You have written few pieces for voice compared to your brother László Sáry....Why so few vocal works until now? What is the reason for the renewed interest?
I always worked with voice. I taught musical theory for decades at the Music Academy...and I analysed songs in 70-80 percent of my hours. The reason that I did not write for voice could be in part because I have a very high degree of respect for voice and I was always afraid that I could not come up with music for songs in which the singer is the centre. The performer must create sound from their own body, that is, it's an entirely different type of art than instrumental music, where the sound is placed in our hands. There's also a more prosaic reason: a long time ago, decades ago, when I found the courage to write for voice, I had an enlarged goiter and had thyroid surgery. The doctor, who was an extraordinary person, a member of a dynasty of physicians, did the job perfectly, but he told me before the surgery that one had to take terrible care as bleeding was very heavy during this type of operation. Because of the many capillaries, one could hardly see where one was reaching and whether or not a nerve was damaged was really only a matter of chance. As it happened, a nerve or one of my vocal chords was damaged and for a long time, I could only whisper. Before, I would sing entire works with the piano at home. I especially liked Mozart and Purcell, but Handel too. Afterward, I had to give up singing. This was such a psychological burden that I completely turned away from writing for voice. When I got the commission [for Solar Eclipse], and it was a German commission, I thought turning down such a commission would show strength of character but also foolishness. I thought here's my chance, at the expense of a theatre, to continue to teach about the human voice, how the waves of sound cancel each other out, how dissonances can be reinforced. Although, as one learns from Richard Strauss and others, this is not enough after a time: one has to experiment for oneself. And it came back, in the course of composing. That is my intensive friendship with voice.
Where is the place for this piece in your oeuvre? I think it could be seen as an overview, as parts from many of your earlier works are used in it.
Yes, the story also has that capacity, because I'm speaking about the terrors of the 20th century through the details of the life of Koestler, so the work can certainly serve as an overview. Not that I stole from myself by reworking some of my earlier works. I built earlier works into Solar Eclipse if I felt that they played an important role where I placed them. I took care that the excerpts should not be foreign bodies in the opera.
On the basis of the libretto, it could appear that the work is a soundtrack to a biographical film about Koestler.
Yes, that's the point. The timing in the work can also be explained by its similarity to a screenplay. It is not chronological, rather Koestler's life is examined through flashbacks, for example.
The reviewers say the scene in the death sentence cell is the highpoint of the work, and the best role is Otto Katz.
That part sticks the best, I was able to work it out with special thought. For me, too, that episode is the most important, in which Otto Katz is condemned to death by his own party in a conceptual trial. I was a university student at the time of the Rajk and Imre Nagy trials, and I knew what it meant for those who believed in this idea and how they came to grips with it. I have to say that the Communist party was the place for every respectable person starting out. In the 50s, when we often went hungry, I wrote etudes for my colleagues. In the autumn, this meant, for example, that I got a kilo of tomatoes for such a piece.
Can we welcome these etudes back?
Yes, it's a Bach work, an etude, that Koestler's wife plays on the piano [in Solar Eclipse]. A recording of the piece is heard, but at the same time, we hear a modern orchestral work. In this scene, it is as if the time period has been suspended.
Have you met any of Koestler's friends?
I met Ferenc Fejtő in Hungary and we exchanged letters. I invited him to the premiere of the opera, but he wrote that there was a car accident and he almost died, so that is why he could not come. He offered a lot of interesting information in his letters.
Is the Hungarian version very different from the German one?
It had to be translated and the there are unimaginable differences between German and Hungarian in terms of stress, syllables and in that the attributives are more stressed in Hungarian. It happened often that I had to write new voices or new melismas and hide inflections.
Attila Jószef also appears in the piece as his Perhaps I shall disappear suddenly... is read.
We cold not allow Attila József to sing in German in the fourth act of the Hungarian language premiere.
Interviewer: László Kolozsi for Fidelio
