A Conductress Performs Open-Heart Surgery: An Interview With Marta Kluczyńska

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On music: new and older, the accessibility of opera and the Polish opera’s herstory. An interview with the conductress and music director of the Polish National Ballet.

Filip Lech: At the beginning of your conducting career, you often reached for new music. Recently, you have been increasingly reaching for an older repertoire.

Marta Kluczyńska: My interest in new music started back when I was studying at the music school on Miodowa Street in Warsaw. Its annual Student Music Forum festival allowed young art adepts to realize themselves artistically; the event shaped many famous composers and performers, and not only of new music. The festival gave me the opportunity to try my hand at being a pianist and composer and, above all, to develop my musical imagination. I was able to broaden my knowledge acquired in the 'classical' mode with the conviction that in music virtually everything is possible and allowed. It was a chance to confront the care for a beautiful, soft, warm sound with the search for dirt, murmurs, crackles and new performance techniques. For me, a teenager formed by the classical music education system, but also one fascinated by grunge, metal and alternative (broadly understood), new music became an ideal form of expression.

The first collaboration offers during university and immediately after graduation were precisely about new music – the works of our colleagues, young composers – it came naturally because of our similar knowledge and experience, seeing the world that we wanted to describe through music in a similar way. The preparation and world premiering of operas as part of the Project P series at The Grand Theatre – Polish National Opera was a kind of a culmination point of my earlier experiences and musical research. I often think back to the time when I was cooperating with incredibly creative composers, our joint reflection on the development of the opera form in the 21st century.

And it was the opera form, or rather various musical-stage, musical-dramatic and performative forms that quickly became the centre of my interests and activities. My dream of working in the opera came true right after I graduated, so I was able to start the process of 'learning the theater' quite early. Contemporary language and musical forms, whether by direct reference or, on the contrary, by rejection, in most cases have classical forms developed over the centuries as their point of reference. I have been reaching for an older repertoire for years, being simultaneously interested in 20th- and 21st-century music. In addition to performing the 'standard' repertoire, a conductor has two career paths – looking into the future or trying to find something interesting, unknown or forgotten in the past. The essence of the traditionally understood profession of a conductor is performing the repertoire of the 19th and early 20th centuries, when the symphony orchestra was constantly developing, reaching an enormous size, thus allowing for the showcasing of a wide range of conducting techniques and for developing one’s ability to work with a large group of musicians. And most of all, a conductor is absolutely necessary for a piece to be performed at all.

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Marta Kluczyńska, photo: Karpati&Zarewicz

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FL: 'Barbara Radziwiłłówna', an opera by Henryk Jarecki from 1893, you reminded the audience of in TW – ON and 'Projekt P', did not have many showings. Why are rediscovered operas, but also the newest ones, lost in theatre repertoires?

MK: The newest or rediscovered operas have one very important feature in common – nobody knows them yet. Another group of works that disappear in the repertoires are those that have not taken strong root in a given cultural circle. I mean, for example, Czech operas: in Poland they are almost absent from opera houses, while in Germany they are played regularly. Both in the first and in the second case, a small number of performances indicates fear of an empty room - an empty room means the audience's fear of the unknown. Therefore, we come to the eternal topic of education, of familiarizing ourselves with very diverse manifestations of culture from an early age and learning to understand them. I am very impressed with educational projects, such as the Akademia Pana Kleksa concerts at the Mieczysław Karłowicz Philharmonic in Szczecin, which involve the entire symphony orchestra and soloists on a grand scale, or the Król Maciuś I concerts based on a fairy tale, commissioned by the POLIN Museum, featuring a children's choir. In the latter, the young viewer is taken seriously and placed on a par with the mature one. The executive apparatus reaches the size of a regular symphonic concert or opera performance, at the same time getting small audiences and getting them accustomed to its existence, to sound, uniqueness and great value. The performers are also children, so the message is no longer elitist and inaccessible, and the subject matter is appropriate for the selected age group, but not infantile.

Everyone knows also the Young People's Concerts – a series of 53 educational concerts prepared by Leonard Bernstein and the New York Philharmonic, broadcast in 40 countries, that has been set as an example of excellence for many years. Bernstein not only refined each episode to perfection, but most of all treated his viewers with deadly seriousness. He translated the most complex musical issues brilliantly – in a simple language, not diminishing their meaning, and speaking with a commitment worthy of the most demanding audience. Let us remember that such musical education is not about ensuring that future artists have a job, but about developing in an individual the need to seek a deeper understanding of art, thus it serves to awaken the need to learn more and more about oneself, to develop one’s personality. A culture that does not have a conscious, informed audience can easily turn into a tool serving the interests of those who finance it.

