The Charity Fund of Rietumu Bank is arranging the event in cooperation with Art Forte Company and Mariinsky Theatre (St. Petersburg).
The Enchanted Wanderer broadcast, which Mariinsky Theatre’s actors are taking part in, will be performed during the Mariinsky Theatre’s guest performance in the National Opera.
The performance in Riga will become the European opening night of
The Enchanted Wanderer with support from the Ministry of Culture of the Russian Federation, the State Culture Capital Foundation of Latvia, „Riga 2014” foundation, Riga City Council and URALCHEM Company.
The open show for Latvian spectators of one of the latest operas of Russian composer Shchedrin will take place on a big screen placed in front of the opera theatre’s new hall in the park near the city channel. About 400 chairs will be set up in the open air and everyone will be able to enjoy the music performance starring the actors of the famous theatre. Leading actors are Kristina Kapustinskaya, Sergey Aleksashkin, Andrey Popov. Valery Gergiev is a director.
Rietumu Charity Fund president Inga Shina notes: “In our modern world opera is not an elite kind of art anymore, which interests mainly melomaniacs and upper classes. Interest in this genre is great in Latvia and is constantly growing, even more in the musicals starring actors of the best European and world’s theatres, which Mariinsky Theatre without doubt refers to. We are really glad that we have a chance to organise such a demonstration so unique for Riga, which, I am sure, will become one of the bright colours on the wonderful cultural palette of the Latvian capital this summer”.
The Mariinsky Theatre tour in Riga is part of the programme “Riga 2014 – the European capital of culture” and is one of the most important events on the concert event guide this year.
“Organising the opera theatre tour is a major and difficult process, which demands well-coordinated work between many people from different countries. But all of these efforts are rewarded when the project is released at the appropriately high level. This time we tried to widen our theatre and present a gift meeting with art to as many opera amateurs as we could” – says Art Forte Company’s director Juliya Lochmele.
The Enchanted Wanderer opera’s free broadcast begins on Thursday, 17 July, at 19:00. Admission is free of charge.
The opera, based on the story The Enchanted Wanderer by Nikolay Leskov, was composed by Rodion Shchedrin on the orders of the American director Lorin Maazel, and is devoted to him. On 19 October, 2002 the New York philharmonic orchestra premiered the concert opera under the direction of Maazel in the Avery Fisher Concert Hall in New York. The Enchanted Wanderer was first performed in Russia in 2007 in the recently opened Mariinsky Theatre Concert Hall on the initiative of Valery Gergiev. A year later, a stage version by stage director Aleksey Stepanyuk and art director Aleksandr Orlov was premiered. The Mariinsky Theatre performance was rewarded with the National Prize “Golden Mask” (best actress – Kristina Kapustinskaya, best composer – Rodion Shchedrin) and is still shown in St. Petersburg. Eleonora Gailisha Mass Media and Public Relations
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