Juha, Op. 74, is a verismoopera in three acts—comprising six tableaux—written from 1931 to 1934 by the Finnish composer Leevi Madetoja. The libretto, a collaboration between Madetoja and the Finnish sopranoAino Ackté, is based on Juhani Aho's 1911 novel by the same name. The story takes place on the border between West Karelia (Finno-Swedish territory) and East Karelia (Russian territory), and features as its central conflict a love triangle between the farmer Juha, his young wife Marja, and a Karelian merchant, Shemeikka. Disillusioned with rural life and seduced by promises of material comfort and romance, Marja runs away with Shemeikka; Juha, who maintains his wife has been abducted, eventually discovers her betrayal and commits suicide by jumping into the rapids.
On 17 February 1935, the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra premiered the work at the Finnish National Opera under the baton of Armas Järnefelt. Although a success at its premiere, Juha failed to match the popularity of Madetoja's first opera, The Ostrobothnians; enthusiasm quickly faded and the inaugural production fizzled in February 1938, for a total of just 13 performances. Despite two mini-revivals in Madetoja's lifetime, he considered it the greatest disappointment of his career. Today, the opera is rarely performed and has been supplanted in the operatic repertoire by Aarre Merikanto's modernist 1922 version (first performed in 1963), which is based upon the same libretto.
History
An advertisement promoting the 17 February 1935 premiere of Madetoja'sJuha; Armas Järnefelt conducted the premiere.
For Madetoja, the 1930s brought hardship and disappointment. During this time, he was at work on two new major projects: a second opera, Juha, and a fourth symphony, each to be his final labor in their respective genres. The former, with a libretto by the famous Finnish soprano, Aino Ackté (adapted from the 1911 novel by writer Juhani Aho),[1] had fallen to Madetoja after a series of events: first, Sibelius—ever the believer in "absolute music"—had refused the project in 1914;[2][a] and, second, in 1922, the Finnish National Opera had rejected a first attempt by Aarre Merikanto as "too Modernist" and "too demanding on the orchestra", leading the composer to withdraw the score.[4][b] Two failures in, Ackté thus turned to Madetoja, the successful The Ostrobothnians of whom was firmly ensconced in the repertoire, to produce a safer, more palatable version of the opera.[4]
The death of Madetoja's mother, Anna, on 26 March 1934, interrupted his work on the opera; the loss so devastated Madetoja that he fell ill and could not travel to Oulu for the funeral.[6][7][c] Madetoja completed work on the opera by the end of 1934 and it premiered to considerable fanfare at the Finnish National Opera on 17 February 1935, the composer's forty-eighth birthday. The critics hailed it as a "brilliant success", an "undisputed masterpiece of Madetoja and Finnish opera literature".[6] Nevertheless, the "euphoria" of the initial performance eventually wore off and, to the composer's disappointment, Juha did not equal the popularity of The Ostrobothnians. Indeed, today Juha is most associated with Merikanto, whose modernist Juha (which the Finnish National Opera performed on 19 October 1967) is the more enduringly popular of the two; having been displaced by Merikanto's, Madetoja's Juha is rarely performed.[6][4]
Roles
Juhacomprises a cast of eleven roles, of which five are for male and six are for female voice types; tableaux 4–6 also include mixed choir. The principal characters are Juha (baritone), his wife Marja (soprano), and her seducer Shemeikka (tenor).
Roles, character descriptions, voice types, premiere performers
Roles
Character description
Appearances
Voice type
Premiere cast 17 February 1935
Juha
A backwoods Finnish farmer and the husband of Marja
Juha and Marja's homeland is the historical Finnish province of Karelia (in blue), then under Swedish rule. Shemeikka's Russian Karelia (not pictured) borders to the east.
Rapids are a recurring plot point in Juha: over them, Marja escapes with Shemeikka; and in them, a ruined Juha downs himself.
In 1934, Madetoja excerpted from Juha two numbers for orchestra: Tragic Episode (Traagillinen episodi) and Rapids Shooting (Koskenlasku). The first number is derived from the opera's overture, whereas the second number is drawn from the orchestra music that occurs between Tableaux 1 and 2. In 1998, Arvo Volmer and the Oulu Symphony Orchestra made the world premiere recordings of Tragic Episode and Rapids Shooting.
Writing for MusicWeb International, Rob Barnett argues that the two Juha excerpts—with their "overhung tragedy and whiplash attack"—are "seriously attractive pieces of music". He concludes that two pieces likely will make their listener "want to catch" Juha in its entirety.[8] A similarly positive review ran in the American Record Guide, with Tom Godell describing Tragic Episode and Rapids Shooting as "remarkable interludes ... [that] powerfully convey the complex, seething emotions of the central characters".[9]
Notes, references, and sources
Notes
^According to Tawaststjerna, Ackté and Aho had first offered the libretto to Sibelius in November 1912, as Ackté had "felt confident that he [Sibelius] would produce something that was both powerful and refined".[3] Interested but noncommittal, Sibelius promised a firm answer within two years. To Ackté's disappointment, Sibelius declined the project in October 1914, finding its "rural verismo uncongenial"[3] and wishing to focus on his Fifth Symphony.[2]
^According to Korhonen, while the 1920s featured the rise of Modernism in Finnish music, the national Romanticism was "still alive and well. Sibelius, Melartin, and Madetoja were at the height of their creative powers, and they were admired by the public at large". As such, many Modernist compositions were criticized by critics and a "hostile ... suspicious" public. Many others, were not even performed, "hidden in desk drawers".[5] Merikanto, an emerging modernist composer, likely received the Juha libretto from Ackté around 1920 and, after a "high state of inspiration", completed his score in the winter of 1921. After making revisions to the score in January 1922, Merikanto submitted the work to the board of the Finnish National Opera in the spring. Their rebuke stung Merikanto, and his Juha remained unperformed until 1963 in Lahti, five years after his death.[4]
^In 1939, Madetoja published his Second Symphony (1918) using the inheritance money from his mother's death to cover the printing costs; as a tribute, he retroactively dedicated the work to her.[6][7]
^ abRefers to the year in which the performers recorded the work; this may not be the same as the year in which the recording was first released to the general public.
Pulliainen, Riitta (2000). Madetoja Orchestral Works 1: I Have Fought My Battle (booklet). Arvo Volmer & Oulu Symphony Orchestra. Tampere, Finland: Alba. p. 4–6. ABCD 132.
Pulliainen, Riitta (2001). Madetoja Orchestral Works 4: Laurel Wreaths (booklet). Arvo Volmer & Oulu Symphony Orchestra. Tampere, Finland: Alba. p. 4–8. ABCD 162.
Salmenhaara, Erkki (1987). Leevi Madetoja (in Finnish). Helsinki: Tammi. ISBN951-30-6725-4.
Tawaststjerna, Erik (1986). Sibelius: Volume 2, 1904–1914. (Robert Layton, English translation). London: Faber and Faber.
Tawaststjerna, Erik (1997). Sibelius: Volume 3, 1914–1957. (Robert Layton, English translation). London: Faber and Faber.
