Salome: Yevgenia Muravieva
Jokanaan: Yevgeny Nikitin
Herod: Andrei Popov
Herodias: Natalia Yevstafieva
World premiere: 9 December 1905, Semperoper, Dresden
Russian premiere: 6 June 1924, State Academic Opera and Ballet Theatre (Mariinsky Theatre) (performed in Russian, translated by Sergey Levik)
Production premiere: 9 February 2017
Running time: 1 hours 40 minutes
The performance without an interval
For one hundred and twelve years the opera directors from all over the world have been puzzling over the answers to the following two questions: (1) who are Jokanaan and Salome whose collision leads to a catastrophe; (2) what is the significance of the 10-minute Dance of the Seven Veils, which Salome performs at a culminating point in the story. It simply cannot be that Jokanaan is just a prophet, Salome – just a Jewish princess, and the famous dance – just a mediocre Eastern striptease. The director Marat Gatsalov, whose work is likely to be familiar to the drama theatre lovers, made his opera debut with this production. He has decisively cut through all the traditional clichés which have been associated with Salome for over a hundred years. The new production has no place for a dance with seven fabric veils, palms under the scorching Judea sun, or, for that matter, any items belonging to that place and epoch. The action might take place anywhere at no particular time, in the space created by set designer Monika Pormale, in the gigantic skyscrapers shaped like letters. What has taken the place of the Dance and Jokanaan’s head cannot be described for it can only be seen.
For one hundred and twelve years the best performers in the world have been selflessly throwing themselves into the depths of the volcano that is hidden in Richard Strauss’s Salome. Valery Gergiev and the Mariinsky Theatre have accepted Strauss’s challenge for the third time, and once again they have masterfully tamed the tempestuous musical element raving for an hour and a half.
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"