A Co-presentation of Lincoln Center Festival
2003 and the Metropolitan Opera
Music
Sergei Prokofiev
Libretto Sergei Prokofiev and Valentin Katayev, based on Katayev’s
novella, I Am a Son of the Working People
Conductor Valery Gergiev
Stage Director Yuri Alexandrov
Set Designer Semyon Pastukh
Costume Designer Galina Solovyeva
Lighting Designer Gleb Filshtinsky
Chorus Master Andrei Petrenko
Vocal coach Irina Sobolieva
Met Titles Sonya Friedman
Cast
Semyon Kotko, a demobilized soldier Victor Lutsiuk
Semyon’s Mother Lyudmila Kanunnikova
Frosia, Semyon’s sister Olga Savova
Remeniuk, Yevgeny Nikitin
Tkachenko, a rich peasant Gennady Bezzubenkov
Khivria, Tkachenk’s wife Olga
Markova-Mikhailenko
Sofia, Tkachenko’s daughter Tatiana Pavlovskaya
Tsaryov,
a sailor Victor Chernomortsev
Lyubka, Tsaryov’s fiancée Irina
Loskutova
Ivasenko, an old man Mikhail
Petrenko
Mikola, Frosia’s sweetheart Yevgeny Akimov
Klembovsky, a workman and former landowner Nikolai
Gassiev
Von Wierhof, a German commander Yori Laptev
German Sergeant Yevgeny Fedotov
German Interpreter Vladimir Zhivopistsev
Bandura Player Mikhail Kit
First Old Man Andrei Khramtsov
Second Old Man Yevgeny Fedotov
First Woman Lyudmila Kasianenko
Second Woman Svetlana Volkava
Third Woman Olga Korzhenskaya
First Anti-Bolshevik Ukrainian Cossack Vladimir Samsonov
Second Anti-Bolshevik Ukrainian Cossack Andrei Karabanov
First Haydamak Vyacheslav Lukhanin
Second Haydamak Victor Vikhrov
Young Man Ilya Bannik
Orchestra and Chorus of the Mariinsky Theatre
World premiere June 23, 1940, Stanislavsky Theatre and Nemirovich-Danchenko
Theatre, Moscow; premiere of this production June 8, 1999, Mariinsky
Theatre, St. Petersburg.
North American premiere July 8, 2003, Metropolitan Opera House, New
York
One of the unexpected stars in this clashingly
powerful opera was its set designer, Semyon Pastukh, who brilliantly
envisioned a vast wasteland littered with wrecked trains, bombed-out
debris, and twisted railroad tracks leading nowhere. In the background,
a mechanical gear wheel and hammer chugged away in almost continual
motion. The equally superb Gleb Filshtinsky had the wonderful inspiration
to light this terrain in an evil, glowing red, underneath the
landscape, transforming it seemingly into molten lava, as if
the earth itself were waiting to erupt and swallow up everyone on stage.
When the title character finally entered, heroically sung by Victor
Lutsiuk, he appeared to be standing on top of a world made of rivulets
of fire. The metaphor here was unmistakable.
The story is complex: three young couples‚ whose lives are torn apart
by warring Russian, German and rebel groups, all of whom are indifferent
to those caught in their path, converge in Semyon Kotko’s small village
and ultimately cause its destruction. In the meantime, we witness
the wedding party of Semyon and Sofia, a scene of brief happiness in
the midst of what is overall a grim chain of events.
Musically, Semyon is as satisfying as anything in Prokofiev’s
canon, and at least one scene is a bona fide classic. Near the
end of Act II, realizing the terror to come, Lyubka (in a star turn
by Irina Loskutova) is overwhelmed and goes mad, staggering backward
along the railroad tracks as a line of soldiers advance upon her. Finally
she is pressed against a wall and there is the suggestion of rape, at
least in this production. During the entire scene, she pours out
her agony using a simple six-note figure that is repeated seemingly
dozens of times (I couldn’t help but think of the ‘invasion’ sequence
in Shostakovich’s Seventh Symphony.) As the tension increases,
this motif grows to an alarming size, resulting in a wrenching climax
that consumes the entire cast and orchestra.
For the nightmarish finale of Act II, when the village is destroyed,
the stage was bathed in a sickly chemical green light, while hordes
of gas-masked soldiers fired smoke guns, barrels glowing red, as enormous
snake-like pipes emerged from a huge pit. When one of the characters
shrieked, ‘What are they doing to us!’ it was almost too painful to
watch, knowing that even more nastiness was to come. Amid a landscape
strewn with dead bodies, the act closed with a long and blazingly loud
climax, for which Gergiev and the orchestra pulled out all the stops.
In some of its more idyllic moments, the score contains some unexpected
charms, such as passages for accordion, and later, the surreal call
of a cuckoo, all vividly done by the Kirov’s superb musicians. Meanwhile,
as in much of Prokofiev, the percussion section works overtime; I never
tire of his ever-present triangle, cymbals and snare drum. The
compelling music combines the composer’s typical machine-like rhythms
and acidic harmonies with the soaring melodic lines similar to his Romeo
and Juliet. Having savored both The Gambler and War
and Peace at the Met, I found this score the most satisfying of
the three, dramatic content aside. And Gergiev made the most of
all of it. There are few conductors at the moment who can match
him in this repertoire when he is inspired, and in this performance
he got some downright savage playing from this great orchestra.
The production was filled with memorable details. At one point,
Lyubka stepped into a small pond for a short swim, her arms gliding
through the water in pleasure. However, the ‘water’ was actually
strips of plastic, stretched loosely across the pond so that they parted
with her body movements. As she stepped onto the shore, wringing
out her dress before carefully smoothing it dry, I thought, this is
the kind of keen attention to stage action that is sometimes missing,
but was always present here.
I absolutely loved Galina Solovyeva’s superb costume designs, which
replicated the persistent, primary reds and greens. These colors
are used seemingly everywhere, including the striking final scene with
the chorus dressed in identical Mao-like gray, all clutching red stars.
The clever staging and choreography here, fully aware of the ironies,
only added to the impact as a bust of Lenin, glowing like a huge amber
light bulb, rose in the middle of the crowd.
With a production this ambitious, it is almost impossible to give it
its full due here. The historical awareness, the magnificent staging,
the incisive orchestral playing, and the agile cast, all driven by the
valiant and energetic Mr. Gergiev, combined to make the best possible
case for one of Prokofiev’s still little-known masterpieces. It
is inconceivable to me that this great score has been sitting around,
waiting to be uncovered. Let’s hope it’s not another fifty years
before it’s produced again.
Bruce Hodges
|
Return to:
Music on the Web