KORNGOLD--A RETURN TO ROMANTICISM

Though Romantic opera seemed to reach an apex with Puccini, he was by no means the last of his ilk. Well into this century, such composers as Erich Wolfgang Korngold continued to uphold the traditions of the late 19th-Century Romanticists.

Which brings us to the repertory for opening week of Deutsche Oper’s Music Center engagement: Puccini’s “Tosca” alternating with Korngold’s most popular work for the stage, “Die Tote Stadt” (The Dead City). To George Korngold, the late composer’s son, the pairing makes perfect sense.

Like “Tosca,” “Die Tote Stadt,” first presented in 1920, has “a good story and it touches a lot of people. And, too, the music is accessible,” Korngold points out. (New York City Opera brought its production to Los Angeles 10 years ago.)

Though his father fell in general disfavor after his death in Hollywood almost 30 years ago, the younger Korngold (a Los Angeles resident) believes that the tide is beginning to turn.

“He is coming back more and more,” George Korngold insists. “His name is appearing on more programs. I think there’s a renaissance in progress--there’s been a return to Romanticism.”

The composer’s son, now 56, is active as a record producer, having worked for CBS and RCA on recordings of his father’s music for stage and film. He recently assisted translator Gunta Dreifels in preparing the English supertitles that will be projected during Deutsche Oper’s performances of “Tote Stadt.”

The tale, based on George Rodenbach’s book “The Dead Bruges,” is archetypically romantic. The plot concerns one man’s obsessive longings for his departed wife. So fervent is his passion for her that he worships regularly at a shrine to her. Locks of her long hair form the centerpiece. When a similar-looking woman enters his life, the man pursues her, until she defames the memory of his departed spouse by dancing with the hair of the deceased. The man, predictably, becomes homicidal in his rage.

Here, the composer’s son points out, the book and the opera travel starkly different paths. The former concludes with the man strangling the woman with his wife’s hair. Korngold follows suit, but--because he was “ever the optimist,” as his son points out--”Tote Stadt” ends as the man suddenly awakens from what has only been a bad dream.

“My father felt the murder was too much for the stage,” Korngold says. “The (final) dream idea was his. He always had a fascination with life-versus-death. His finest opera, ‘Das Wunder der Heliane’ (1927), has the same fascination. The message of ‘Tote Stadt’ was clear to him: Don’t mourn the dead. Learn to live one’s own life.”

JOFFREY UNCOVERED?: When the Joffrey Ballet presents its fall season at the Music Center later this month, a burning question will be answered for many dance buffs: Will the Joffrey dance in the buff?

The issue concerns the company’s local premiere of “Untitled,” a work danced here on numerous occasions by its creators, Pilobolus. Two unbelievably tall women in long, Edwardian gowns--and very hairy legs--glide about, finally settling center stage. Slowly, two men who had acted as concealed stilts, emerge from behind the women. The men are stark naked.

Will the Joffrey follow, uh, suit? “It depends on the weather,” Rima Corben, the company’s press representative, replied, with an unstoppable stream of giggles. “We haven’t begun rehearsals yet,” she said, “and I honestly don’t think anyone has made up their minds about this. As a matter of fact, even the Pilobolus people can’t recall whether they originally did it nude or not.”

Audiences viewing the work at Royce Hall performances, when Pilobolus was a frequent visitor to UCLA, had generally shown mild surprise--or no reaction at all. Will the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion crowds act in kind? Stay tuned.

GOODBY BOWL: The Los Angeles Philharmonic’s summer season at Hollywod Bowl concludes with the traditional “Royal Fireworks Music” with accompanying pyrotechnics at weekend pops concerts led by Sir Charles Groves. Pianist Earl Wild will be soloist in a pair of knuckle-busters by Liszt.

On Tuesday, Groves will conduct a program of music by Schubert, Beethoven and Brahms with Silvia Marcovici as soloist in the latter’s Violin Concerto. On Thursday, the program lists orchestral works by William Schuman and Edward Elgar surrounding a solo vehicle for pianist Leon Fleisher: Ravel’s Concerto for the Left Hand. Once again, Groves will conduct.

PEOPLE: Tonight at 6 on KCET Channel 28, flutist James Galway will host the first of 16 weekly programs titled “Music in Time,” a survey of Western music, filmed in Europe and the United States. Among the participants in the first program, “Sounds of Music,” are Carlo Maria Giulini with the Los Angeles Philharmonic and Christopher Hogwood with the Academy of Ancient Music.

Los Angeles pianist David Arden has been selected as one of 12 semi-finalists at the Carnegie Hall International American Music Competition, which will be completed Sept. 29 in New York. Arden, an alumnus of UCLA and piano soloist with American Ballet Theatre from 1981-84, will be vying for a hefty first prize worth $75,000.