Eine floren­tinische Tragödie/ Bluebeard's Castle

Although composed at almost the same time, the two pieces of the evening, A Florentine Tragedy and Bluebeard's Castle , offer completely different soundscapes, which gives this combination an additional appeal. In Bluebeard 's Castle , described as a mystery by the librettist Béla Balázs, one can hear the influence of the French Impressionists as well as Béla Bartók's preoccupation with Eastern European folk music. There is a particular focus on the orchestra, which takes on the actual leading role here and depicts the emotional ups and downs of the protagonists as well as the actual narrative of the drama. The two protagonists, Judith and the Duke, take on the role of a commenting declamation for long stretches. In Alexander Zemlinsky's Eine Florentinische Tragödie , the audience is treated to an extraordinarily lush orchestral splendor inspired by Oscar Wilde's richly pictorial poem, which oscillates between late Romanticism and modernism and was clearly influenced by Johannes Brahms, Gustav Mahler and Richard Strauss.