On April 23, a staging in concert of the opera ”Ruslan and Lyudmila” will be presented on the main stage of the Bolshoi Theater. The performance promises to hit the headlines of the season, Russian musicologists, scientific consultants of the Bolshoi Theater (GABT) Evgeny Levashev, composer Yuri Poteenko and musicologist Nadezhda Teterina having made a discovery that can hardly be overestimated. Namely, handwritten scores of Mikhail Ivanovich Glinka were found in the Berlin State Library, including the operas "Life for the Tsar" and "Ruslan and Lyudmila", as well as previously unknown works. These documents had been considered lost for a hundred and fifty years.
The musicologists were able to identify at least 2610 pages of authorized (that is, viewed and personally corrected) by Glinka musical manuscripts in Berlin. The motive for conducting source studies was the musicians’ community dissatisfaction with both the pre-revolutionary score of the opera and the existing academic publication.
There was no integral autograph of the opera, since the composer wrote it in a hurry, dictating the score to the copyists. However, several of the composer’s lifetime authorized copies have survived. The "Ruslan and Lyudmila" score discovered in Berlin is an autographed authorized manuscript made by the composer's bondman and music secretary Yakov Netoev, whom Glinka himself taught the techniques of musical recording. Suffering from severe polyarthritis, Glinka often could not write handedly, so he dictated music text to his secretary.
Among the manuscript sets of the opera scores — more or less complete — known up to now, the newly discovered hand-written score is chronologically the latest one (1850 or 1854). And yet, it is the most carefully crafted one and therefore it brighter reveals the author's message.
Especially for the new production, based on the amazing finds, the Bolshoi Theater has purchased authentic wind instruments, as well as an ancient harp and a piano of the time.
The Bolshoi Theater together with the State Institute of Art Studies has also launched an initiative to prepare and publish, on the occasion of the 200th anniversary of Glinka, an academic edition of the "Ruslan and Lyudmila" score and klavier (piano score) meeting the latest requirements. At the end of April 2003, when “Ruslan and Lyudmila” will hit the main stage of the Bolshoi Theater in full, there will be held an exhibition dedicated to this opera.
At present, the final rehearsals are underway on the main stage of Russia, and on the eve of the premiere, the “Utro” correspondent met up with the production conductor and stage director, the chief conductor of the Bolshoi Theater Alexander Vedernikov, to talk about the features of a new reading of the great work.
"Utro": Alexander Alexandrovich, as it has been known, you changed the production team shortly before the premiere. What was the reason?
Alexander Vedernikov: This is due to the aesthetic guidelines modification that occurred while working on the score. And to the new discoveries of musicologists, of course.
The stage action should be based not even on music, but on the general aesthetic approach to the work. It’s one thing to choose a strategy that relies on a traditionally realistic reading, as we used to perceive it based on the Stalin's era productions of “Ruslan and Lyudmila”, in the 60s. By so doing, the entire music substance bears the imprint of that era. But now it has become apparent that the existing printed scores do not directly and accurately reflect the Glinka’s message, or they even frankly distort it. It’s not about the number of bars, nor about the notation variances, it is about the whole approach to the score.
Performing “Ruslan and Lyudmila” according to existing printed documents is like publishing Pushkin's works in adapting original punctuation to today's standards. In opera, it shows up still funny; a familiar example from the Soviet period - Lisa's aria in “The Queen of Spades”: “Where did these tears come from, what are they for, my maiden dreams, you went south". In pre-revolutionary times, the pronoun in this text in Russian declined differently and rhymed...
In connection with the latest discoveries of musicologists in the field of Glinka's heritage, a similar approach — authenticity — can be reproduced in music. However, it is worth making a reservation: not in the stage part of the play, because a good few of what we do trying to reconstruct such a masterpiece, would be a typical modern replica.
On the other hand, the spectators are already used to some traditional aesthetics. Note that the problem of reconstruction of the historical theater of the XVIII–XIX centuries in the field of directing, in my opinion, has not even been brought up. Genuine historicism is impossible, if only because of the lack of information: after all, there was no video or phonogram, and in general very little material remained. Therefore, we do not have such a task: to fully reconstruct the Glinka times. Our approach to the music of the great composer implies somewhat coveted tinge of archaism. The use of authentic instruments, etc. should be combined with a fairly modern approach to directing and stagecraft. It does not coincide at all with the one of yesterday, especially of the Stalinist Empire style era. Therefore, we realized that we were getting into a situation of some stylistic "Volapuk" and decided to abandon the traditional large theatrical production.
