‘Jenufa’ at the ENO: an opera that packs a punch

Wow! I don’t usually start a review with the conductor and orchestra, but under the baton of Keri-Lynn Wilson, founder and director of the Ukrainian Freedom Orchestra, Janáček’s Jenufa packed a greater emotional punch than I ever remember.

This was the composer’s third opera, and the first in which he found his true musical voice. Its composition took him many years — nine, according to a woman (Marie Stejskalová) who worked for the family and witnessed its creation, during the evenings and night-time to the light of paraffin lamps. He pursued other work at the same time, and suffered a personal tragedy with the slow death of his dear daughter Olga (Oluška) from typhoid that she had contracted on a family visit to Russia. As he played it through to her she listened peacefully, and when he rose from the piano said, “It’s beautiful. What a pity that I won’t see it.”

It is indeed beautiful — but harrowing. Jenufa is based on the play Her stepdaughter (Její pastorkyňa) by Gabriela Preissová, which Janáček had seen, probably in Brno in January 1891. After attending two performances of Mascagni’s Cavalleria rusticana in March 1892, he felt inspired, and adapted its Italian verismo style to the Czech play, writing his own libretto.

The result received its premiere in Brno in January 1904, but despite local success, critics from Prague pointed out shortcomings. Janáček made changes, presented at revivals in Brno. Then in 1916 a new version was finally performed in Prague, including a number of cosmetic changes by Karel Kovarovic, music director of the Prague National Theatre. Its success gave the composer confidence to produce further remarkable operas (Katya Kabanova, Cunning Little Vixen, The Makropulos Affair, and From the House of the Dead) that are all in the standard repertoire. The version we see at the ENO is Janáček’s original, which with our modern tastes does not feel as unusual as it did over a hundred years ago.

The story is that Jenufa is in love with Števa, a smug ne’er do well who will inherit the local mill, but is herself desperately loved by his half-brother Laca, who will inherit nothing. Jenufa’s stepmother, the Kostelnička (so called as warden of the village church), an important and upstanding member of the local community, forbids Jenufa’s marriage to Števa until he stops drinking for a year. When she finds out her stepdaughter is pregnant with his baby, she confines Jenufa to the house, keeping the baby a secret.

In the meantime Laca’s intense jealousy has led him to slash Jenufa’s cheek with a knife, so that when Števa returns from potential army service he rejects her. The Kostelnička then persuades Laca to accept Jenufa despite the disfigurement, but the existence of Števa’s baby causes him to demur, so she claims it died. Now, in desperation, she defies her own Christian faith and abandons all morality by taking the baby and dumping him in a frozen pond. Laca marries Jenufa, but as the preparations take place, someone announces the discovery of a dead baby. The finale is beautifully redemptive.

This is a revival of David Alden’s 2006 production for the ENO, set in the dull Czechoslovakia of Communist times, which serves the story very well. The performance took time to gel. The first Act felt a little unfocused, but Acts II and III, with only a five minute break between them, were simply wonderful. Susan Bullock as the Kostelnička gave a moving performance. Her mea culpa at the end was convincingly done, and her Act II interaction with the strong Števa of John Findon was excellent; vocal strength too from an ungainly and robotic Richard Trey Smagur as Laca. Fiona Kimm made a delightful old lady as Grandmother Burya, and the Jenufa of Jennifer Davis was beautifully nuanced. One really felt for her throughout, and her nobility of purpose was beautifully captured at the end.

This is a hugely dramatic opera, informed by Janáček’s own experience of his daughter’s death, and it should appeal to anyone who enjoys serious drama and has a sensitivity to music. Unfortunately the ENO’s own publicity team don’t quite get it. On social media they suggest first time opera-goers should try Magic Flute or The Barber of Seville instead. But hold on, these are late 18th and early 19th century operas. Young people today are imbued with a more modern musical background, and may be going to the opera to see real drama. With Jenufa they will certainly get it.

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