Old-time musicians

"What does her obedient and loyal maid want to convey to me?" The male protagonist Tristan who appeared on the stage was handsome, wearing sturdy armor, holding a rune giant sword, and his face was upright and resolute.

"My sir Tristan! It is my master's wish to see you!" Brown Ganni bowed and sang.

"If she's tired from the long journey, she's almost at the end! We can reach the shore before the sun sets!"

"No, Sir Knight, you heard me! This lady needs your services! Go to her, she is waiting for you!"

"Here, where I stand, I am serving her faithfully!"

“.”

The two sides engaged in an "extreme tug of war". The maid Brunelleschi tried her best but could not persuade Tristan to go down and meet Isolde.

What's going on with these two people?

After keeping the audience in suspense for a while, the answer was finally revealed in Act I, Scene III, "Isolde's Ballade".

Of course, this recitative still whets the audience's appetite from the beginning because of its strange subtitle, "Tantris".

The heroine recalled the scene when they first met.

It turns out that she had rescued the seriously injured "Tantris" during the war between the two countries, and the two gradually fell in love during their recovery and getting along with each other.

But one day, she accidentally discovered that a crack on the man's sword was exactly the same shape as the fatal wound on the head of her former fiancé!

"Tantris", whose real name should be "Tristan", is his enemy!

Isolde once wanted to kill Tristan to avenge her fiancé.

But emotion temporarily overcame reason, and she used her family's secret technique to heal Tristan and released him.

But fate plays tricks on people. Now Tristan has become a marriage proposal messenger and comes to Ireland to marry him on behalf of his uncle King Mark! !

In the past, they fought each other, but now they are allied. This is common between countries. Politics only has eternal interests. However, for specific people who bear hatred and tears,

Isolde was disappointed and in pain, and all new and old hatreds surged into her heart!

"Bring me that little box. The deadly poison is the antidote!"

In scene 4, Isolde issues a desperate command to her maid, Brunelleschi.

She was determined to die with Tristan!

Brownganni's persuasion was in vain and the situation once again reached a stalemate.

But by the last scene of the first act, that is, the fifth scene, the conflict could no longer be dragged on.

——The ship back to Connor is about to dock, and the two will have to meet even if they don’t want to!

"Mr. Tristan is here!" The short syllables were sung by the baritone servant Kuvenal.

"Let him come over!" Isolde ordered.

Tristan let go of the steering wheel and walked towards the audience in front of the stage.

This opera singer pair is definitely a good match, with top vocal skills and acting skills. Even the picky audience from the south cannot help but be impressed and praise them.

Especially the scene that is currently being performed on the stage where "the male and female protagonists meet but are speechless to each other."

This aria is called "Drinking the Magic Potion Together", and the woodwind section in the orchestra pit played a special leading motive at this time.

It is a derivative and deformation of the long note in the "Tristan Chord" or the accompanying "Desire Motive" in the "Prelude", and the melody form is extremely special - first it is a powerful sustained note of F, which lasts for about 5 beats, and after a brief detour, it falls into a long sustained state again.

When the audience first listened to it, they felt that the musical image was indeed loud and powerful, worthy of the title of "Knight's Honor".

But as the melody line progressed, they gradually felt that this "motive" was really long and depressing!

While this "honor" gives the hero faith and pride, it also puts worldly shackles on him!

After a long period of face-to-face time, Tristan on the stage finally broke the silence: "Please tell me, my lady! What do you need?"

"Don't you know what I want?" Isolde sneered with a look of pain, "Is it fear that fills your heart and makes you avoid my gaze?"

"Respect makes me awed," Tristan intoned, remaining calm.

Fanning in the orchestra pit instructed the band to play uneasy tremolo groups, which seemed to carry a forbidden tremor.

"What respect do you have for me? With open derision you refuse my request to come to my presence!" Isolde sang.

"My only duty is to obey the king." Tristan pressed his chest.

"Then I have no gratitude towards your master. Should his servant offend his partner with bad manners?"

"Where I live, we need to follow traditions. On the way to the wedding, the escort needs to avoid the bride he is protecting."

"What kind of reason is this?" Isolde sneered and sang, "Since you are so strict in observing traditions, my sir, don't forget another tradition of revenge. There is still a blood debt between us that has not been paid!"

"It has been paid off."

"That's not between us!"

Along with the tense duet between the two, the "Tristan Honor Motive" underwent complex derivative changes. Some deep desires in the male protagonist's heart were restrained again and again by the long notes representing secular power.

