On December 20, 2020 at 17:00 the great Russian opera Ruslan and Lyudmila (concert performance) will be first performed in the Great Hall of the Primorsky Stage of the Mariinsky Theatre. Pavel Smelkov will act as a Music Director and a Conductor at the premiere.
Ruslan and Lyudmila is the second opera by Mikhail Glinka, a founder of the Russian classical music language. The opera is based on Alexander Pushkin’s epic fairy tale of the same name. Ruslan, a brave warrior, and Lyudmila, a daughter of the Prince of Kiev, are a hero and a heroine of the opera. They celebrate their wedding when the celebration is suddenly broken by a mystic disappearance of the bride. Ruslan and two other warriors set out to rescue her.
Ruslan and Lyudmila was premiered at the Bolshoi Theatre in Saint Petersburg in 1842. The opera was initially little appreciated. It succeeded further, but was usually staged in an abridged form, partially because of censorial restrictions. Now Ruslan and Lyudmila is an unquestioned masterpiece of Russian opera. The overture, Chernomor's March and arias of Lyudmila, Ruslan, Farlaf, Gorislava, and Ratmir remain very popular up to now.
At the Primorsky Stage of the Mariinsky Theatre, the full version of Ruslan and Lyudmila will be first sung in concert performance; it will allow the audience to appreciate all the riches of the opera score.
The primary parts will be performed by soloists of the Mariinsky Opera of the Primorsky Stage such as Yevgeny Plekhanov (Ruslan), Maria Suzdaltseva (Lyudmila), Tatiana Makarchuk (Ratmir), Anatoly Badayev (Farlaf), Liliya Kadnikova (Gorislava), Roman Krukovich (Finn), Alexei Smirnov (Bayan), Irina Kolodyazhnaya (Naina), and Sergei Pleshivtsev (Svetozar). The Mariinsky Orchestra of the Primorsky Stage will be under the baton of Pavel Smelkov, a Principal Conductor of the Primorsky Stage.
