Frank Martin, The Love Potion. 30 Sept., 1, 9 Oct, 2016. Chicago Opera Theater, Music Box Theatre, Chicago, ILThe Chicago Opera Theater, Chicago's innovative, younger, and feistier opera company, is praised (sometimes scorned) for taking risks. Its record may be somewhat spotty, but the 2016-2017 season has opened with a low-key, but poignant, success in its courageous revival of Frank Martin's well-known, but rarely performed opera (oratorio), Le Vin Herbe (not entirely accurately or subtly translated as The Love Potion).Frank Martin, a Swiss composer, came of age musically in his fifties, chronologically in the late 1930s, and composed steadily until his death in 1974, ten days after he stopped work on his last cantata. He died in the Netherlands, where he had lived for many years, and was buried in Geneva. His Swiss passport was helpful for his career, but perhaps less useful for his reputation. He composed peacefully during the war, but was performed somewhat infrequently afterward, suspicions raised by his popularity in Paris under the occupation. Since then suspicions have declined in ferocity and relevance, and he has achieved a secure position in the musical hierarchy, but he is still performed less frequently than he deserves. The COT performance made a strong case for his continuing value.Martin studied with Emile Jacques-Dalcroze (of eurhythmics fame), but later came under the more profound influence of Arnold Schoenberg. Like many composers in the 40s and after, Martin relaxed the rigors of the strict twelve-tone scale and found generous spaces for tonality. His music has a certain Schoenbergian coolness, but that does not disallow moments of beauty and, as Le Vin Herbe proves, moments of heart-breaking poignancy.When, according to the program notes, Martin was asked by Robert Blum to write a half-hour piece for his Madrigal Choir, he turned to Bedier's 'novel,' and chose the chapter, Le Philtre, to set to music. He later decided to add La Foret du Morois and La Mort. The resulting work for a chorus with soloists is usually defined as an oratorio, but, while there is a little action, there is passion and incident, so the urge to perform it is as a drama and call it an opera is entirely understandable. While the chorus of twelve in this production spends much of its time discreetly seated in the chairs at the back of the stage in front of illuminating projections, no harm is done and much clarity and is gained when they get off their chairs and act out the various personae of the drama. …