MARCH BLITZSTEIN AND REGINA

Timeline
March 2, 1905__________________________________________________________________
Marcus Samuel Blitzstein born in Philadelphia.
1923-1926_____________________________________________________________________
Piano studies with Alexander Siloti; composition studies with Rosario Scalero at Curtis Institute of Music.
1925__________________________________________________________________________
First large-scale composition: Svarga, a ballet.
Marc Blitzstein in 1925
1926_________________________________________________
Performs Liszt's Piano Concerto no. 1 with Philadelphia Orchestra.
1927_________________________________________________
Brief composition studies with Nadia Boulanger in Paris and Arnold
Schoenberg in Berlin. Composed Piano Sonata
Late 1920’s___________________________________________
Compositions: Settings of Walt Whitman; solo piano music.
1929-1933_____________________________________________________________________
Extensive travels in Europe, including a tour of Germany with Aaron Copland.
Compositions: Cain (ballet), string quartets, The Condemned (choral opera).
1929__________________________________________________________________________
Triple Sec (one-act opera), libretto by Ronald Jeans, plays on Broadway as part of Garrick Gaieties. His
first stage work, performed privately in Philadelphia
1933__________________________________________________________________________

Marries writer and translator Eva Goldbeck, the daughter of Lina Abarbanell. They settle in Greenwich
Village in New York, where Blitzstein will live for the rest of his life.

Eva Goldbeck
1935__________________________________________________________

Attends Hanns Eisler’s New York lecture series “The crisis ion Music”. Becomes
committed to the doctrine of “art for society’s sake”.
Meets Bertolt Brecht, who suggests that Blitzstein compose an opera on the theme
of prostitution as an allegory on the condition of laborers under capitalism.
1936__________________________________________________________________________
Eva Goldbeck dies. Eva had always been frail and struggling with breast cancer. Sexually, artistically and
intellectually frustrated, she starved herself to death at age of 34.
Blitzstein writes music, lyrics, and book for The Cradle Will Rock during the summer, drawing on Brecht’s
suggestion and on Kurt Weill’s ideas about musical theater articulated during rehearsals for
Weill’s Johnny Johnson.
1937__________________________________________________________________________

The Cradle Will Rock a “play in music” (dedicated to Brecht) scheduled for production by the Federal
Theatre Project, directed Orson Welles and produced by John Houseman. The production is cancelled at
the last minute, whereupon the cast and creative team rent a theater uptown and put on the show with
Blitzstein at the piano and actors scattered throughout the audience to circumvent union restrictions. It
is a surprise success, serving as a springboard for a Broadway opening in December.

1938_________________________________________________________
Joins Communist Party. Compose incidental music to Danton’s Death (Büchner,
author of Woyzeck).

1937-1941____________________________________________________
Compositions: I've Got the Tune (one-act radio opera), film scores, No for an
Answer (opera).

1939________________________________________________________________________________
Meets Leonard Bernstein and forms a lifelong friendship.

1942_________________________________________________________________________________

Blitzstein joins the U.S. Army Air Force; he is stationed in England.

1946_________________________________________________________________________________
Blitzstein receives an honorable discharge from the Army. Premiere of the Airborne Symphony in New
York with Bernstein conducting; RCA issues a recording.

Blitzstein (center) with Leonard Bernstein (left) and Robert Shaw (seated), at the recording of Airborne
Symphony, 1946. Image courtesy of Photofest
1946-1949____________________________________________________________________________
Compose Regina, an opera for Broadway based on Lillian Hellman's play The Little Foxes.
1949__________________________________________________________________________

Premiere of Regina on Broadway. 68 performances.

1950-1955_____________________________________________________________________

Compositions: Reuben Reuben; translation and adaptation of The Threepenny Opera

1952______________________________________________________________________
Concert premiere of The Threepenny Opera at Brandeis University with Leonard Bernstein conducting
and Lotte Lenya in the cast.
1956-1959_____________________________________________________________________
Compositions: Juno, This Is the Garden (cantata), incidental music for Shakespeare plays
1959_________________________________________________________________________________
Juno (music and lyrics by Blitzstein, book by Joseph Stein) opens on Broadway. 16 performances.

