The Witch’s Song
Illustration and text taken from the booklet
“A bright star twinkles in the center of the upper part of the stage opening, then disappears when the curtain rises. An open seascape is revealed. A three-master slowly approaches in the glowing setting sun. In the distance, the cries of sailors adjusting the sails can be heard.” The sky is overcast. A storm is rising. The ship disappears into the shelter of a stormy landscape. But from the curtain of clouds, the Virgin Mary appears in the sky, protecting the sailor from danger and offering miraculous aid.
The storm passes quickly. The clouds disperse, and the same three-master, now safe from destruction, sets sail again. It is already late in the evening. The cries of sailors can be heard again in the distance. As evening darkens, a brilliant flash of light appears in the sky. An invaluable aid to a skilled and reliable guide: the North Star.
Opera in four acts
1934
Written and composed by Armas Launis
The legend that the Virgin Mary took the place of a nun (who had left her convent) during her absence has been addressed, among others, by Maurice Maeterlinck in the play “Sister Beatrice,” Karl Vollmoeller and Engelbert Humperdinck in the pantomime “Ihme,” and Amos Andersson and Heikki Klemetti in the pantomime “Vallis Gratiae.” The first primarily describes the actions of the Virgin Mary in place of the runaway nun. Maeterlinck’s play was adapted into an opera by the Russian composer Gretchaninov and performed in Moscow in 1911–1912 and in Paris in 1931. Vollmoeller and Andersson, on the other hand, focus on the stages of the nun’s escape and her time at the convent, the former taking place along the Rhine, the latter in Naantali.
The plot of “The Witch’s Song” is the closest to Amos Andersson’s adaptation. However, it differs from all the aforementioned adaptations in that the story of the runaway nun is interwoven with another theme, related to Wildenbruch’s eponymous poem: a witch takes revenge on her hated family with a magic potion. Its mysterious power causes the drinker to hear an inner melody that haunts her constantly, driving her to madness: the witch’s song, which she sings at certain celebrations. A third theme intertwines with the two previous ones, like a link: the story of a haunted house finally freed from its ghosts. In the lyrical text, this scenography stands out clearly from parallel adaptations due to its concise, precise, and poetic form.
“Mermaid” is an appropriate, if somewhat impractical, name for the popular image of churches dedicated to the Virgin Mary in Mediterranean coastal towns, for the Virgin Mary, in this sense, is the mother who ensures the safety of all sailors, as evidenced by numerous votive tablets attached to these images. The story of the miraculous rescue in the first act is a local anecdote from Marseille. Singing beggars are a common sight in the streets of Morocco. The bonfires of Saint John, an ancient medieval folk festival, are still celebrated as described in this play, even today in all the towns in the Pyrenees that bear the name of Saint John.
The opera is steeped in the sea, the cradle of the author’s family and a source of inspiration for its composition.
It is also worth mentioning that the theme of the “Witch’s Song” was inspired by an unusual incident that occurred in the author’s hometown: a woman, despite being among the enlightened, went to a witch for advice and even drank the magic potion she was offered. As a result, she fell under the influence of malevolent spirits that sometimes forced her to express, against her will, the thoughts of her inner tormentors.
The choruses “Ave, maris stella” and “Media vita” draw on ancient medieval motifs. The music, which concludes the previous scene of the third act and introduces the next, is based on Bach’s Prelude in B minor (Well-Tempered Clavier No. 1).
Texte traduit du finnois.