FL: Is opera accompanied by an ethos of elitism?

MK: I think nowadays not so much anymore, and the proof of this is for instance what dress code is currently applied in operas all over the world – no particular one at all! The premiere audience is often dressed in an intelligent manner, but during a serial performance, we see evening dresses next to sweaters. In Bavaria, you can meet spectators in traditional national costumes. It is similar with elitism in terms of understanding the message – many listeners initially perceive the opera purely emotionally. A moving libretto, a beautiful melody, an impressive edifice of the theater ... There is nothing wrong with that, it is a good starting point for seeking to understand the work on more and more levels.

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If someone is afraid to cross the threshold of the opera, I heartily recommend the Operowym Głosem [In an Opera Voice] vlog produced by the Polish National Opera (available on YouTube). It is a witty, substantive, modern and eloquently written program that familiarizes the audience with issues related to opera, embracing all those who are frightened by the aforementioned ethos of elitism.

FL: There is also the economic issue – tickets, at least in Poland, are almost always very expensive.

MK: Tickets should be very expensive, but also very cheap. The price spread can be large. Let the best visibility and audibility cost more, side spaces with limited visibility – not much. Some theatres around the world also sell for pennies their 'score places', i.e. without view of the stage, for the show furnished with music-stands and lamps that allow you to sit with the notes and follow the musical layer. Sometimes there are also standing places available; contrary to appearances, they are very popular and often filled to the brim. However, do not expect theater tickets to cost less than those to the cinema.

FL: One of the stages in a conducting career is assisting. What can one learn when assisting other conductors and conductresses?

MK: Assisting is a very important development stage on the way to becoming a conductor/conductress. Studies at an art university mainly give us a theoretical foundation and a number of skills, the importance of which we often do not even understand without practice. We joke among conductors that from some masters you learn how to work well, from others – what not to do. Can we imagine that a newly minted medical graduate goes right into the operating room and performs an operation on a living person? When it comes to conducting, the responsibility is smaller, but during a concert or performance I often have the impression that I’m carrying out an open-heart surgery. Or maybe even on an open soul? I don't believe in fast careers. The development of a conductor or conductress takes time and patience. In the case of an opera theater, everything should happen slowly, step by step. I made my debut at the Polish National Opera at the age of 24, but it was a performance for children. I gradually expanded my repertoire to include more and more complex items, observing conductors from all over the world, conducting rehearsals, conducting stage music, learning the specifics of opera theater, its structure and the principles of interpersonal communication.

FL: You are now the music director of the Polish National Ballet.

MK: To me, conducting ballets is a very important part of my creative work. It fascinates me how the stage speaks to us in this case in a completely different language, the extraordinary language of dance. The conductor becomes the only link between dance and music. You cannot hear the dance, so the musicians of the orchestra do not have any additional point of reference, as is the case with opera. It is therefore necessary to know this language, understand it and treat it with sensitivity. The ballet repertoire can be musically very attractive, but also demanding. Who wouldn’t dream of conducting or playing in Igor Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring or Sergei Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet? However, we must remember that at the same time dancers often have to perform incredibly difficult variations, which they have been preparing for months, and it is not enough to sink into the music score to achieve the right effect. The goal is to create a coherent performance, you need to understand the nature and specificity of the dance, learn the pace and articulation that will help the dancers bring out their qualities in the best way. This can only be learned while working in the opera theater. As the musical director of the Polish National Ballet, my task is not only to conduct performances, but – metaphorically speaking – to be a translator between the language of music and the language of ballet.

FL: What is opera theater for you as an institution, a place? It is a great edifice with a long tradition, a living organism in which several hundred people work...

MK: I could talk about the theatre endlessly: about the impressive building and the people working in it, who are wonderful, narrowly specialized professionals at the highest level in their field. About how to be a theatre person, i.e. not only perform your tasks, but also have the understanding and awareness of participating in something much bigger and looking at your profession through this prism. About opera and ballet repertoire, where each work opens a new world for us and takes us on a journey into ourselves. About hours and weeks of rehearsals, at the end of which comes the premiere evening with those hours which are so satisfying, which give you back all the energy and effort put into the performance, and more. Finally, about work and reflection on oneself.

