Part1  Part2  Part 3  Part4

6. SHARP_EARS GETS HERSELF TALKED ABOUT

The forester and the schoolmaster are playing cards in a private room just off the main bar of the Pásek Inn; both are well into their cups. As the parson watches the game he pulls on a long meerschaum pipe. As we see later, Janáček intended the parson and the badger to be allied characters and the pipe to be the visual link between them. From time to time, the parson takes long pulls at a tankard of ale. We are evidently in the midst of a conversation for we hear the parson saying to his friends that in his new parish people are bound to respect him. (No. 95 and A of No. 95 in a descending sequence with the second note prolonged) That reminds him, says the forester jokingly, that there is bound to be a big wedding here one of these days for everyone knows that our friend the schoolmaster has a sweetheart. The parson mutters under his breath "Non des mulieri corpus tuum".

The forester now launches into a song in which he mocks the bashful schoolmaster for being so backward in his courting of Verunka-in the excellent English translation of the libretto by Norman Tucker:

Once long ago he went a-Maying
He and his girl, spring’s call obeying,
Now all these days are fast decaying,
Flowers are fading, May time’s over
The girl’s grown old-so has her lover!

sung mainly to this phrase

No. 97

The song has a folk-song flavour about it: at first the accompaniment consists of No. 95, No. 95 inverted and the descending sequence derived from (A): later, when Sharp Ears is being discussed, this tune appears

No. 98

and continues until the schoolmaster leaves.

"Mister Forester! "exclaims the schoolmaster reproachfully, for it appears that the schoolmaster never got around to asking Verunka to marry him. The schoolmaster retaliates by saying that foresters often go to the other extreme. What about that vixen he took home with him a while back? "Don’t mention her to me ", replies the forester crossly, "she got the better of me and I am well rid of her. "The tipsy schoolmaster trumps his own ace-an act of folly which completely restores the forester’s good humour.

The innkeeper enters, somewhat alarmed at the amount of noise coming from the ante-room. The parson who has been by no means behind the others in his drinking, again mutters his Latin tag which the forester irritably asks him to translate. "Give not thy body to a woman", he chants piously, at which the forester laughs uproariously and lifting up the coat-tails of the schoolmaster asks if, by any stretch of imagination, anyone could call this walking skeleton a "body". He can't stop laughing at his own joke. The schoolmaster rises shakily to his feet, goes towards the window, sees through it the first streak of dawn and announces that as a cock has just crowed it is time he went home.

The forester replies that it is best to leave the cock out of it: didn’t Peter betray Jesus because of one? The schoolmaster takes his hat, pays the innkeeper and makes a drunken exit. The innkeeper, who has been standing on tenterhooks, summons up courage enough to whisper in the parson’s ear that if he doesn’t want to make a scandal and have an embarrassing meeting with his new parishioners, he’d also better think about going home. With an irritable "You don’t have to tell me!" the parson picks up his hat and hastily retires. As the parson makes his exit we hear again ten bars of the orchestral introduction, No. 96 etc.

At this point, in German productions of the opera, the customers in the main pub are seen looking threateningly at the parson. In the vocal score, top of p. 69, there are, indeed, two bars of music in which the villagers express disapproval of their new pastor: "Shame on you-drunkard!" On the other hand, in performances of the opera I have seen in Czechoslovakia the chorus parts are omitted (and are likewise omitted in the Supraphon recording by the Prague National Theatre): indeed, the customers in the main pub are never seen, nor is the above incident mentioned by so great a Janáček authority as Vogel in his account of the opera.

My own feeling is that Janáček added the chorus parts and the stage directions in the vocal score at the suggestion of Max Brod who, as has already been stated, made many questionable "improvements" on the original libretto but whose judgment Janáček trusted implicitly. The best that can be said for this interpolation is that it livens the action and makes more convincing the punitive transfer of the parson to another parish.

