At first glance Berlin’s arguably largest depository of uniforms can hardly be described as a military location. Yet in terms of sheer quantity and variety of uniforms in storage the inventory of costumes held by the Deutsche Oper Berlin surely outstrips the stock of garments stored in any conventional barracks. There are probably enough shakos, tunics and cartridge belts here, arranged according to size, style and rank, to fit out an entire army.

The reality is that the vast array of uniforms reflects the conspicuous interest that opera has had in soldiery for almost 200 years. From Gaetano Donizetti‘s LA FILLE DU REGIMENT to Benjamin Britten‘s BILLY BUDD and Bernd Alois Zimmermann‘s THE SOLDIERS, orders are issued and executed. And that is not all: it is not just the supporting corps that is under arms; in the great operas of the 19th and 20th centuries the main characters, too, are military men. Meyerbeer’s Vasco da Gama is an ambitious naval officer, Radames in AIDA a spied-on general, Don José in Bizet’s CARMEN a psychopathic deserter and Othello himself – especially in Verdi’s version, the opera adaptation most familiar to audiences – a field marshal consumed by jealousy. And from this short list alone it is clear that opera paints a rather unflattering picture of the profession - and even disparages it in a number of works.

This is all the more remarkable in that it is precisely this most populist art form that runs counter not only to public expectations but also to the all-pervading spirit of an entire century. More than any period before it, the age of Wagner and Verdi was suffused with militarist esprit. In no other chapter of history were more monuments erected to fallen heroes, more streets named after battles won. Whole nations appeared bent on waging war at the earliest opportunity and getting killed for king and country. This zeitgeist was a product of the French Revolution, which had sown the idea that anyone who laid down his life for the fatherland was assured a place in the pantheon of heroes. This gave the armies of the grande nation the edge over their opponents, seen as mere conscripted villains, a superiority that lasted only until their enemies adopted the same approach.

Tobias Kehrer and Charles Castronovo in CARMEN © Marcus Lieberenz

 

Opera in general and luminaries such as Bizet, Verdi, Puccini and the composers who came after them are a spanner in the works of this fervour. And perfidious though it may seem, it is the singers with the most powerful voices who get to sing the soldiers’ roles. It is almost always tenors who have to sing the parts of anti-heroes instead of being allowed to luxuriate in the aura of their high Cs. CARMEN presents the unheroic reality of the soldier’s life with a realism that remains unsurpassed. The mind-numbing routine of keeping watch in shifts, which is what José does day in, day out, is guaranteed to bury any dreams of heroism. And Bizet’s portrayal of José, whose sense of duty wilts in the face of the erotic pull of a woman of dubious virtue, is unlikely to have endeared him to the officers in the audience at the premiere in Paris in 1875, only four years after the end of hostilities.

Even more unsettling in this respect is Verdi’s Othello, who makes his entrance as a hero, a full-throated general fresh from victory. Yet this zenith is only the cue for a fall, spread over four acts. The commander cannot quell his own jealousy and is presented as gullible and violent. The message we take from both operas is the same: it is irresponsible to entrust weapons to people who can hardly stay calm and collected themselves. A moral that needs no modern-day updating.