"U": And what is this approach?
A.V.: We proceeded from the fact that Pushkin's fairy tale itself, along with the opera, is too well known still at school, so by choosing a straightforward form of presentation, we will not say anything new. Everyone will be concerned about a purely scientific aspect in connection with new research, that is, about a certain musical historicity.
Then we decided that the minimal direction would illustrate the musical patterns and the Glinka’s message, and not the plot. Therefore, this is called concert-stage performance, although in terms of the volume of the artistic means that are involved (scenery, light, costumes, etc.), it amounts to a full-fledged production.
In addition, all researchers note that Glinka's operas are sufficiently oratorial. Unlike the chronologically closest opera, “Rusalka” by Dargomyzhsky, where a domestic drama is played out, Glinka always represents an epic. And it is much like some kind of statics, because the problems carried out by the epic are so global that they leave no room for a banal "relatability".
One more thing: for Glinka, words were of secondary importance, he first wrote music, and then commissioned "a certain amount of text", such-and-such species of time, and all the librettists hammered away at the task. In any case, the primacy of the Glinka's musical idea in relation to the verbal one is indisputable.
I think that starting to embody his opera on stage, this approach is logical.
"U": Were you prompted by the Berlin finding of Professor Levashov, or even without this were you going to resume “Ruslan and Lyudmila”?
A.V.: The creative search was inspired by the Bolshoi Theater, and when a series of these findings appeared, I felt myself sure of ground. Looking over the printed editions of the score, I always felt something was wrong there. But I did not understand what it was the matter.
"U": Are the findings significant for you as a conductor?
A.V.: It depends on the views the conductor has. There are two types of artists: some express themselves in the work, while others try to dissolve themselves in it. I belong to the second type. Therefore, all the details that make it possible for me to penetrate the author's message, and not just fantasize about some given topics, are very important for me. It's pretty hard for me to talk about it because it's a pretty specific area, but making an analogy... Imagine: You're reading a transcript of Sumerian cuneiform tablets. You’ve got them in translation into Russian. At the same time, you know that Sumerian and Russian languages are so different that many concepts do not match. So you will only have the most general idea of the subject. Or else you get a dictionary that explains all the discrepancies in detail. And suddenly you understand every little thing and, it turns out the text has a different meaning...
The same is true for the recent findings of Glinka's authorized scores: many things become clear, meanings change, completely new tones appear.
"U": Some authentic instruments were purchased especially for this production. Will the spectators somehow feel this, or are these delights only accessible to specialists?
A.V.: All kinds of musical details are important. I will resort again to some examples. In the "Poem of Ecstasy" by Scriabin an organ sounds. It appears in the ending when the entire orchestra plays fortissimo, and this instrument is practically not heard. But if the organ was not there, the whole impression would change. Something would be missed. An ordinary listener may not formulate, what is this about. There are such keys in the instrument that produce almost infrasonic vibrations, and it effects somewhat on the subconscious of the listener.
In the same way, a person who does not understand the sound of ancient instruments may not observe what exactly has changed. But he/she will feel it at the level of the whole orchestra flow of sound.
"U": So what is the difference between ancient instruments and modern ones in this regard? By the way, do they sound all the time?
A.V.: Until the middle of the 19th century, wind instruments were fanfare rather than melodic. While Glinka, according to the memoirs of contemporaries, did not like new inventions. Trumpets, horns and trombones of the time lacking of lowering works, they could not extract the whole range of sounds, as is the case now. But this was their originality.
Yes, in “Ruslan and Lyudmila” ancient winds sound all the time. Here you need a special virtuosity of performance. When it comes to the harp and piano, they sound to represent the gusli. The glass harmonica sounds only once. Glinka had a special flair – he introduced that kind of instruments just where such a special emphasis was expected. Afterwards, everything was lost.
No one can know today if he/she authenticity performs one or another old piece. Any musical performance is a desire for an ideal, so it is always somewhat imperfect. We try to get closer to style. One can only observe movement in a certain direction, as we are doing.
"U": A return to origins, is it so important? Maybe it was just worth modernizing “Ruslan and Lyudmila”?
