Recommended for Grades 6-12
In this resource, you will:
- Learn the opera’s background and synopsis
- Meet the opera’s composer
Duke Bluebeard鈥檚 Castle
by Béla Bartók
Duke Bluebeard's Castle
by Béla Bartók
A quick overview of Bartók’s 1918 opera of the French folk tale.
Background
Béla Balázs shared with Béla Bartók a determination to create an opera which was modern and Hungarian. Basing his libretto on a fairy tale by Charles Perrault, Balázs wrote the text for either Bartók or Zoltán Kodály to set. Bartók composed his version in 1911, entering it in a national competition for one-act operas.
The opera did not win and was not produced by the Budapest Opera until after the successful run of Balázs and Bartók’s ballet The Wooden Prince in 1917. Duke Bluebeard’s Castle was first performed in a double bill with that ballet. This opera, a masterful psychological study through music, was Bartók’s only venture into the opera genre.
Synopsis
Bluebeard brings Judith, his new bride, to a remote castle. There are no windows, only seven locked doors. Bluebeard tells her that no one must see what lies behind them. She asks that the doors be opened to let in air and sunlight. He opens the first door, revealing a torture chamber. Judith is unafraid and asks Bluebeard to let her open the second door. Behind it, she finds his armory, its weapons covered in blood.
In the third room, she sees mountains of gold, fabulous and gems, all are stained with blood. The fourth door reveals the castle’s secret garden, its flowers speckled with blood. He tells her not to question him and bids her open the fifth door to fill the castle with light (“Nyisd ki az ötödik ajtót”). Through the fifth door, Judith sees Bluebeard’s vast kingdom, but soon a cloud casts a blood-red shadow over the radiant landscape.
Two doors are still unopened. He says they must remain so, but she again resists. Bluebeard lets her open the sixth door. Behind it lies a tranquil lake, filled with tears (“Csendes fehér látok”). Bluebeard warns her that the last door must stay shut forever. She demands that it be opened. In the final chamber are the ghosts of his former wives.
—Synopsis by William Friedkin
Meet the Artists
Listen to the Story
Gustave Doré (1832–1883), Barbe Bleue (Bluebeard), woodcut, 1862 [].
Presented by Washington National Opera, host Saul Lilienstein takes you through the musical world of Bartók’s 1918 opera of the French folk tale, Duke Bluebeard’s Castle.
Watch an Excerpt
Nadja Michael (Judith) and Mikhail Petrenko (Bluebeard) in the Metropolitan Opera’s production of Duke Bluebeard’s Castle.
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