Theatre is also a small country with all its glamorous and not-so-glamorous aspects. Its principles of operation should be learned and respected. However, for me, theatre is above all what cannot be seen. Theatre is the emotion that arises during the encounter with art and another person. I have made many friends in the theatre, many masters – conductors who always offer me advice and support.

FL: The statistics on women on the conductor’s podium are devastating. What can be done to change this?

MK: In 2019, I participated in the Hart Institute for Women Conductors programme at the Dallas Opera, as well as in Katie Mitchell’s Women Opera Makers Workshop during the festival in Aix-en-Provence. There are more such programs dedicated to women. Amazing things are done by Marin Alsop who was the first to break through the glass ceiling in this field. We also have a La Maestra competition, intended exclusively for female conductors. I am aware of the controversy around it in some circles. Yes, it is no longer a problem for a woman to study conducting at a music college, but studies are just the beginning. The opportunity to practice this profession is associated with hours spent with the orchestra. We have to constantly learn and develop, mature musically. In this field, women need promotion and support because they are often not the 'first choice'.

The next stage is taking up director positions in cultural institutions or orchestras. Unfortunately, I have the impression that there has been some regression in this respect in Poland. For many years the Wrocław Opera was led by Ewa Michnik, the Gorzów Philharmonic was led by Monika Wolińska, and the director of the Szczecin Philharmonic was Ewa Strusińska. At the moment, apart from Agnieszka Duczmal, there is no conductress in this position. It is important to allow women to be noticed and to allow female conductors to prove themselves on the podium as much as their male colleagues. Only then can we consider who managed the task and who failed. And it probably won't be related to gender...

While studying and then starting my professional career, I had no female conductor role models. I had to figure it out on my own somehow, although I met many supportive conductors on my way. I have the impression that great artists are so focused on their own competences and achieving a valuable artistic effect that they couldn’t care less for gender. I remember during my last year of conducting studies I went to master classes with maestro Gabriel Chmura. Unfortunately, I had to leave them the day before the end, and the Maestro, hearing about it, invited me to a meeting. He told me then: 'I invited you for a coffee, because before you left, I wanted to tell you one thing – you will be conducting.' These words gave me motivation and self-confidence for the next many years and many concerts...

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Marta Kluczyńska, photo: Karpati&Zarewicz

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FL: What was the first Polish opera composed by a woman? I feel silly, but I have no idea.

MK: One of the first Polish opera composers was Ludmiła Jeske-Choińska, a singer and composer, a graduate of the Warsaw composition class led by Zygmunt Noskowski. Already by the 1880s, she had written two operettas: Filutka and Zuch dziewczyna. Then she composed the comic opera Marquis de Créqui.

The first polish female conductress was, so it is thought, Anda Kitschman, a very interesting figure of the first half of the 20th century. However, we must remember that in almost every area of life, women began to be active at exactly the same time as men, but this was not necessarily remembered and recorded. There certainly exists a much earlier Polish opera composed by a woman, waiting to be discovered.

FL: Since we're on the topic of discovering the history of Polish music, let's talk about 'Barbara Radziwiłłówna' by Henryk Jarecki. What was it like to work on preparing an opera not played for over a hundred years?

Goplana directed by Janusz Wiśniewski – Image Gallery

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MK: It all started with the outbreak of the pandemic. The world stood still and at the same time we gained a lot of time to reflect. I had already worked before on less known Polish operas, such as Faust by Antoni Henryk Radziwiłł or Goplana by Władysław Żeleński, but then I got the feeling that it was time to think about a bigger problem – the total lack of reception of a huge amount of very valuable Polish musical literature. A deficiency that often results from various types of negligence, from misconceptions or simply oblivion. I have been interested in Henryk Jarecki for a long time (his arias, duets and songs have already been performed by Szymon Mechliński, a great promoter of forgotten Polish music). It turned out that the manuscripts of Jarecki's operas were available on Polona website (during the pandemic it was a great advantage as it was impossible to visit the library) and most of them had not been performed since their premieres. I was struck by the fact that you can start working on such a large project practically without leaving your home. All you need is to want to do that.

