Anaïs Mitchell’s Hadestown: A Story of Looking Back
April 12th, 2015
Rachel Eisenberg
It’s a traditional story. Boy meets girl. Boy falls in love with girl. Girl dies and is sent to the underworld. Boy uses his musical talents to convince the underworld’s leader to let girl go. Boy looks back, and the girl is lost to the underworld because he doubted. People, as Kurt Vonnegut so elegantly states in Slaughterhouse-Five, aren’t supposed to look back.
But look back Anaïs Mitchell did. Her new album Hadestown was adapted from a stage opera, which toured in Vermont and Boston in 2006. The album that came from the stage is not an exact replica. It doesn’t need to be – translating from the stage into an album is an imprecise science, but one Mitchell manages. Mitchell added guest singers, including Justin Vernon of Bon Iver fame, Ani DiFranco, and Greg Brown. Hadestown revitalizes a 2000-year-old Greek myth, framing it in “post-apocalyptic Depression-era America,” as Mitchell describes the setting, within the bustle of speakeasies and the whispers of mines.
The Orpheus and Eurydice myth begins with Orpheus, a lyre-player, marrying the beauty Eurydice. They live happily before Eurydice is bitten by a snake and dies. Orpheus, wanting to retrieve his love, ventures down into Hades, the Greek underworld. There, he charms Cerberus and draws tears from Persephone. Hades allows Eurydice to leave with Orpheus, provided Orpheus doesn’t look back. He does, and Eurydice fades behind him, lost forever.
The 2010 album was Mitchell’s fourth and strongest effort after the Vermont-based singer-songwriter signed with Ani DiFranco’s label, Righteous Babes Records. The framing of Hadestown allows for Mitchell’s lyrical prowess to shine, and gives a voice to her commentary on social issues. Old as the Orpheus and Eurydice myth may be, it is given new life in Hadestown, where it exists to provide a tale of moral warning. The structure is similar to that of the myth’s, but the details – important ones – differ.
The album opens with Eurydice wondering how Orpheus can provide for her, as they are surrounded by nothing but poverty. But life aboveground isn’t all there is—a walled city, Hadestown, exists underground. Hades, Hadestown’s owner and mayor, hears Eurydice singing, and persuades her to join him in Hadestown. She leaves a goodbye for Orpheus in song, but he isn’t having any of it—he follows Eurydice down to Hadestown.
As Hades reminds his citizens how lucky they are to be in Hadestown, his wife Persephone meets Orpheus in a different side of Hadestown, where she runs her speakeasy. Moved by his plight, she persuades Hades to let Orpheus bring Eurydice back into the light. Orpheus’ songs have moved Hadestown’s population, the Cerberus of this tale, and they move to riot; Hades agrees, on one condition—Orpheus cannot look back to see if Eurydice is following him. While leading Eurydice up, Orpheus has a moment of doubt, and turns, leaving Eurydice to her fate in Hadestown. The album ends with Eurydice and Persephone singing a lament to Orpheus, as they wonder where he has gone.
The moral of the album, according to Mitchell, is that “yes, we’re fucked, but we still have to try with all our might. We have to love hard and make beauty in the face of futility.” It is certainly one that will resonate, given societal ills that seem to be ever-growing. Despite drawing from a myth with an ending that hits like a sucker punch, Hadestown remains a beautiful, optimistic album, where workers can successfully be led to revolt with music and a powerful man can be swayed from his opinions.
The outcome of the album is not favorable to Orpheus, but he still leaves Hadestown with the citizens thinking of him and his lessons – that living under Hades’ rule is not safety, it is oppression. Even though his quest failed, he nevertheless provides hope for the citizens of Hadestown.
Hadestown may not be an album for everyone. The songs draw from several genres—a singing jazz beat, cheery ragtime numbers, a dash of country, and from Mitchell’s roots, enough folk that it would make Pete Seeger proud.
It is the guest stars that truly help Hadestown shine; while Mitchell is a powerful singer in her own right, many will find themselves put off by her high, lilting voice. The guests provide contrast—as Orpheus, Justin Vernon is given a chance to show off his vocal range, ranging from a gravelly baritone to a lovely falsetto. Placed against Mitchell, the two create duets that form the backbone of the album’s story, even if they are only together for two songs—Wedding Song and Doubt Comes In.
DiFranco is another musical guest, lending her voice to Persephone. Her characters dances her way through the opera, working endlessly to provide a medium between Hades’ elitism and the rough-and-tumble world of the workers. Her voice provides a softer line for Greg Brown’s Hades to play against. Brown is one of the real stand outs of the album; his rough gritty bass gives life to Mitchell’s lyrics, and Hades consequently becomes the easiest character to picture, a corrupt boss-CEO figure that comfortably ties in with the listener’s view on his position. Hadestown is a story of an oppressed people rising up against their oppressor, and everyone loves an underdog.
A modern listener can find quite a bit to relate to in the album, despite how long ago Mitchell’s inspiration came from. One of the most powerful songs on the album is Why We Build the Wall, wherein Hades, as described by Hadestown’s website, “indoctrinates his worker-citizens”. The image of the wall, built to keep out “the enemy (the enemy is poverty)” will be undoubtedly one that sticks in the listener’s mind, stirring up memories of political debates. Mitchell said she “really and truly had no specific place in mind” when she wrote the song, but acknowledges listeners will draw their own conclusions.
Hadestown is a strong album, combining genres seemingly effortlessly. Mitchell’s lyrics, Michael Chorney’s score, and all of the musical talent serve to create an album that sucks you into its world – the gray of the workers (Orpheus sing “and a million minds that were just one mind, like stones in a row,” to describe the workers of Hadestown), their longing for freedom, Orpheus’ doomed quest for Eurydice. Despite its hour-long run time, Hadestown flashes by like a train on a track, gunning for its destination.
Anaïs Mitchell looked back, 2000 years back, and found a narrative for the social ills of the present day. I love her for it. Hadestown at its core is about humanity and its will to survive, and that’s something we need in the modern era, when things often look hopeless. The inclusion of modern-day social ills serves to strengthen the album’s message – as long as there is music and self-expression, there is hope for humanity to break free from its chains.