The tipsy forester says facetiously to the publican that maybe, after all, the schoolmaster will sell his old bones to a woman. As he orders another beer, he quotes from Scripture- "In the sweat of thy brow shalt thou eat thy bread ", pointing out that there is not a single word in them for or against drinking. If only the Lord had dropped a hint of two, but he didn’t, so another beer please! The innkeeper, making conversation, says that one of these days the forester must tell him all about his adventures with the vixen. But this is a sore point with the forester and he explodes with a "Damn you, man, there is nothing more to tell-she ran away that’s all, and I am not running after her if that’s what you think!" and bids the publican a curt good-night.

The thematic material for the dialogue between the innkeeper and the forester is almost entirely devoted to figure D in No. 94. From it grows the twisting befuddled theme of the next orchestral interlude.

No 99

Beginning furiously, it tapers off into a soft trill when the curtain rises.

7. SHARP_EARS PLAYS TRICKS

Some way into the forest we see a path leading uphill, bordered by a fence behind which enormous sunflowers are growing. Bright moonlight. One would naturally suppose that this scene follows immediately on the previous one when the cock crowing has just heralded the dawn. It is unwise to ponder on this and similar discrepancies in Janáček’s opera, for this is the dangerous path taken by Max Brod which resulted in him making unnecessary and unwanted "reforms ".

The schoolmaster comes up the path unsteadily, stopping for a moment to say that either the earth is rotating from west to east or his own centre of gravity has shifted (rocking, off-balance phrases in the orchestra). Anyway, something seems to be the matter. He asks himself three questions: Why had he spent the whole night drinking with strangers (sic)? Why, when the whole world was asleep, did he have to stay awake? Why should he find himself groping about in this ludicrous manner at the risk of breaking a limb? He stumbles (a big climax in the orchestra with trombones, etc., blaring out the first two bars of No. 98), remarking that without his stick he probably wouldn’t get home at all. The stick gives him the equivalent of three legs to support him which makes a perfect balance. He sways backwards and forwards shakily, unwisely risks a few steps without the aid of his stick and falls down on the ground beside the sunflowers.

At this moment, Sharp-Ears runs among the sunflowers and hides (lovely pattering, shimmering sounds in the orchestra). A gentle breeze makes the sunflowers tremble mysteriously and the drunken schoolmaster somehow identifies them with a former sweetheart of his-not the Verunka mentioned in the previous scene-but a gypsy girl named Terynka. We will hear more of this Terynka in a few moments for it appears that the parson once nursed a guilty passion for this maiden, and still another character, the disreputable Harašta, whom we meet for the first time in the last act, will lay claim to her as his bride. As already stated, Terynka appears directly neither in the opera nor in Tesnohlidek’s story although, in the latter, she is spoken of as the owner of a sweet-shop.

The schoolmaster raises a forefinger enquiringly (atmospheric sustained "vision" music of great beauty): "Staccato! Flageoletto!" and then addresses the sunflower as though it were Terynka. If he had only known she was waiting for him he would have left the inn hours ago

No. 100

Does she really love him? The flower, moved by the obliging Sharp-Ears, nods a reply. He has loved her for ages, she has kept him waiting so long for an answer (picturesque music and scoring which increases in erotic excitement) and, although he is a poor, weak character, yet his love for her is strong, and now that he has found her again he will stay with her forever. The sunflower moves coyly away. The schoolmaster, taking this as a direct invitation, runs towards the fence, bursts through it and collapses helplessly on the other side (deftly illustrated in the orchestra). Sharp Ears runs from the sunflowers and hides in a bush.

The parson now enters, tries unsuccessfully to light a cigar and sitting down on a stone racks his brain as to where in the classics the phrase "Always remember to be a good man" comes from. The drunken parson catches the eyes of Sharp-Ears glowing through the bushes and identifies them with the eyes of Terynka.

No 101

This was altogether a lamentable affair and occurred in his student days when she used to look at him with eyes of modesty and innocence-dark eyes, deep as a pool that mirrored the skies above, but eyes which also held in them treachery and betrayal.

No 102

She got herself into trouble with a butcher boy and he (the music rhythmically livens up), the young priest, was blamed for it. Since then he has never been able to trust any woman but, he concludes sadly, all that lies in the dim and distant past (motif of longing, No. 101 again) and now he is nothing but a poor old useless creature. He brightens up though, when he suddenly remembers that the phrase "Always remember to be a good man" comes from Xenophon’s Anabasis!