A.V.: But how can you bring the opera of the mid-nineteenth century to modernity, unless by scenic means like dressing everyone in transparent overalls and so on? There is only one way: to make a musical theater out of this. That said, as in McDonald's, in fact, there is no authentic food, so French cuisine should exist, high art should flourish as well, despite only so many connoisseurs.
That said, in no case should we equate the Bolshoi Theater to the 50s-60s or to Stalin's time. It's apparent why one single era was made the center of attraction — it was the beginning of the Iron Curtain collapse, the world found out that "the Russian ballet was ahead of the curve". It is a pity that this period of all others is associated with the heyday, and not the 30s, when Eisenstein staged Wagner's operas in Russia, or earlier, when Rachmaninoff directed the Bolshoi Theater. Being concerned about the development of opera as a genre (because it is quite problematic), I believe that looking back at the Soviet era would transform the repertoire of the Bolshoi Theater into a collection of beautiful sepulchres.
This applies not only to productions, but also to musical aesthetics, which today is not perceived at all. Back then, there was a trend for a very pompous, so-called "big style": exaggerated theatricality, emphasis on the external, not internal content of pieces, obvious social attitudes, total simplification, disregard for genuine texts, in short — forgery and bad taste; well there, a horse on stage in “Boris Godunov”...
"U": Is there enough audience today to fill the hall at a kind of experimental performance when dealing with the Glinka's opera?
A.V.: Of course, those kinds of people exist — both realistically and potentially. After all, someone is scared away by the classic opera performances in the Bolshoi Theater, because many people think that all of the above lasts. It’s a matter of our communication with the spectators.
I believe that the Bolshoi Theater still invigorates the development of opera, not only following the scientists’ researches, but also commissioning new operas. Meanwhile, performing practice requires a new impetus, because the legacy of Russian composers is in an appalling condition. So to prepare all the conditions for such a breakthrough is part of our mission, which is needed by both the audience and the performers themselves. Although it brings neither fame nor money.
"U": Will opera be absorbed by mass market production — musical theatre and cabaret?
A.V.: We are largely on our own, and depending on the policy of the state in the field of education. Surely, the government supports the Bolshoi Theater, but we need to think broader, to think the future. For now, I do not see the statesmen having a strategic view of what our society will look like. There is no point to figure that something special is happening in our country in the field of classical art - everything is in line with world trends. Technology, the "digital", all that computer virtual reality still owns the minds.
Someday — and perhaps very soon — the people will get surfeited and they will begin coming back to the analog sound, to an "analog art..."
Source
The musicologists were able to identify at least 2610 pages of authorized (that is, viewed and personally corrected) by Glinka musical manuscripts in Berlin. The motive for conducting source studies was the musicians’ community dissatisfaction with both the pre-revolutionary score of the opera and the existing academic publication.
There was no integral autograph of the opera, since the composer wrote it in a hurry, dictating the score to the copyists. However, several of the composer’s lifetime authorized copies have survived. The "Ruslan and Lyudmila" score discovered in Berlin is an autographed authorized manuscript made by the composer's bondman and music secretary Yakov Netoev, whom Glinka himself taught the techniques of musical recording. Suffering from severe polyarthritis, Glinka often could not write handedly, so he dictated music text to his secretary.
Among the manuscript sets of the opera scores — more or less complete — known up to now, the newly discovered hand-written score is chronologically the latest one (1850 or 1854). And yet, it is the most carefully crafted one and therefore it brighter reveals the author's message.
Especially for the new production, based on the amazing finds, the Bolshoi Theater has purchased authentic wind instruments, as well as an ancient harp and a piano of the time.
The Bolshoi Theater together with the State Institute of Art Studies has also launched an initiative to prepare and publish, on the occasion of the 200th anniversary of Glinka, an academic edition of the "Ruslan and Lyudmila" score and klavier (piano score) meeting the latest requirements. At the end of April 2003, when “Ruslan and Lyudmila” will hit the main stage of the Bolshoi Theater in full, there will be held an exhibition dedicated to this opera.
At present, the final rehearsals are underway on the main stage of Russia, and on the eve of the premiere, the “Utro” correspondent met up with the production conductor and stage director, the chief conductor of the Bolshoi Theater Alexander Vedernikov, to talk about the features of a new reading of the great work.
"Utro": Alexander Alexandrovich, as it has been known, you changed the production team shortly before the premiere. What was the reason?
Alexander Vedernikov: This is due to the aesthetic guidelines modification that occurred while working on the score. And to the new discoveries of musicologists, of course.
