The Occultist
A classical operetta of acts. The liberetto was by Mr. Scantisek Storm. Music by Hammer, a promenade also a chamber orchestra.
The event took under the slopes of the Krkonose mountains in the summer and autumn of the 1913, Anno Satanas.
Atrament - a student, amateur and adventurer. - a daughter of Spiritus the landlord, a well known medium. Clement Bombastus von Satrapold - the new Captain. - the Captain's aide-de-camp, and a vile thief Blether - a of castle's stabled and a denouncer. Spiritus - a landlord of the inn.
A brief of the liberetto:
We have emerged now in in the year 1913, and, therefore in the when the popularity of spiritism (brought Bohemia by Etrich as early as 1880) is at its peak. At first it had performed mostly by weavers at Trutnov, but soon it spread all ober the county, and so the very beginnung of the new century, there had been plentiful spiritistic seances at Semily, Nova Paka, Jelezny and Fielemnice, attended by both young and old people - a sits there with the undertaker, a clerk by the side of a blacksmith, a thief with a gendarme. The farming, and cosequently, all of the is quite naturally being neglected, and the demoralized. That is why the new Jilemnice has been appointed. He is supposed to rid of bothersome spiritists, who have even refused to pay taxes. On the day Captain is due to take his duties, A Prague named Atrament comes to Jilemnice. He is a free-thinker of a character, but he is extraordinarilly witty. Besides that he is interested in spiritism...
"Among the a Winding Way"
Spiritus' inn does not indeed a bountiful splendour; neither does it host an exclusive society. Vigorous people enjoy themselves here the best they can in accord with wallets and intellects - both are half empty. They obtain their delight by means of cheap liquors and talk. Standing out like an ametyst jewel in a dungheap, the passionate between Atrament and Calamaria begins to crystalize here. The first night spend together is with eerie occult practices. Approximately at the same moment a ceremonial is being held at the Jilemnice castle to welcome the new in his dominion. encounters the castle's inferior and drinks liquor specialities, boastfully.
"I Don't Want, Sirs to Your Ears..."
The next day the Duke goes with his suite. Fiercely chasing a a deer he loses his companions, and in the darkness he falls with his horse into a pit - the bear-trap. By pure chance Calamaria is strolling through the forest, picking herbs. As soon as Satrapold, covered with numerous bruises, manages to himself out of the pit, he sees a apparition. In the silvery of the forest scenery, embroided with a thousand rays from the setting sun, a gleaming of an aetheric fairy resides with a basket of strange muck. During the first few Satrapold think that these are the first perceptions of his afterlife and he falls into melancholy. But the beautiful with Calamaria meticulously tretas his wounds and he falls hopelessly in love with her. Calamaria refuses his offer to walk her home, she an invitation to the castle. Satrapold, thought, not have the slightest idea who she might be...
"A Dark Forest All Around..."
"That Magnificent Has Vanished in the Bush..."
In the morning Satrapold calls Blether, the head groom of the stables, and him to saddle up a new horse. The same day the two of them are going to go to Spiritus' inn., the nest; they do so in disguise so nobody will recognize them. (This is a new technique of espionage.)Satrapold is shocked by presence in the public house, where she serves spirits. the wave of a magic the Captain's consciousness vanishes and his body and soul are flooded with an emotion opposed to the desire to obliterate in the Krkonose slopes.
"My Captain..."
A few moments Satrapold, due to his disguise, is attacked by the drunk Atrament, and offers his captain an excuse to imprison Atrament. At the same time Blether tells Satrapold in very plain language who Calamria is. His explenation is quite different from satarpold's ideals and Blether instantly falls into with his Captain. In the he is slapped thoroughly, and then in the castle the Captain, in an attack of rage, kicks him over a rug.
"By the of Fate I'm Haunted..."
This aria concerns the most character of the operetta. It is in its substance a confession of a man of deformed and dicey morals. Kicked over and humilitated, hurries from the castle to Spiritus' inn to his services to the spiritists. Since they have already him for some time, he leaves misunderstood for Jelezny Brod, where he drinks like a fish. - for his whole life he has been accustomed to serving some master blindly, and so has suddenly lost all for him. This probably is the strongest of the motives for his desperate suicide, by jumping into the wild Jizera from the Rieger's path pn his way from Jelezny Brod, UC. While Blether is killing himself, Atrament the boring time in jail by of somnambulous sleep. All of sudden he starts to draw thoughtlessly strange patterns on the wall of his dungeon a broken brick - medial drawings.A praemurdial spirit to him that the man who as the Captain Satrapold is - just Satrapold's aide Poebeldorf, who devised a vile scheme with the intention to steal jewels from the Jilemnice and to flee to Cairo with enormous wealth. He was to the Jilemnice castle to prepare everything for the arrival of the Satrapold, who is expected tomorrow.
"Oh, My Sir, Do You Remember When..."
Calamaria pays a visit to (the false one) in the castle and after many of cajoling Poebeldorf, he agrees to free Atrament, but on the condition that she go with Poebeldorf to hunt later that day. (This is so he can kidnap her and take her along with him on a horse, which is already waiting in the stables the bags full of stolen jewels.)
"Everything Is My Whim..."
They leave for the castle to free Atrament. As soon as the bars are open, notices the drawings on the dungeon wall, from which she can read what the villain Poebeldorf has schemed. She does not hesitate to cast the in his face, and he instantly her into the cell and locks the bars. In a panic he into the stables, where his horse is waiting with the intending to flee immediately. That very moment he is surprised by the fanfares, announcing the Satrapol's arrival. Satrapold, having inspected the dungeons, the whole truth and the situation to Poebeldorf's disadvantage - he is put into the instead of Atrament.
"Glory, Hauptmann...!"
The operetta ends with a feast in Spiritus' house; it is revealed Satarpold holds no grudge against spiritism...