1960__________________________________________________________________________

Accepts commission from the Ford Foundation to compose an opera for the Metropolitan Opera.
Blitzstein chooses the trial of Sacco and Vanzetti for the subject.
1960-1964_____________________________________________________________________

Compositions: two operas based on stories by Bernard Malamud; Sacco and Vanzetti (all unfinished).

January 22, 1964________________________________________________________________

While spending some time in the island of Martinique, France, while picking some sailors in a bar, they
robbed him and kick him, and dies as a result of this attack, he following day in a hospital.

Marc Blitzstein as a man of his times

Marc Blitzstein was a composer who re-invented himself several times during his life. From a highly
gifted child, able to play a Mozart’s piano concerto at age 7, and making his professional concerto debut
with the Philadelphia Orchestra in Liszt's E-flat Piano Concerto when he was 21, who was one of the first
students at the then new Curtis Institute of Philadelphia, who studied later with Arnold Schoenberg and
Nadia Boulanger, he became the typical “modern composer” of the times, with a very percussive sound
on his first compositions (not 12 tone, but more in the likes of Bartok/Stravinsky) for piano, or orchestra.
In this early stage of his life, he was a self-proclaimed and unrepentant “artistic snob”, who firmly
believed that true art was only for the intellectual elite. Then, the first “reinvention”, the big swift comes
after 1935, when he attends Hanns Eisler’s New York lecture series “The crisis ion Music”. Here are some
of his ideas, on a Hanns Eisler's Speech to the Choir of the International Ladies' Garment Workers Union,
I938:

“One characteristic of this crisis in music is the division of entertainment and serious music. Is this not a
very strange division? Must we be entertained only by the cheapest musical rubbish and must we look
serious and behave like snobs when listening to serious classical music?”
“What did the Industrial Revolution do to music culture? It destroyed most of the old folk music. The
explanation is simple. Factory workers cannot sing at work in the same way and for the same reasons as
the Volga boatmen sang. The tempo and rhythm of their work is dictated by their machines and not by
the workers themselves”.

After a deep transformation, Blitzstein becomes committed to the doctrine of “art for society’s sake”.

After several compositions for “Musical Theater” compositions, finally comes The Cradle Will Rock a
“play in music” (dedicated to Brecht) scheduled for production by the Federal Theatre Project, directed
Orson Welles and produced by John Houseman.

The production is cancelled at the last minute, whereupon the cast and creative team rent a theater
uptown and put on the show with Blitzstein at the piano and actors scattered throughout the audience
to circumvent union restrictions.

It is a surprise success, serving as a springboard for a Broadway opening in December. Musicraft issues a
cast recording.

His new language, his new “message”. His empathy for the worker, the black, the low class, is reflected
on a song by this play called “Joe Worker”

Listen , here’s a story

Not much fun and not much Glory,
Low class, low down;
The thing you never cae to see until there is a showdown.
Here it is, I’ll make it snappy

Joe worker gets gypped.

For no good reason, just gypped.
From the Start until the finish comes,
They feed him out of garbage cans,
They breed him in the sums…

Blitzstein is now ready to deliver his message. He has now, in 1938 Joined the Communist Party. It is a
sad and cruel irony of life, that he believed in the struggling class, advocating his fight against the
exploiter, the rich, while at the end, HIS PEOPLE, the “undedicated”, the “common man”, the “Joe
Worker” would be the one who would kill him on an island called La Martinique, in France. He was killed
by the men he always spoke on behalf of.

REGINA VS. LITTLE FOXES

Regina
(New York City Opera version)
Opera in three acts
Libretto by Marc Blitzstein, based on The Little Foxes by Lillian Hellman

From left: William Warfield, Jane Pickens (as Regina) and Lillyn Brown in Regina on Broadway, 1949.
Original Cast:

Regina Giddens (soprano), Alexandra (Zan) Giddens (soprano), Birdie Hubbard (soprano), Addie
(contralto), Horace Giddens (bass), Benjamin Hubbard (baritone), Oscar Hubbard (baritone), Leo
Hubbard (tenor), Cal (baritone), William Marshall (tenor), Jabez, known as Jazz (baritone), John Bagtry
(speaking role), Belle. ANGEL BAND: Jazz (trumpet), Rucker (clarinet), Lias (banjo, guitar), Sebastian
(trombone), Adam (washboard and drums).

