Stravinsky’s Oedipus Rex

To the Bozar this evening for Stravinsky’s Oedipus Rex (preceded by Apollo musagète), performed by the London Symphony Orchestra and the Monteverdi Choir, with Fanny Ardant as the narrator and all under the towering baton of John Eliot Gardiner (picture). A curiosity of the piece is that it is sung in Latin. The choir were made up as assassins and Creon was also made up to brilliant effect. Here, I thought, was yet another combination of words and music (Stravinsky called it an ‘opera-oratorio) to add to the Clarke/Westlake list (see this post). Stravinsky’s music creates an authetically claustrophobic sense of inexorable destiny. We know what is going to happen to Oedipus. This is a musical description of the journey to a horrible certainty.