[Bluebeard giving the keys of his house
to his new wife - Image Wikipedia]
Here is the story of the original French folktale, which was rather changed by Balazs and Bartok. Bluebeard is a very rich but terrifying man with a big blue beard. When he leaves for business, he hands his young wife the keys of the castle. She is allowed to visit all rooms except one, a small storage room in the basement. Over time, the wife can not contain her curiosity and opens the banned room. There she finds the six dead bodies of her predecessors. When Bluebeard comes unexpectedly home, he soon notes that his wife has used the forbidden key. He becomes furious and wants to kill her on the spot. However, she is able to delay his anger and warns her brothers. They attack Bluebeard and kill him.
Much has been written about the meaning of this folktale: is Bluebeard just a monster, a serial murderer? Or is the curiosity of his wife the problem? What do the closed rooms mean - that there are secrets (which are perhaps better kept covered up) in any human relationship?
In the opera, the psychological dimensions are much stronger than in the folktale and often Symbolist images are used, such as flowers dripping with blood. A spoken prologue invites the audience to enter the realm of myth. The scene consists of a large, dark hall in a castle, with seven closed doors. Bluebeard has just brought his new wife, Judith, to his castle. She demands that all doors be opened, to let light fall into the dusty rooms, emphasizing that her wish arises only from love for Bluebeard. Bluebeard refuses and declares that the rooms behind the doors may not be seen by anyone. He begs her to love him, but not to ask questions. Judith perseveres and finally convinces Bluebeard. The doors are opened one at a time; after opening each door, Bluebeard begs Judith to stop.
The first door conceals a torture chamber, covered with blood. Judith is shocked, but keeps going on. Behind the second door is a weapons storehouse and the third door gives access to a treasure room. Initially, Judith is overjoyed by the beauty of the jewels, until she notices that they are all blood-stained. Behind the fourth door a magic garden lies hidden, but here, too, the plants and flowers are oozing blood. When the fifth door is opened, Judith is dazzled by light: here lies the enormous empire of Bluebeard. And, here too, she sees that grim clouds throw blood-red shadows over that kingdom.
Bluebeard pleads with Judith to stop now, but she refuses to give up. Behind the sixth door, a silent silvery lake appears. Bluebeard calls it a "lake of tears," but whose tears is unclear. This is the first room without blood, though.
At the seventh door, Bluebeard refuses to continue. His resistance is violent and he continues to ask Judith to kiss him, to love him and never ask anything anymore about this seventh room. This last door must remain shut forever. But Judith persists, asking him about his former wives, and then accusing him of having murdered them, suggesting that the blood she saw in the other rooms was their blood, and that it were their tears that filled the lake. Are their dead bodies hidden behind this last door? At this, Bluebeard hands over the last key.
Behind the door are indeed Bluebeard's three former wives, but amazingly, they are still alive, dressed in crowns and jewelry. Silently, one by one, they step out. Bluebeard praises them and calls the first one his "wife of dawn," the second one his "wife of noon," and the third one "his wife of the afternoon." And, he continues, Judith, his fourth wife, will be the "wife of the night." He puts a crown on Judith's head, which is very heavy to wear - her head droops under the weight. She begs him to stop, but it is too late. She has to follow the other wives into the secret chamber, and the door closes behind her. Bluebeard remains alone in the vastness and darkness of his castle...
[Bela Bartok - Image Wikipedia]
The message of Bartok's opera seems to be "that loneliness is the essential quality of the human condition" (Opera, The Rough Guide, p. 487). Bartok was an extremely private and introverted man and the fact that he dedicated the opera to his new bride Marta seems - rather ironically - to be a message that she shouldn't pry into his soul.
Bartok wrote disquieting music for this opera, full of anxiety and impending horror; it is often polytonal. The dissonant minor second interval is used to symbolize the blood in the various rooms. Moreover, Bartok characterized the gulf between both characters by writing opulent and grandiose music for Judith, but starkly sober and repressed music for Bluebeard. For the opening of the various doors Bartok composed highly expressive, miniature tone poems. The highlight comes when the fifth door is opened, leading to Bluebeard's kingdom: a huge C major chord for orchestra and organ aptly symbolizes the staggering light bursting from this room.
There have been countless versions of Bluebeard, both as opera (for example by Paul Dukas in 1907, based on a Symbolist play by Maeterlinck), as film, and in literature, but Bartok has given us the best one. The opera should be performed more often, but the Hungarian language may be a problem for many singers (although there are also German and English versions); and as it is rather static, with only two performers, it is often performed in a concert version. There are many versions on disc; my favorite one (which breaks through the lack of incident and with its beautiful visuals and drama is never for one moment dull) is the superb 1988 BBC film version, with Robert Lloyd and Elizabeth Lawrence, and conductor Adam Fischer.
Twentieth Century Opera