Publisher: European American Music (vocal score: Chappell, 1954; libretto: Chappell, 1953)

First Performance: New York City Opera, April 2, 1953

The Little Foxes is a 1939 cynical play by Lillian Hellman, considered a classic of 20th century drama. The
title comes the “Song of Solomon” in the King James version of the Bible, which reads, "Take us the
foxes, the little foxes, that spoil the vines: for our vines have tender grapes." Set in a small town in
Alabama in 1900, it focuses on the struggle for control of a family business. Regina happens to be the
most authoritarian figure of all the brothers, the one who wins power and money at the end…but at a
high cost: Rejection of everybody, including the daughter, and loneliness. The last piercing words of
Alexandra (Zan) when witnessing a new weak side of her mother when she leaves are painfully true:
“Are you afraid, mama?”

Lillian Hellman wrote about Regina: “I had never seen music in The Little Foxes, never thought of it that
way. And so, a long time ago, when Marc Blitzstein said he wanted to make an opera of the play, I don’t
know, or I don’t remember, why I said yes. Like most writers, I don’t like very much to have my work
touched by anybody else; and the play was far behind me and I didn’t want to think about it anymore.”
This is a very important fact, since the relationship Hellman/Blitzstein would be affected little by little
because of this “collaborative” work. In fact, it would be far from been a collaboration. There was a
friction in the relationship because of their points of view of what Hellman and Blitzstein wanted to
depict in the play/Opera. Hellman admitted once: “when a friend told me that Birdie’s third act
confession scene was more touching with music than it had been without music, I was a little jealous. I
suppose most of us don’t like to hear that we’ve been improved upon.” This is quite significant if we
think that this has nothing to do with the addition of an external device (like the Dixieland Band that
Blitzstein included on the first act, or the Gospel songs heard on the famous “Rain quartet) but with the
play itself! Birdie’s confession is not only important, but crucial in the play, here we have this woman,
who is THE OPPOSITE to Regina’s personality, all the opposite values in frank opposition to Regina’s
ambition and materialistic vision of life. Birdie loves her hometown, her home, the plantation above
money, Regina is looking for profits, even if she must fight and win over her brothers. This crucial
moment, is now sounding “more touching” thanks to Blitzstein music! And the fascinating “Rain
Quartet” is a special place to mention: There’s no way that anything spoken during the play, could equal
the happiness, the joy of life, the EMOTION it depicts and the audience receive, while hearing this
musical number. The 8 minutes of music, starting with the orchestra mysterious complex melodic lines,
with unusual harmonies in a very ambiguous key of d minor/B flat, creates a special “ethos” on the
audience of un-expectation:
Hellman seems to show that even she, can fully appreciate all that Blitzstein achieves when she
expressed: “It took me many years, and a number of performances, truly to understand all that is good
about Regina. It was only in 1958, at the City Center, in its latest and I think best interpretation - perhaps
because it was directed by Herman Shumlin and designed by Howard Bay, both of whom had done the
original play - that I fully appreciated Regina”. Instead of giving full credit to Blitzstein for the
transformation she did, she rather Credit external factors, like the direction and design.

After that eerie orchestral introduction to third act, there’s a swift: A lovely and joyful song full of gaiety,
in a B flat key, introduced by Alexandra (still unaware of who is really her mother and what is her
mother Regina capable of doing: killing her husband):
This innocence of a song, equals Alexandra innocence and beauty. Blitzstein “spices” the song, by adding
a Gb note on the accompaniment, while the main melody sings a G natural: There’s a obvious harmonic
clash, that is diluted by the fact that the accompaniment is played in staccato.