At one point, Tristan could not help singing with a dull and sour tone:

"If Morold (the heroine's fiancé) is so valuable to you, then you should pick up this sword again, be firm and decisive, hold it firmly, and don't let the sword slip from your hand!"

"Do you dare to laugh at me?" Isolde sang angrily, "this noble Irish hero, he was at least engaged to me! I offered him weapons, he fought for me. He fell in the battle, and my reputation is ruined! My heart is in great pain. I swear: if no man can avenge his murderer, I, a woman, will dare to do so!"

Obviously, the heroine is also tied up in the royal marriage and worldly reputation!

After a series of six consecutive ascending passages, the music turns from weak to strong, and the harmony reaches a high point that longs for a perfect resolution.

"Princess, you can have whatever you want." Tristan was still struggling and compromising, emphasizing the knight's duty of obedience.

The curse-like "unsolvable" of "Prelude" still works here. After a moment of confusion, the rhythm of the drama slows down again.

The maid Brunelleschi has handed the poison to Isolde on the right side of the stage. A beam of light shines on the latter, and she holds the poison in both hands, while Tristan on the other side has his back turned and is in darkness.

This is a recitative female solo - Isolde asks the hero a series of questions, like questioning, but also like asking herself: "What do I like? Are you afraid of meeting my demands and staying away from my sight?" "What are you worried about?" "Are you afraid that there will be a blood debt between us?" "Why don't I kill you?" "Who must kill Tristan?" "He won the crown and land for his master, how can he not be his most loyal person?" "."

Facing Isolde's increasingly long questions, Tristan's answers were still brief or evasive.

"Pull up the cable, drop the small anchor, lower the anchor, and follow the current"

Later, he simply used the excuse of "the ship is about to dock and I'm very busy" which made people's blood pressure rise, and turned around to direct the work of his follower Kuvenal.

"well"

Isolde lost her patience and walked towards Tristan holding the poison.

"In the face of this sincere gift, my greatest gratitude is to be awakened by a glass of redemptive wine!"

In the character's action design, Marley reinforced the audience's belief in "dying" - although the two had already fallen in love with each other before the "drinking the potion together" scene, they knew that their love had no way out, and they could only use this self-destructive death to escape from this messy world!

"The only comfort in eternal pain! The wine that makes me forget everything! I will drink you without hesitation!" Tristan reached out and took the poison handed to him.

"Are you going to betray me again? Half of it is mine! Traitor, I'll drink with you!" Isolde sang loudly with tears in her voice.

After the two drank the medicine, they walked away to the opposite sides of the stage.

The audience watched with bated breath. They found that the lighting effects on the stage had changed. The two were first enveloped by two beams of strong light, which kept flickering. It seemed that their lives were about to end due to taking poison.

The lights disappeared to the point of being almost invisible, but they were still on because what they took was not poison at all, but the "love potion" that the maid Brown Ganni secretly replaced with out of compassion, risking her life in the name of betrayal!

The two of them ran into each other and hugged each other!

"Tristan!" "Isolde!"

"Unfaithful lover!" "The most holy girl!"

In the band, Fanning suddenly raised his arms, and several large parts played powerfully together. The nightmarish "Tristan Chord" in the "Prelude" gushed out again!

"It seems like the conflicted lovers are reconciling, and they are embracing each other happily, but in fact... it's cruel! What a cruel plot!"

There were several masters in the art world in the audience - their friend Marey had consulted them on some of the stage designs at the time - and when they saw the scenes they had imagined actually collide with the music, they felt a huge shock in their hearts!

"To some extent, this is also an extension of the 'never-resolved' nightmare in 'Prelude'. Originally, the hero and heroine were just filled with love and hate, and it might have been a 'good ending' for them to both die. But now, instead of hatred, irrational desires have devoured their only sanity, and they will never be satisfied, never calm down, and make things worse!" Virgil, Pissarro, Claude and others who were part of the first generation of Impressionist painters closed their eyes and shook their heads!

The next moment, the momentum created by the changes in the music suddenly stopped.

The brief blank made the audience's heart hang in their throat.

The male chorus in the theater descended and began to sing a short and majestic tune in unison:

"Long live King Mark!" "Long live King Mark!"

It turned out that the sailboat had already docked!

The king personally led his guards to the shore to welcome Isolde!

The first act of the musical, which lasted more than an hour, finally came to an end!

The audience was eager to know what would happen after everyone returned to the palace, but the two exhausted people had already fainted on the ground, the lights went out, and the curtain closed!