Prague sets up a Zemlinsky premiere
NewsOne city in the work has not forgotten Alexander Zemlinsky in his 150th year.
Prague will stage a reconstruction of his unfinished opera Malva, after a story by Gorky, and there will be four concerts of his music in the Musica non Grata series, focussed on banned composers.
Zemlinsky was music director of Prageu’s German opera house in the 1920s.
Just to make it clear, the new work — “Malva, a fragment (1912)” — is not a reconstruction of the entire opera, but a performing version of the opening three scenes, which Zemlinsky sketched out in considerable detail. All that survives is his short score and a typewritten libretto. My contribution has been to decipher the MS and orchestrate it. Three solo voices, large orchestra and optional off-stage male-voice chorus. Lasts about 25 minutes.
Hopefully there will be a recording.