After this surprising introduction, It follows one of the most intelligent moments in the history of Opera:
an onomatopoeic depiction of the rain: sixteen notes with syncopation, in the high voices, that really
makes “think of the rain, in an optimistic key of B flat:

Who can listen to this music and stay still? Audiences become fascinated for this pyrotechnic music!
Here everything is happiness, the “good people”, forgetting about any problems, enjoying the “Rain”, as
a metaphor of what the rich people seems to desire (, Nature, beauty, peace) but they’re too busy to
fully enjoy it, UNLESS they are still innocent, like Alexandra (it’s not a causality that she is the one who
sings the main theme: “Make a quiet day, Try for a very quiet day, Let’s keep it steady and low…listen to
the rain….Lalalala…”). Only pure souls can escape from the greed of the powerful. This huge contrast
between characters who are related by blood (mother/daughter) has been explored in the past by
Mozart in “the Magic Flute”. REGINA-ALEXANDRA is the equivalent to THE QUEEN OF THE NIGHT-
PAMINA. Since Lillian Hellman was not thinking of Mozart’s Opera, for obvious reasons (unless
consciously) we will have to call it a “happy coincidence”. Suddenly, the mood changes: we hear a low
baritone voice, Hubbard, Regina’s husband, still, positive, but kind of warning us that something is
coming (probably his own dead) when he sings: “Consider the rain, the falling of friendly rain, that
serves the earth, then moves again.” And then, the CRUCIAL WORDS for the dramaturgy: “SOME PEOPLE
EAT ALL THE EARTH”.
THOSE WORDS, are exactly the words that Alexandra will say (in the Play) at the very end, to her mom
(and to herself). Those words that’s ALL that SHE NEEDS TO LEAVE REGINA forever. She discovers that
REGINA, her mother if “one of those people who eat all the earth” for her OWN benefit. But HE,
HUBBARD, and, Alexandra, his daughter are those people who “Stand around and watch while they eat,
and watch while they eat the earth”. This WARNING of the tragedy in the happiest song of the Opera, is
the CORE of the Opera.

Then, the Quartet sings back those words, in a complex canon like procedure, but then they recover the
original mood of “Make a quiet day” Alexandra sang at the beginning. And in the middle of all of this,
the GOSPEL SONG…. the poor, the PEOPLE, the workers, the “good people” who thanks God for all the
blessings interrupts, with its assertive praise of God: “certainly Lord”.

The 9 minutes Quartet is a summary of the entire OPERA: There’s drama, a sense of mystery, (the
orchestra introduction) that give us hints that unexpected events will happen; Alexandra’s innocence,
enjoying beautiful and simple things like…the rain!; the WORKERS, the Black People goodness
represented by their faith in The Lord (Gospel song) and Hubbard dark presence and a puppet of Regina
limitless ambition.

No wonder why Lillian Hellman said: “Regina is no longer my play so perhaps I can speak of it here
without modesty. It is, to me, the most original of American operas, the most daring. The theme of The
Little Foxes did not seem the proper subject for opera - although God knows what is a proper subject.
And yet the bite and power of the music comments on the people in a wonderfully witty way, and the
sad sweetness of the music for the "good characters" makes them better”.
Here is at the end, a humble opinion from Hellman, that pays tribute to Blitzstein’s Opera. Hellman
recognize that “The Little Foxes” has been modified, and turned into something else, another art work
on its own merits, called REGINA. The Little Foxes and Regina are two different works, in a way. Both are
masterpieces, one as a play, and the other as an Opera. I want to end with Hellman’s own words, that
describes the best, Regina, one of the most unfairly neglected masterpieces of XX century Operas from
America, and in general. Regina, a personification of unlimited ambition who wins “the world but losses
everything else, respect from her brothers, company and security from her husband, and mist
important, filial love from her daughter in Hellman’s play, becomes in Blitzstein Operatic version, a
personification of capitalistic Greed, inhuman exploitation (money over family) and eventually loneliness
and misery. For Blitzstein, the subject was converted into a perfect fit for his communist political ideas.

I want to finish this notes with Hellman’s perfect summary or Regina: “Mr. Blitzstein here, as in all his
other work, has power and originality. Regina is interesting - for me the best quality in any work - and it
is sharp and clean. These are virtues badly needed in a theatre-music world where slickness sometimes
makes cynicism sound pretty, and where the popular too often passes for the profound”.