"The Handmaid's Tale" opera by Ruders

Synopsis

On today’s date in 2000, the Royal Danish Opera in Copenhagen gave the premiere of a new opera, “The Handmaid’s Tale,” based on a novel of the same name by Canadian writer Margaret Atwood.

The book and opera tell of a nightmarish future: following a nuclear disaster in the United States, infertility rates have soared, and a religious sect has staged a military coup, enslaving the few fertile women who remain as breeders, or “handmaids,” for the military and religious commanders of their sect. Says Atwood, "There is nothing new about the society I depicted in The Handmaid's Tale except the time and place. All of the things I have written about have been done before—more than once, in fact."

Despite its grim subject matter, Danish composer Poul Ruders says he saw "huge operatic potential" when he first read the book back in 1992. The heroine of his opera, a handmaid named “Offred,” can still remember life before the disaster, and, through a series of flashbacks and monologues, recounts a tale of hope and suffering—emotions not foreign to many other classic operas of the past.

The original production in Copenhagen was sung in Danish, but Ruders says he conceived the work in English. The opera was staged in that language first in London at the English National Opera, and subsequently, at the opera’s American premiere, in St. Paul by the Minnesota Opera, to great critical acclaim.

Music Played in Today's Program

Poul Ruders (b. 1949) The Handmaid's Tale Royal Danish Orchestra; Michael Schonwandt, cond. DaCapo 9.224165-66

On This Day

Births

• 1844 - Russian composer Nicolai Rimsky-Korsakov (Gregorian date: Mar. 18);

• 1870 - Austrian operetta composer Oscar Straus, in Vienna;

Deaths

• 1932 - American composer and bandleader John Philip Sousa, age 77, in Reading, Pa.;

• 1967 - Hungarian composer Zoltán Kodály, age 84, in Budapest;

Premieres

• 1791 - Beethoven: "Ritterballett" (Knightly Ballet), in Bonn;

• 1825 - Beethoven: String Quartet in Eb, Op. 127, in Vienna, the Schuppanzigh Quartet; This premiere was under-rehearsed and poorly performed (the Quartet had only received the music two weeks earlier), and Beethoven arranged for a second performance by a quartet led by violinist Joseph Boehm on March 26, which was better rehearsed and better received;

• 1831 - Bellini: opera "La Sonnambula" (The Sleepwalker), in Milan at the Teatro Carcano;

• 1853 - Verdi: opera "La Traviata" (The Lost One), in Venice at the Teatro La Fenice;

• 1896 - Arthur Foote: Suite in d, by the Boston Symphony, Emil Paur conducting;

• 1917 - Rachmaninoff: "Etudes-tableaux," Op. 39 (first complete performance of the set of nine), in Petrograd (St. Petersburg), by the composer (Julian date: Feb. 21);

• 1926 - Hindemith: "Concerto for Orchestra," by the Boston Symphony with Serge Koussevitzky conducting;

• 1927 - Prokofiev: Quintet for winds and strings, Op. 39, in Moscow;

• 1933 - Varèse: "Ionisation," in New York City, with Nicholas Slonimsky conducting;

• 1934 - Piston: "Concerto for Orchestra," in Cambridge, Mass.;

• 1947 - Miaskovsky: Symphony No. 25, at the Moscow Conservatory by the USSR State Symphony, Alexander Gauk conducting;

• 1984 - John Harbison: "Ulysses' Raft," by the New Haven Symphony, Murray Sidlin conducting;

• 2000 - Poul Ruders: opera "The Handmaid's Tale," in Copenhagen, by the Royal Danish Theater, Mark Schönwandt conducting;

• 2003 - John Harbison: "Requiem," by vocal soloists Christine Brewer, Margaret Lattimore, Paul Groves, and Jonathan Lemalu, with the Tanglewood Festival Chorus, and the Boston Symphony conducted by Bernard Haitink.