Frederik Rung
The Three Cornered Hat
Act 1
1. “The grapes entice us behind the cover of the vine leaf”
2. “Are you waiting for guests today?”
3. “Because I believe in you, my wife”
4. “But what do I see?”
5. “Corregidor! You are the first man here today”
6. “Your eyes burning in the soul”
7. “My God, Lord Jesus! What’s going on?”
8. “But look, their highnesses are coming!”
9. “Hi Nanitta, ink and pen!”
10. “Tonight, Garduna!”
11. “Here we linger happily behind the leaves of the vine leaf”
Act 2
12. “Have you tasted my new sauce for stewed tomatoes?”
13. “Quiet, someone’s knocking!”
14. “Don Berudes”
15. “Help, I’m drowning!”
16. “What a villain”
17. “Nanitta! The door is open, what happened?”
18. “Nanitta, my own wife!”
19. “Purple cape, golden ribbons!”
20. “Garduna! What’s keeping him?”
21. “Follow me!”
Act 3
22. “Twelve the bells chime, twelve is the hour of sleep”
23. “Open up!”
24. “Father Lucas, has any misfortune befallen you?”
25. “Good morning, senorita!”
26. “I unlucky woman!”
27. “Then explain, please”
28. “Here, Nanitta, by my side”
29. “So madam, keep your word”
Hakon Børresen
The Royal Guest
30. Prelude
C.F.E. Horneman
Aladdin
31. Overture
Eduard DuPuy
Youth and Folly
1. Overture
Fini Henriques
Voelund the Smith
2. Prelude
K.A. Wieth-Knudsen
Death and the Mother
3. Church Scene
C.F.E. Horneman
Gurre-Suite
4. Overture
5. Volmer and Tove
6. Tove’s Funeral
7. In the Forest by Gurre
Svend S. Schultz
Three Danish Dances
8. No.1
9. No.2
10. No.3
Knudåge Riisager
11. Toccata
12. Marche Tartare
Tage Nielsen
13. Intermezzo Gaio, Op. 5
The Three-Cornered Hat ©
By Martin Granau / Peter Quantrill
The main work on this album is a genuine rarity, a Danish operatic setting of The Three-Cornered Hat. Its composer, Frederik Rung (1854-1914), was born into music as the son of the composer and master of singing at the Royal Theatre, Henrik Rung, and the singer Pauline Rung. As a 12 year old, Frederik played guitar in the band of the Royal Chapel during a staging of Beaumarchais’ The Barber of Seville. The following year he enrolled as one of the youngest students at the new conservatoire in Copenhagen, where he was taught by its founders Niels W. Gade and J.P.E. Hartmann, and the violinist Valdemar Tofte.
Further studies took Rung him to Vienna, Paris and London before he returned home to Denmark and began following in his father’s footsteps at the Royal Theatre. He had been periodically employed there as a repetiteur from 1872, but in 1884 he started to conduct performances, and in 1895 he was appointed as Second Conductor. After Johan Svendsen’s departure in 1908, Rung briefly took over as Principal Conductor. He gave the Danish premiere of Das Rhinegold, prior to leading the entire Ring cycle at the Royal Theatre.
Rung was renowned for his precise hearing: he would rehearse certain passages over and over until everything was in place. As a consultant on the purchase of new bells for Copenhagen City Hall in 1899, he insisted on sending the largest bell back to the foundry in Germany because he detected an impurity in its ring. Beyond the opera house, Rung had taken charge of the ambitious choir of the Cæcilia Association in 1877, and a decade later he established its Madrigal Choir, one of the first elite choirs in Denmark. Rung’s own output as a composer includes a symphony, a serenade for nine instruments and several works for violin and piano, but he focused his creative energies on vocal and stage works such as The Three-Cornered Hat. Inspired by Pedro Antonio de Alarcón’s short story of the same name from 1874, Rung wrote the music during a stay in Norway in the summer of 1893, six years before Hugo Wolf’s eponymous opera and more than two decades before Manuel de Falla’s ballet. To fashion a libretto from Alarcón’s story, Rung worked with the author and journalist – and later artistic director of the Royal Theatre – Einar Christiansen (1861-1939), who also performed the same function for Nielsen’s Saul and David a few years later. Their labours produced an ingenious rhyming text full of humour and charm.
The piano score for the opera is dated August 3, 1893. In writing the full score, Rung demonstrated an experienced mastery of the orchestra in support of the catchy sung parts. He completed his work on November 30, 1893. Early the following year, The Three-Cornered Hat was staged at the Royal Theatre on six occasions – and never heard again since, except for the present radio production from 1953, broadcast on November 28 that year.
RELEASE DATE: June 2022
CATALOGUE NUMBER: DACOCD 922
EAN: 5709499922002
