Bolshoi Opera Performs in Concert Rimsky-Korsakov's The Tsar's Bride

Yesterday afternoon at Avery Fisher Hall, while the rest of NYC watched the World Cup finals, the Bolshoi Opera performed in concert The Tsar's Bride by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov as part of this summer's Lincoln Center Festival.  Though I prefer to see opera fully staged, I went knowing this would be a rare opportunity to hear a legendary company perform a work by one of the most influential of late nineteenth century Russian composers.

Rimsky-Korsakov is known in the West today primarily as the composer of the lovely tone poem Scheherazade.  But this was only one work in a long career marked by associations with composers known as The Five (which group also included Modest Mussorgsky and Alexander Borodin) and later The Belyayev Circle (which group also included Alexander Glazunov), both of which strongly stressed the importance of nationalism in Russian music.  The primary difference between the two groups was the latter's willingness to adopt Western musical styles to achieve its aims.  This was largely due to the influence of Tchaikovsky who had long served as mentor to Rimsky-Korsakov and with whom he maintained even closer ties from 1887 onward.  As a result of these relationships, Rimsky-Korsakov was at the very center of the Russian musical tradition as it emerged into the twentieth century, and he exerted an enormous influence on such seminal figures as Stravinsky and Rachmaninoff.  In fact, when Rachmaninoff fled Russia at the onset of the Revolution, the only score he took with him was that of The Golden Cockerel.

Though the plot of The Tsar's Bride, based on a play by Lev Mey, was pure melodrama - complete with poisons, love potions, sexual blackmail and even a forced marriage to Ivan the Terrible - the opera itself was utterly compelling if only for the masterful score.  It held the sold out audience on the edge of their seats throughout its four movements (some three hours in length, not including two intermissions).

The elaborate production was superb.  It was led by Gennadi Rozhdestvensky who made his debut with the Bolshoi Theater in 1951 when he conducted Tchaikovsky's The Sleeping Beauty.  Himself  the son of a noted conductor and now aged 83, Rozhdestvensky has lost none of his skill at the podium.  That he remains a stalwart of the Russian musical scene can be seen from the great number of compositions dedicated to him over the years.  The ubiquitous Alfred Schnittke wrote:

"I once calculated that there are now some forty compositions written for Rozhdestvensky—either derived from his ideas or else he was the first to conduct them. I could not believe it, but it really is so. I could even say that nearly all my own work as a composer depended on contact with him and on the many talks we had. It was in these talks that I conceived the idea for many of my compositions. I count that as one of the luckiest circumstances of my life."

The Bolshoi orchestra showed itself in performance fully the equal of other great international ensembles and together with the chorus provided magnificent support for the singers.  Of these, Uliana Alexyuk, who only made her Bolshoi debut in 2010, was excellent as Marfa as was baritone Alexander Kasyanov in the pivotal role of Grigory.  Svetlana Shilova as Lyubasha also deserves credit for her affecting a cappella singing at the party scene in the first act.