Alban Berg’s “Wozzeck” – Norrlandsoperan, Umeå

    Reich and Szyber direct and create the set- and costume design for “Wozzeck” at the Norrlandsoperan, premiering October 1, 2011. The work is performed October 1 to 15, with a subsequent partial concert tour to Luleå, Haparanda, Pitea, Sundsvall, Östersund and Sollefteå.

Our statement:  What really struck us in the meeting with Alban Berg’s Wozzeck is it’s pure density. A work of fifteen tableaux in which everything is interconnected within a fateful tragedy. It is a tragedy in which all the characters in a relentless movement lose everything and face ruin and death. We feel for Marie and the baby, who, if possible, are even more powerless than the main figure Wozzek. The question we ask is if we all live under a prescribed “life script” wherein heredity and environment have assigned us roles we cannot escape? Where all we have is hopeless attempts to communicate with each other and ourselves.

Amidst all this fatalism we find a black humor and social criticism. And we want everyone who sees our staging of Alban Berg’s modernist masterpiece, at the same suffer the cutting beauty of the music  and be able to laugh at the dramatic character’s toss and turn, simultaneously crying over their total powerlessness.

Wozzeck is one of the 2oth century’s most important operas, a highly expressive psychological drama that explores the effects of poverty, class, mental instability and violence, the overt as well as the subjugated. The roles of Wozzeck and Marie are portrayed by two of Sweden’s top opera singers, baritone Frederick Zetterström and the dramatic soprano Susanna Levonen.

Music: Alban Berg
Libretto: Alban Berg after Georg Büchner’s drama
Conductor: Roland Kluttig / Daniel Blendulf
Direction, costume- and set design: Carina Reich and Bogdan Szyber
Lighting design: Norunn Standal

In the roles:
Wozzeck: Fredrik Zetterström
Wozzeck on tour: Gabriel Suovanen
Marie: Susanna Levonen
Captain: Ulrik Qvale
Doctor: Lars Arvidson
Drum Major: Anders Hakansson
Andres: Fredrik Strid
Margret: Ms Reuter
1st journeyman: Hans-Erik Sundstrom
2nd apprentice: Viktor Tågestad
Idiot: Anders Lundström
Mime / dance: Isabell Skarby Hay, Magnus Dovärn, Svetlana Gustavsson-Biba
The child: Ruben Englund, Elmer Kuisma

Norrland Opera Symphony Orchestra

The performances 6, 8 and 9 October recorded by Swedish Television.