A song that will not die: Shifting symbolism in the interpretation of two sanguineous operas

• Main Author: van der Schoot Albert
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts - Institute of Musicology of Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts 2005-01-01
• Series: Muzikologija
• Subjects: Bluebeard; Halewijn/Mädchenmörderballade; symbolism and Symbolism; curiosity as a vice/as a virtue; individuation; Enlightenment
• Online Access: http://www.doiserbia.nb.rs/img/doi/1450-9814/2005/1450-98140505057v.pdf

Bartók's well-known opera Duke Bluebeard's Castle has an internationally hardly known parallel in Willem Pijper's opera Halewijn. The Hungarian and the Dutch opera share the same motives; they make use of a historical, a literary and a musical heritage, both from eastern and western Europe, in different ways yet with remarkable similarities. This article is an investigation into the backgrounds of the two operas and into the contexts in which their motives developed - and continue to develop.