Murder, Manipulation, & Mercy

At first glance, everything seems clear: here a merciful ruler, there a traitor and a murderer. Yet Mozart’s La clemenza di Tito raises many questions. For example: the relationship between power and mercy, between friendship and loyalty—and what drives people to commit their deeds. During rehearsals, Hanna-Elisabeth Müller and Katleho Mokhoabane discussed these and other aspects of Mozart’s late opera.

Let’s start with the music. If you were to venture a definition: How can you recognize Mozart’s music? What is the “Mozartian” quality?

HEM: When you hear a clear melody that’s very simple and instantly gives you goosebumps. That’s Mozart.

Katleho Mokhoabane, you’re still a very young singer, and it’s impossible to avoid the question of who your role models are when it comes to Mozart tenors. Were there any voices that had a formative influence on you?

KM: Peter Schreier, Michael Schade, Daniel Behle, Bogdan Volkov, and quite a few others as well.

Is a voice really a gift? Or is singing just hard work?

KM: It’s a gift. First and foremost. But that gift alone isn’t enough in our line of work. That’s why you have to keep working on your voice. No matter what stage of your career you’re at, it takes continuous effort. In my case, I strive not only to sing better but also to expand my repertoire. And above all: to take care of my voice so that it stays healthy. It’s so sad to hear that there are singers who had a five-year period when everything was great, and then things went downhill. Very often, this is because they didn’t take good care of their instrument.

Mozart’s La clemenza di Tito features a cast of very diverse characters. Vitellia, however, tends to be on the darker side. What drives her to incite Sesto—who is in love with her—to murder Emperor Tito? Wounded pride? The will to power?

HEM: Ambition. Lust for power. A great greed for everything, really. She wants to be loved; she wants people to look up to her. And she wants to have power and be able to control everything. Which is exactly what she does, because she’s manipulating events all the time and using others like playthings. Until, in the end, the intrigue fails and she falls—falls very hard. And I don’t know if she has enough personal strength to get back on her feet.

But can you really talk your way out of a character like Vitellia? Like, "Yeah, but...?"

HEM: If you absolutely must: It has qualities that one might even wish for in a different context—and that many people may well lack. That ambition, the planning, thinking through all the possibilities, the strategy for reaching a goal. And this constant staying on the ball. These are things that can also be seen in a positive light—if they were applied differently.

But is Vitellia as dangerous as Hagen or Iago?

HEM: She wants to have the Emperor killed by his best friend, her lover. It doesn’t get much more intricate or profound than that. The fact that the Emperor survives has nothing to do with her. But of course I try to give the character a human touch. After all, there has to be a person on stage whom we could all know, but who has become entangled in mistakes—and even more mistakes.

One of your colleagues once said that Emperor Tito, as portrayed by you, is a grown-up Tamino.

KM: I agree. He’s definitely an older version of Tamino, who is still very young and naive and has a corresponding outlook on life. Tito, on the other hand, has already been through quite a bit, and the conflicts he has to face are nonetheless more than challenging for him. For young singers, the role is correspondingly difficult. Precisely because Tito has had experiences that I haven’t yet had. The character requires nuance and life experience—but that, too, is part of the profession: being able to become someone completely different.

Do you see Tito as a forgiving person, or as a politician for whom even clemenza is a political act?

KM: Both . Tito not only feels deep compassion for the people around him, but he is also a ruler. That’s why a little politics has to be woven into the character as well. But first and foremost, I see him as a deeply emotional person. And since he cares deeply for those entrusted to him, he is doubly devastated by Sesto’s betrayal. The fact that he is capable of forgiveness says something about his humanistic outlook.

Sesto is deeply in love with Vitellia: What kind of love is this? Too much of it? A false love? Toxic?

HEM: Sesto and Vitellia are, of course, the most thrilling couple. But they’re also, of course, incredibly toxic. There’s this deep and utterly unbreakable love on Sesto’s part—he keeps trying again and again. Vitellia, on the other hand, offers almost nothing but orders. I even believe that Vitellia never thinks about feelings. For her, such a thing simply doesn’t exist. She uses every relationship that comes her way to get one step further. That’s exactly the problem! The fact that she sits there and asks herself, “What have I done?”, comes so late that, unfortunately, we don’t get to see it. Her relationship with Tito is quite simple: He’s the emperor and she wants to be the empress—and that’s it!

Will Tito act differently in the future? Are friendship and trust even possible anymore?

KM: I do think those values will still be present in his life. But will it be easy? Certainly not. Tito will no doubt be much more cautious in his future dealings with the people around him. But for the most part, he remains loyal to Clemenza. He is kind, and that shows that he is, first and foremost, a human being and not a politician. A person who has to go through quite a lot.

Le nozze di Figaro is also a political work, but it focuses even more on the personal level. What about La clemenza di Tito? Is it a political work? Or is it merely a backdrop against which private matters are dealt with?

HEM: The levels are intertwined, because the work is both personal and political. We have an emperor who is under immense pressure because a verdict is pending regarding his best friend, who is plotting to kill him. Everyone would expect him to at least send him into exile or even have him killed. This is a political issue, intertwined with an incredibly strong and profound emotional bond. And he has a choice: He can stay alone, or he can surround himself with people who have betrayed him. Which is better? Security and loneliness—or a community that you can’t necessarily trust? Many of us have faced such a decision: I don’t want to give up on someone because I’m used to being close to them, even when all the red warning signs are already flashing.

Katleho Mokhoabane, you were part of the State Opera’s opera studio and are now returning to this theater in a leading role after a year’s absence. How do you feel? Like you’re home? Or is it a different world now?

KM: First and foremost, I feel right at home here: I’ve spent two years here and really appreciate my colleagues as well as the State Opera. But of course, it’s also a bit of a new experience. After all, *Tito* goes far beyond what I last sang on this stage. I’m no longer the very young singer I was back then in the studio.

We began our conversation with Mozart’s music, and now we conclude it with it as well. Behind us lie centuries of tradition and performance practice. How does a young person today approach Mozart? How should Mozart sound?

KM: As light as possible. Personally, I like to stick to what’s in the score, because we know that Mozart was brilliant enough to know exactly what he wanted. In other words: lightness. That’s easier said than done, though. We singers have to work hard to ensure that the final result sounds appropriately light.