Pretty soon I decided to take up the opera Barbara Radziwiłłówna, mainly because of its musical value, but also because of the famous, well-known story of the most controversial Polish queen. First it was necessary to analyze and decide which version of the music score should be rewritten. In addition to its various versions, there were also two pieces for the piano. It was necessary to create an entire edition of music sheet material from scratch. The next stage was getting a major cultural institution interested in taking on the piece. I already had substantive support from the Fryderyk Chopin University of Music, where I started my doctoral thesis, but the key issue was to be able to perform the work. This in turn requires, especially in the case of such a large, romantic, 4-act opera with a choir and difficult vocal parts, a lot of effort and resources. I started, of course, close to home, with the Teatr Wielki – Polish National Opera. I went to the director, Waldemar Dąbrowski, with fragments of the piano excerpt and the score, and a text about Henryk Jarecki. The director was interested, but at the time he had not yet approved the project, he told me to continue working. After a few months, I came back with more materials, which is when he trusted me and approved the project. He said that now good soloists need to be found.

That is not an easy task for an opera without an existing performing practice; in addition, the vocal parts in Barbara Radziwiłłówna are extremely demanding. It was helpful to look at the sources – who sang them during the premiere? The role of Zygmunt August was played by a Ukrainian tenor Olexandr Myshuga - his flagship parts in those days were Jontek from Halka, Stefan in Straszny Dwór or Kirkor in Goplana. Bona was played by Gemma Bellincioni, a very famous Italian singer at the time, the first performer of the Santuzza part in Pietro Mascagni's opera Cavalleria rusticana, regularly invited to the Lviv Opera. Interestingly, she was the only one of the cast of Barbara to sing her part in Italian, in a translation prepared especially for her. Even the recordings of her singing have survived – they are worth listening to, although the recording sound quality from those times is imperfect and may even have a comical quality for the modern ear.

In the title role of Barbara – mind you this is a part for a full, lyrical voice, with the ability to withstand high tessitura – I immediately heard Izabela Matuła. Of course, the role of Gasztold had to be given to Szymon Mechliński. Another singer, who had previously dealt with Jarecki, was the tenor Łukasz Załęski – our Zygmunt. Casting Bona turned out to be a difficult task, because this part is somewhat 'between' the soprano and mezzo-soprano. It turned out that this role was ideal for Monika Ledzion-Porczyńska, whose voice is developing towards dramatic singing.

Finally, the time came to enter the theatre rehearsal mode – first separately – with soloists, choir, orchestra. The orchestral texture is quite dense here. Besides, some of his contemporaries accused Jarecki of excessive 'Wagnerianism'. The nineteenth-century Lviv audience was more accustomed to Italian melodiousness and the accompagnato approach to the orchestral part. The composer was fascinated by Wagner, he was the first in Poland to prepare and conduct several of his operas. This admiration can be heard in Jarecki's operas, but the echoes of the Polish school of composition resound even more in them...

FL: Did any tough decisions have to be made during the work?

MK: It was very difficult to decide on abbreviations, but some were necessary. For example, a scene from Act IV that symbolically represents the Prussian tribute – Albrecht Hohenzollern pays tribute to the new king. This fragment has a great spectacular potential, but it would not be defensible to include it in the concert version. I cut it out because I think it only makes sense in the stage version. It is very difficult to shorten romantic operas. In the operas of Mozart, Rossini, Donizetti or Bellini, there are often scenes in which the same lines are repeated several times - then it is enough not to repeat them. Moreover, in earlier operas one aria or duo usually oscillates within the same key – even after cutting 16 or 32 bars. In romantic operas it is much more difficult – the omission of a few bars makes it difficult to match the key, the texture.

I had the biggest problem with the language used in the libretto of Barbara Radziwiłłówna. This is not a nineteenth-century language, but an attempt at archaization. Not necessarily successful, sometimes sounding, especially to contemporary ears, very surprising. However, I did not want to change the text, especially during the first presentation of the work. Keep in mind that the libretto is only one of the opera's components. Anyway, its author was most likely Adolf Kiczman, who denied this authorship.

FL: Do you have any plans around reintroducing further forgotten operas?

MK: There is a lot of material that can be worked on, I hope that other conductors, institutions and musicians will also be eager to reach for manuscripts and invest in discovering them. There is enough work in this area for everyone. I already have ideas for at least two forgotten operas I would like to work on, as well as for my dreamed-of works from a more well-known but unobvious opera and symphonic repertoire.

Translated from Polish by Michał Abel Pelczar

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