Malodor - no "Maldoror"!

I'm having some slight difficulty with the latest work in our  

repertory, an opera by Philipp Maintz, to be premiered in Theater  

Basel next Thursday: it has nothing to do with the complexity of it's  

musical texts or the abhorrent tale of the ultimate devil in human  

form. Nope, it's got nothing to do with any of this. It's purely my  

legasthenic side, which tells me to pronounce "Malodor" when I'm  

reading "Maldoror": I promise you, I'm not doing it on purpose. On the  

contrary, I feel I have been quite privileged to have had a deeper  

look into the preparations being made for this coming premiere, having  

been present at some scenic and musical rehearsals prior to its going  

on stage- something new for me. The reason for this is that my eleven- 

year-old son is one of the two boys playing and singing the role of  

the child in this production. 

They needed a bilingual French-German  

speaking boy who could sing and bingo- he was in. It was quite  

touching to watch professional musicians grouped around a piano with  

these two kids, all learning their parts together. I enjoyed the quiet  

intensity with which Joachim Rathke, the regisseur, explained the  

boys' role to them, how he coaxed and corrected them, never using any  

tone of voice but the most collegial. Although he often bent over to  

speak to the kids at their face level, he never talked down to them.  

I'm more than grateful to have experienced the professionalism of our  

singers, who had to learn musical texts that would have driven many to  

desperation. It was almost humbling to experience the way they  

mastered this seemingly impossible task with charm and calmness. Why  

humbling? Because I found my viola part challenging, even though I  

have my music in front of me at every moment. They learned their parts  

- much more complex than mine- all by heart.

How does my son see the opera? He's very impressed with the scenery, a  

huge metal grid shaped in the form of a wave. He came home from  

rehearsals happy, saying how nice Michael - "he's the bad guy, Mama",  

is and laughing at learning how a faked slap in the face from his  

stage "Dad" works. But what he finds absolutely  coolest about  

"Maldoror", the scene that all the kids want to rehearse the most?  

That's simple: he likes playing dead.