Golijov’s Ainadamar: Opera or Musical Pastiche

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The following comments on Ainadamar were written after a visit to the Santa Fe Opera in the summer of 2005.

There must be a running debate in musical circles, particularly with audiences and music critics, as to whether Osvaldo Golijov’s “Ainadamar” is a theatrical musical piece or an opera. The performance on August 14th, 2005 by the Santa Fe Opera, whose refurbished opera house is situated in the stoic, primeval mountains of Northern New Mexico, certainly did not settle the argument.

Ainadamar is based on the life of poet and dramatist, Federico Garcia Lorca and his personal relationship with Spanish actor, Margarita Xirgu who was the writer’s protagonist in a number of his plays. Their relationship began with Lorca’s first critical success, Mariana Pineda, in which Margarita portrayed a 19th Century political martyr who would rather die than reveal the names of her lover and his compatriots in their fight for freedom. The theme of woman as sacrificial lamb was one that Lorca succumbed to throughout his dramatic works.

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Rigoletto in Russian – A Thrilling Discovery

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Giuseppe Verdi, October 9/10, 1813 – January 27, 1901

This performance of Rigoletto by Giuseppe Verdi and a libretto by Francesco Maria Piave was staged by O. Mukhortova at the St. Petersburg Mussorgsky State Academic Opera Theater on May 1st, 2001.

I can still recall with vivid immediacy the visceral excitement I felt just moments after the curtain went up on Giuseppe Verdi’s Rigoletto at the Academic Opera Theater in St. Petersburg. It was on May 21, 2001, to be exact,’ that my eye caught the chorus members ever so gracefully flitting across the stage in perfect harmony with Verdi’s exuberant open ing chords of Act 1, acting out the regal banality that is so much a part of the Duke of Mantua’s courtly affectations. They projected this atti tude with such assurance and aplomb that it immediately stirred my emotions. The pleasure I felt on seeing and hearing the Russians pre sent their unique interpretation of Guiseppe Verdi was based on their skilled acting and their striking vocal rendition.

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Russian ingenuity in L’Elisir d’amore: from stark tragedy to opera buffa

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Gaetano Donizetti, November 29, 1767 – April 8, 1848

This performance of L’Elisir d’amore by Gaetano Donizetti; libretto by Felice Romano was staged by Ludmila Noletova at the Moscow Theater named after Konstantin Stanislavsky and Vladimir Memirovich-Danchenko on May 28, 2001.

To most of today’s opera critics in the Western world, performing an opera in two languages in the same production is suspect, almost subversive. Fortunately for the audience gathered at the Moscow Aca demic Music Theater for Gaetano Donizetti’s L’Elisir d’amore on a May evening in 2001 there were no critical detractors present for this bilingual presentation. On that evening, in that historic theater named after Konstantin Stanislavsky and Vladimir Nemirovich-Danchenko, the audience was allowed to enjoy L’Elisir without any bothersome out bursts of disapproval. The production, bordering on the experimental and slightly daring, was carried off with sufficient panache to do away with any misgivings the audience might have had.

This production of L’Elisir, with its recitatives dashed off in Russ ian and the main arias piquantly rolled out in Italian, was so delightful in its approach and so well thought-out by stage director Ludmila Nale tova, that her approach dovetailed smoothly with Donizetti’s gifted mu sical invention and librettist Felice Romani’s deftly humorous text. It became apparent as the performance progressed that the Russian and Italian text, each in its own way, had sparked a descriptive and colorful interpretation filled with tender diminutives highlighting the good-na tured personalities of the comedy’s two main protagonists – the gawky Nemorino and the saucy Adina.

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