Mark Steinberg: Reimagining the Myth of Dido

In Virgil’s Aeneid, Dido, queen of Carthage, despairs and ultimately ends her life when her great love, Aeneas, leaves her to fulfill his destiny. A strong, independent leader prior to Aeneas’ arrival, Dido kills herself with Aeneas’ sword.

The myth is musically memorialized in Henry Purcell’s opera, Dido and Aeneas. Considered Purcell’s only true opera, it includes a beautiful aria, Dido’s Lament. It’s a sad story of a woman who — literally — gives it all up for love.

What if it didn’t happen that way? What if Dido did something different?

It’s questions like these that prompted the Brentano Quartet embark on a new project, a work reconsidering the Dido myth. Called Dido Reimagined, the piece is for string quartet and soprano. The Quartet invited composer  Melinda Wagner and librettist Stephanie Fleishmann to reimagine the story of Queen Dido. Award-winning soprano Dawn Upshaw rejoins the Brentano for this newest collaboration.

“This is a more feminist take,” Steinberg says of the monodrama. “Instead of committing suicide after being abandoned, she finds strength in her own way of being.”

The first half of the July 16 performance will set the scene with other English Renaissance and Baroque pieces, including Purcell’s Fantasia No. 5, as well as pieces by John Dowland, Matthew Locke and William Byrd. The first half will conclude with Purcell’s Dido’s Lament.

Performing early music written originally for viols is not new to the Brentano Quartet. “We love the way the instruments intertwine,” Steinberg says of that musical era. In a note he wrote about Dido’s Lament, he describes their interest further: “Gathering works here by composers Henry Purcell, John Dowland, Matthew Locke, Thomas Tomkins, William Byrd and Robert Johnson (who supplied music for Shakespeare’s productions) gives us a chance to shrink the concert hall into a parlor, to invite our audience to be our confidantes. The music combines elements of the public and the private; the listener can eavesdrop on the proceedings, can get drawn into the conversations and collisions, the friendliness and the frictions.”

Dido Reimagined premiered earlier this year after being postponed two years due to COVID-19. Commissioning new works is part of the Quartet’s mission, not only to expand the chamber music repertoire but also because, Steinberg says, collaborating with composers informs their interpretation and understanding of other pieces. “It’s our own education too,” he says. “It informs how we look at music in general.”

Steinberg studied composition when he was younger. “It’s one of the best things that happened to me as a performer,” he says. “The virtues of freshly looking at something no one has played before informs pieces we have already played. It’s like setting new and old music against each other. It’s a conversation between them and sets up listening for the audience in new ways, too.”

Dideo Reimagined will be performed at 8 p.m. on Saturday, July 16 at the Music Shed. Click for tickets and information. 

You can read more about Mark Steinberg and the Brentano Quartet in this 2021 interview with Mark Steinberg.