The forester-gun in hand-rushes in pursuing Sharp Ears, but the vixen eludes him as the orchestra gives a scream of rage. The shocked schoolmaster and parson hurriedly pick themselves up, whimpering pathetically that this rough-and-tumble character, the gamekeeper, doesn’t understand the frailty of man. The schoolmaster climbs the fence and rushes off as the parson makes his exit in the opposite direction. The forester twice fires his gun after the vixen and, coming from the wood, says "I bet you anything that was our own cunning little vixen. "(No. 101 transformed out of all recognition and worked up as a whirling figure as the curtain falls.)

8. SHARP_EARS IS WOOED AND WON

We have come now to one of the big, and certainly one of the loveliest, scenes in the opera, the enchanting wooing and marriage of Sharp-Ears. A wordless and barely audible chorus off-stage sets an atmosphere of romance and mystery preparing us for the love scenes which are to follow.

No. 103

This tender and delicate theme has something of the quality of a Moravian folk-song about it, with its typical (Lydian) augmented fourth interval at (A). It is preceded and followed by a forceful orchestral version of the first two bars, with a series of perfect fourths replacing (B) of No. 103 which we hear lightly tripping in a 3/8 allegretto as the curtain rises. This semiquaver "tiptoe" 3/8 figure of fourths combines and alternates with a lilting triple-time version of bar 1 of No. 103.

Sharp-Ears is resting blissfully in her vixen’s den. It is a warm midsummer’s night, bathed in bright moonlight. She hears a rustle in the undergrowth and a handsome young fox appears. She trembles all over. The fox approaches her in a very refined manner and asks politely whether his sudden appearance has startled her. He has come to look at the birds which he believes are nesting ;n this part of the wood. Sharp-Ears replies modestly that -no, he didn’t frighten her and that there are birds here, for she knows the neighbourhood well. She was just going out for a short stroll having a touch of headache. The fox asks if he may accompany her, that is if her mother doesn’t mind: there are dangerous gamekeepers about and she needs protection. The vixen replies that she has been independent for a long time and has, in fact, her own house which her Uncle Badger bequeathed to her. The ingratiating phrase

No. 104

we have heard before in Act I-compare with A of No. 86. The fox is much impressed. She continues with her tale at one time she lived with a forester as one of his family where she was brought up like a human being. In a low thrilling voice she tells the fox how she was forced to steal (a mischievous, "cocky" little phrase No. 105)

No 105

and, alas, was caught in the act by the forester who boasted that he would kill her and make out of her pelt a fur coat for his wife. But she knew how to defend herself all right and the forester got the worst of it:

No. 106

"Shame on you, you old rip", she shouted, letting her imagination run riot: "how dare you strike an animal. You’ve got plenty of everything and I have nothing. Go on, hit me! hit me! But just you watch out" (forceful heroic presentation of No. 106 plus). "And he did hit me. ‘You have asked for it then’, I shrieked, and rushed at him. He fell to the ground like a tree sawn asunder. I ran off and have lived in the forest ever since where I feel completely free. " One would naturally assume that Sharp-Ears was giving a boastful and exaggerated account of her escape at the end of Act II: on consulting Tesnohlidek’s novel, however, one finds it is quite another incident which she is describing.

The fox, overawed with admiration, bows low before the vixen and introduces himself (flutes play a variation of the 3/8 allegretto sequence of perfect fourths). He is Golden Crest, a curly-headed fox from the Deep Ravine. She replies that her name is Sharp-Ears, vixen, late of the Forester’s Cottage, Lakeside, and gives him a paw which he kisses. The fox asks if he may be allowed to pay her another visit and does she often walk in this clearing (the affectionate lilting version of the first bar of No. 103). She replies bashfully that she has no objection to seeing him again, and that between midnight and one o’clock, she often goes for a walk alone (a tripping whole-tone scale passage). She has no male friends and she never allows anyone to keep her company. He replies gallantly that she is a model for the modern woman-oh and-by the way -does she smoke? "Not yet", she replies.

"Do you eat rabbits?"

