studies 28(2) 211–234 and “Béla Bartók’s Controversy with Géza Molnár in 1911: As a Member of the ‘Transitional Generation’” in Studia Musicologica 58(2) 129–146. - Moderator: NAKAMURA, Ryo
Next meeting
Next meeting will be held on November 5th (Sat.) 2022
Presenter: ONISHI, Yuki
Moderator: KASAI, Amane
- Waseda Institute for Research in Opera and Music Theatre (WIROM), Comprehensive Research Organization, Waseda University
- e-mail address: operaken-uketsuke[at]list.waseda.jp ( [at] = @)
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