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| | Arts Calendar / October 19 / Opera |
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 Opera in four acts to music by Alexei Verstovsky. Libretto by Mikhail Zagoskin in Maria Fomicheva’s version. Musical version by Ivan Velikanov. Music Director: Ivan Velikanov. Stage Director: Maria Fomicheva. Set Designer: Alyona Glinskaya. The action takes place during the reign of the Kyiv prince Svyatoslav, before the Christianization of Russia. The bank of the Dnieper near Kyiv. A Christian girl Nadezhda, the daughter of the fisherman Alexei, lives in one the huts. She is waiting to meet her lover, the princely youth Vseslav. The Stranger comes to the fishermen. He conceived a conspiracy against Svyatoslav in hope of getting closer to power and now wants to use Vseslav as his tool. The Stranger and Vseslav agreed to meet at midnight at the grave of the ancient Prince Askold. Townspeople gather to celebrate the Feast of the pagan god Uslad. Girls play games and dance round dances.
Boris Pokrovsky Chamber Stage  |
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 Opera in two acts without intermission by Gian Carlo Menotti. Libretto by Gian Carlo Menotti. Artistic director of the production – Dmitry Bertman. Stage-director – Ilya Ilyin. Conductor – Valery Kiryanov. Sung in Russian. Gian Carlo Menotti's opera "The Medium" is director Ilya Ilyin's second turn to the work of the famous composer of the 20th century (the opera The Telephone entered the theater's repertoire in 2018). The plot of "The Medium" was suggested to the composer by life itself. Once, traveling in Europe, Menotti found himself in Salzburg as a guest of a Dutchman, whose wife, a baroness, held spiritualistic s?ances. The composer asked to attend one of them and witnessed the Baroness talking to Dudley, his early deceased daughter. Menotti later recalled, "I was confused because she truly believed in the possibility of meeting her daughter and so could see her, and I did not believe and saw nothing. This incident led me to the idea that faith is constructive and skepticism is destructive." "Menotti has a special attitude to the mystical," says director Ilya Ilyin. - He sees the mystical in man as a search for the divine within himself. In my opinion, there is nothing mystical in the opera "The Medium". It is full of human passions, betrayals, crimes, payback for these crimes, fear, and these human feelings are woven into the musical fabric of the score. It is no coincidence that this opera came at a time when there were historical rifts, gigantic movements of human flows across the planet. It was interesting for me to reflect on the theme - why, in such difficult times, people have an indomitable attraction to mysticism, to the beyond, to abnormal phenomena. They are looking for answers to questions they can't get in life, and then mediums appear next to them". Together with other creators of the play Ilya Ilyin is preparing a real detective with an unusual outcome. There will be several endings - and this is the highlight of the production."
Helikon Opera |
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