"Yes, I am very fond of rabbits."

The fox takes formal leave and hurries away.

Left alone, Sharp-Ears stretches herself out on the ground, rolls in the sand, then cleans herself, smoothes her fur and polishes her nails. Why does he find her so attractive? Is she really so very lovely? She ponders in blissful reverie to equally lyrical, translucent music. Listen to the delightful flute cadenza

No 107

accompanying the love motif

No. 108

giving a sympathetic, wonderfully true and tender portrayal of the awakening of young love.

The fox quietly stands watching the vixen from a hiding place in the bushes. How lovely she is! He must act quickly or someone else may claim her. Sharp-Ears is likewise rhapsodizing about the handsome fox who now emerges timidly, bidding her good-morning. Rising shyly, SharpEars asks why he has returned early. They both laugh a little self-consciously

No. 109

He says he has brought her something nice for breakfast, and shows her a rabbit he has just caught. He continues to look at her lovingly, twirling his moustache. They sit down to breakfast; the sky brightens with the rosy glow of dawn. Getting bolder, he bends his head down, places his tail alongside the vixen and gives her a timid kiss on the ear. Has she ever been in love? No, the vixen replies bashfully: what about him? "Nor I", says the fox, and in an upsurge of passion he tells her that that is because he has never met a woman whom he could respect and honour-one for whom he would be prepared to give his life.

No. 110

But if he did meet such a person-the vixen gulps and is near fainting-he would ask her right out whether she could love him. After a moment’s hesitation, he fiercely embraces the vixen, who is terrified at these new emotions within her and commands him roughly to go away and never see her again.

No 111

The distraught fox tells her that he will kill himself-he cannot live without her. "It’s you, Sharp-Ears, you that I love so dearly! "he declares passionately. "Me? "cries the vixen incredulously, "M@! Why me? "(No. 96 as a delightful capricious polka).

"I’m no cunning, lying fox", he continues. "I say only the things my heart is feeling. I love your soul, not your body You are marvellous! One day people will write books and operas (sic) about you!" (further derivative love motif). He hugs and kisses her, and asks her if she really wants him (solo violin, harp in tender erotic music). "Yes", she whispers humbly, "yes, indeed." They both slip into the den.

The blue dragon-fly reappears and repeats her questing dance from the first scene of Act I to the same delicate tentative flute and violin music. An owl flies in fussily like a shadow (to wonderfully descriptive screeching owl music). Have they heard the news? Do they know the scandalous thing that has happened? The little vixen is as bad as the rest of them! She has just seen it all. A host of animals have now appeared: squirrels chuckle, a hedgehog sticks out its tongue, a canary and a jay nod knowingly.

The vixen crawls out of the den followed by the fox. She sighs

No. 112

lamenting her downfall! The phrase is immediately repeated in the orchestra in a triumphant jerky variation, probably indicative of the fox’s satisfaction. She whimpers.

"What is the matter? Why are you crying?" the fox asks anxiously. "Don’t you know? Can’t you guess?" and Sharp-Ears whispers in his ear and falls on his neck (climax). The fox sighs deeply: "Well, in that case... we had better see a parson! " A woodpecker pokes his head out of an old ash tree (clattering xylophone noises) declaring gruffly that it is about time too! Do they want him to marry them? "Yes, if you please", replies the fox. The woodpecker conducts the wedding ceremony and the chorus of animals and insects sing a broadened chorale-like version of the first half of No. 103, concurrently with the loud opening bars of the orchestra (i.e. the same theme) with happy animal clutterings on top. The chorus then sing and dance a gay nuptial dance, the haunting third and fourth bar of No. 103 speeded up and boxed into a conventional sixteen-bar phrase in polka time. Contrasted to it is No. 112 in happy waltz rhythm with block chord harmonies in the orchestra: these two themes alternate three times. No. 112 at its third appearance is interrupted by soprano, tenors and trumpet crashing in with the end phrase of No. 103 (marked C). This new idea is repeated several times and the jolly (wordless) wedding dance-song concludes in triumph with a tutti piu mosso repeat of the first part of the dance.

 

---

Part1  Part2  Part 3  Part4   NEXT