I. RENARD
ballet
Music by Igor Stravinsky
libretto by the composer after Russian folk tales from the collection of Alexander Afanasiev
Musical Director: Valery Gergiev
Director and Choreographer: Maxim Petrov
Set Designer: Alyona Pikalova
Costume Designer: Uldus Bakhtiozina
Lighting Designer: Konstantin Binkin
Video Designer: Sergey Rylko
Animated characters designed by Yulia Gilchenok
Musical Preparation: Larisa Gergieva
Performers:
Alexei Atamanov
Maxim Izmestiev
Artyom Kellerman
Andrei Lagunenko
Viktor Litvinenko
Aaron Osawa-Horowitz
Dmitry Pykhachov
Yaroslav Ryzhov
Vasily Shcherbakov
Erwin Zagidullin
Maxim Zenin
Tenor I: Alexander Timchenko
Tenor II: Alexander Trofimov
Bass I: Andrei Serov
Bass II: Yuri Vlasov
II. LES CINQ DOIGTS
eight very easy pieces using five notes for piano
Music by Igor Stravinsky
musical intermission
Performed by Lyudmila Sveshnikova (piano)
III. MAVRA
opera
Music by Igor Stravinsky
libretto by Boris Kochno after the poem The Little House in Kolomna by Alexander Pushkin
accompanied by supertitles in Russian and in English
Musical Director: Valery Gergiev
Director and Choreographer: Maxim Petrov
Set Designer: Alyona Pikalova
Costume Designer: Uldus Bakhtiozina
Lighting Designer: Konstantin Binkin
Musical Preparation: Natalia Mordashova
The Hussar: Yevgeny Akimov
The Mother: Anna Kiknadze
Parasha: Irina Churilova
The Neighbour: Ekaterina Krapivina
IV. THE FAIRY'S KISS
ballet
Music by Igor Stravinsky
libretto by the composer after fairy-tales by Hans Christian
Musical Director: Valery Gergiev
Choreographer: Maxim Petrov
Set Designer: Alyona Pikalova
Costume Designer: Uldus Bakhtiozina
Lighting Designer: Konstantin Binkin
Musical Preparation: Lyudmila Sveshnikova
Performers:
The Youth: Alexander Sergeev
First Fairy: Maria Bulanova
Second Fairy: Tatiana Tkachenko
Third Fairy: Nadezhda Batoeva
Fourth Fairy: Soslan Kulaev
The Bride: Renata Shakirova
Youths: Nail Yenikeyev, Artyom Kellerman
The Mariinsky Orchestra
Conductor: Ivan Stolbov
The three works by Igor Stravinsky in this programme represent three genres.
Renard is an “histoire burlesque chantée et joée”. Even by fairytale standards, the plot is banal (a vixen abducts a cockerel and other animals save him) and, in general, has little meaning: the voices of the four singers are not determined by the characters. Line by line and word by word, when compiling the libretto from Russian folk tales Stravinsky was interested, first and foremost, in the phonetics and the rhythm of the text. Today, this text reminds us most of Daniil Kharms and Alexander Vvedensky, while the tempo and energy of the musical presentation invokes rap.
Mavra is an opera based on Pushkin’s the Little House in Kolomna, a bridge between Russia and Europe: the score is indeed dedicated to the memory of Alexander Pushkin, Mikhail Glinka and Pyotr Tchaikovsky, the three leading pro-western men in 19th century Russian art. Voices from a past that is beautiful – with urban romances, gypsy songs and Italian opera in a Russian format – sound like listening to an old record. (Stravinsky had actually found the sliding musical intonations so typical of Mavra in gramophone recordings, still very imperfect in the 1920s.) One hears voices of St Petersburg’s Kolomna district where Stravinsky grew up: the church bells of the St Nicholas Naval Cathedral and the marches of the army brass bands that were based in New Holland.
Le Baiser de la fée is a ballet. Stravinsky took pieces by Tchaikovsky to work on and dedicated the score to him. One may discern a dozen direct citations from piano miniatures and romances, though more frequently the listener will be perturbed vaguely familiar intonations: Le Baiser de la fée is reminiscent of a “toothy” neural work, and all of Tchaikovsky’s music flows through it. As the basis of the plot, Andersen’s “Ice-Maiden” is listed in purely nominal terms – the ballet’s true plot in actual fact comprises the adventures of a great Russian classic in the future. the journey travelled by the audience is one from “A lullaby into a storm”, instigated in the very first bars, to “A lullaby in the land of eternity” (the title of the epilogue), from a comprehensible and highly structured life to the emptiness of the vast stage of the Mariinsky-II. Bogdan Korolyok
Premiere of Renard staged by Bronislava Nijinska: 18 May 1922, The Ballets Russes of Sergei Diaghilev, Paris
Premiere of Mavra: 3 June 1922, The Ballets Russes of Sergei Diaghilev, Paris
Premiere of The Fairy's Kiss (under the title Le Baiser de la fée) staged by Bronislava Nijinska: 27 November 1928, The Ida Rubinstein Ballet Company, Paris
Premiere of the evening at the Mariinsky Theatre: 11 July 2021
The highlighting of performances by age represents recommendations.
This highlighting is being used in accordance with Federal Law N436-FZ dated 29 December 2010 (edition dated 1 May 2019) "On the protection of children from information that may be harmful to their health"