The stage action should be based not even on music, but on the general aesthetic approach to the work. It’s one thing to choose a strategy that relies on a traditionally realistic reading, as we used to perceive it based on the Stalin's era productions of “Ruslan and Lyudmila”, in the 60s. By so doing, the entire music substance bears the imprint of that era. But now it has become apparent that the existing printed scores do not directly and accurately reflect the Glinka’s message, or they even frankly distort it. It’s not about the number of bars, nor about the notation variances, it is about the whole approach to the score.
Performing “Ruslan and Lyudmila” according to existing printed documents is like publishing Pushkin's works in adapting original punctuation to today's standards. In opera, it shows up still funny; a familiar example from the Soviet period - Lisa's aria in “The Queen of Spades”: “Where did these tears come from, what are they for, my maiden dreams, you went south". In pre-revolutionary times, the pronoun in this text in Russian declined differently and rhymed...
In connection with the latest discoveries of musicologists in the field of Glinka's heritage, a similar approach — authenticity — can be reproduced in music. However, it is worth making a reservation: not in the stage part of the play, because a good few of what we do trying to reconstruct such a masterpiece, would be a typical modern replica.
On the other hand, the spectators are already used to some traditional aesthetics. Note that the problem of reconstruction of the historical theater of the XVIII–XIX centuries in the field of directing, in my opinion, has not even been brought up. Genuine historicism is impossible, if only because of the lack of information: after all, there was no video or phonogram, and in general very little material remained. Therefore, we do not have such a task: to fully reconstruct the Glinka times. Our approach to the music of the great composer implies somewhat coveted tinge of archaism. The use of authentic instruments, etc. should be combined with a fairly modern approach to directing and stagecraft. It does not coincide at all with the one of yesterday, especially of the Stalinist Empire style era. Therefore, we realized that we were getting into a situation of some stylistic "Volapuk" and decided to abandon the traditional large theatrical production.
"U": And what is this approach?
A.V.: We proceeded from the fact that Pushkin's fairy tale itself, along with the opera, is too well known still at school, so by choosing a straightforward form of presentation, we will not say anything new. Everyone will be concerned about a purely scientific aspect in connection with new research, that is, about a certain musical historicity.
Then we decided that the minimal direction would illustrate the musical patterns and the Glinka’s message, and not the plot. Therefore, this is called concert-stage performance, although in terms of the volume of the artistic means that are involved (scenery, light, costumes, etc.), it amounts to a full-fledged production.
In addition, all researchers note that Glinka's operas are sufficiently oratorial. Unlike the chronologically closest opera, “Rusalka” by Dargomyzhsky, where a domestic drama is played out, Glinka always represents an epic. And it is much like some kind of statics, because the problems carried out by the epic are so global that they leave no room for a banal "relatability".
One more thing: for Glinka, words were of secondary importance, he first wrote music, and then commissioned "a certain amount of text", such-and-such species of time, and all the librettists hammered away at the task. In any case, the primacy of the Glinka's musical idea in relation to the verbal one is indisputable.
I think that starting to embody his opera on stage, this approach is logical.
"U": Were you prompted by the Berlin finding of Professor Levashov, or even without this were you going to resume “Ruslan and Lyudmila”?
A.V.: The creative search was inspired by the Bolshoi Theater, and when a series of these findings appeared, I felt myself sure of ground. Looking over the printed editions of the score, I always felt something was wrong there. But I did not understand what it was the matter.
"U": Are the findings significant for you as a conductor?
A.V.: It depends on the views the conductor has. There are two types of artists: some express themselves in the work, while others try to dissolve themselves in it. I belong to the second type. Therefore, all the details that make it possible for me to penetrate the author's message, and not just fantasize about some given topics, are very important for me. It's pretty hard for me to talk about it because it's a pretty specific area, but making an analogy... Imagine: You're reading a transcript of Sumerian cuneiform tablets. You’ve got them in translation into Russian. At the same time, you know that Sumerian and Russian languages are so different that many concepts do not match. So you will only have the most general idea of the subject. Or else you get a dictionary that explains all the discrepancies in detail. And suddenly you understand every little thing and, it turns out the text has a different meaning...
The same is true for the recent findings of Glinka's authorized scores: many things become clear, meanings change, completely new tones appear.
"U": Some authentic instruments were purchased especially for this production. Will the spectators somehow feel this, or are these delights only accessible to specialists?
A.V.: All kinds of musical details are important. I will resort again to some examples. In the "Poem of Ecstasy" by Scriabin an organ sounds. It appears in the ending when the entire orchestra plays fortissimo, and this instrument is practically not heard. But if the organ was not there, the whole impression would change. Something would be missed. An ordinary listener may not formulate, what is this about. There are such keys in the instrument that produce almost infrasonic vibrations, and it effects somewhat on the subconscious of the listener.
In the same way, a person who does not understand the sound of ancient instruments may not observe what exactly has changed. But he/she will feel it at the level of the whole orchestra flow of sound.
"U": So what is the difference between ancient instruments and modern ones in this regard? By the way, do they sound all the time?
A.V.: Until the middle of the 19th century, wind instruments were fanfare rather than melodic. While Glinka, according to the memoirs of contemporaries, did not like new inventions. Trumpets, horns and trombones of the time lacking of lowering works, they could not extract the whole range of sounds, as is the case now. But this was their originality.
Yes, in “Ruslan and Lyudmila” ancient winds sound all the time. Here you need a special virtuosity of performance. When it comes to the harp and piano, they sound to represent the gusli. The glass harmonica sounds only once. Glinka had a special flair – he introduced that kind of instruments just where such a special emphasis was expected. Afterwards, everything was lost.
No one can know today if he/she authenticity performs one or another old piece. Any musical performance is a desire for an ideal, so it is always somewhat imperfect. We try to get closer to style. One can only observe movement in a certain direction, as we are doing.
"U": A return to origins, is it so important? Maybe it was just worth modernizing “Ruslan and Lyudmila”?
A.V.: But how can you bring the opera of the mid-nineteenth century to modernity, unless by scenic means like dressing everyone in transparent overalls and so on? There is only one way: to make a musical theater out of this. That said, as in McDonald's, in fact, there is no authentic food, so French cuisine should exist, high art should flourish as well, despite only so many connoisseurs.
That said, in no case should we equate the Bolshoi Theater to the 50s-60s or to Stalin's time. It's apparent why one single era was made the center of attraction — it was the beginning of the Iron Curtain collapse, the world found out that "the Russian ballet was ahead of the curve". It is a pity that this period of all others is associated with the heyday, and not the 30s, when Eisenstein staged Wagner's operas in Russia, or earlier, when Rachmaninoff directed the Bolshoi Theater. Being concerned about the development of opera as a genre (because it is quite problematic), I believe that looking back at the Soviet era would transform the repertoire of the Bolshoi Theater into a collection of beautiful sepulchres.
This applies not only to productions, but also to musical aesthetics, which today is not perceived at all. Back then, there was a trend for a very pompous, so-called "big style": exaggerated theatricality, emphasis on the external, not internal content of pieces, obvious social attitudes, total simplification, disregard for genuine texts, in short — forgery and bad taste; well there, a horse on stage in “Boris Godunov”...
"U": Is there enough audience today to fill the hall at a kind of experimental performance when dealing with the Glinka's opera?
A.V.: Of course, those kinds of people exist — both realistically and potentially. After all, someone is scared away by the classic opera performances in the Bolshoi Theater, because many people think that all of the above lasts. It’s a matter of our communication with the spectators.
I believe that the Bolshoi Theater still invigorates the development of opera, not only following the scientists’ researches, but also commissioning new operas. Meanwhile, performing practice requires a new impetus, because the legacy of Russian composers is in an appalling condition. So to prepare all the conditions for such a breakthrough is part of our mission, which is needed by both the audience and the performers themselves. Although it brings neither fame nor money.
"U": Will opera be absorbed by mass market production — musical theatre and cabaret?
A.V.: We are largely on our own, and depending on the policy of the state in the field of education. Surely, the government supports the Bolshoi Theater, but we need to think broader, to think the future. For now, I do not see the statesmen having a strategic view of what our society will look like. There is no point to figure that something special is happening in our country in the field of classical art - everything is in line with world trends. Technology, the "digital", all that computer virtual reality still owns the minds.
Someday — and perhaps very soon — the people will get surfeited and they will begin coming back to the analog sound, to an "analog art..."
Source
Igor KAMIROV,
Belcanto.ru, April 11, 2003
Belcanto.ru, April 11, 2003
Getting back to analog art
