Name: Capodistrias: Monodrama of a secret life
Start: 2021-10-01T00:00:00.000Z
End: 2021-10-03T00:00:00.000Z
Location: Alternative Stage

Organization

Singer

Timos Sirlantzis

Ioannis Capodistrias

Stage director

Themelis Glynatsis

Conductor

Nicolas Vassiliou

Lighting designer

Stella Kaltsou

Costume designer

Alexia Theodorakis

Set designer

Video designer

Marios Gampierakis

Chrysoula Korovesi

Research Consultant

Manto Malamou

Marilena Germanou

Featuring

Greek National Opera

Capodistrias: Monodrama of a secret life

Athens

Greece

Alternative Stage

Stavros Niarchos Foundation Cultural Center

Public

Approved

Capodistrias: Monodrama of a secret life Calliope Tsoupaki

Kapodistrias: Monodrama of a secret life in the Alternative Stage of ELS

Καποδίστριας: Μονόδραμα μιας μυστικής ζωής στην Εναλλακτική Σκηνή ΕΛΣ

The unrequited love between the first governor of the modern Greek State, Ioannis Capodistrias, and Roxandra Sturdza, the lady-in-waiting of the Empress of Russia, serves as subject to the new monodrama by Calliope Tsoupaki, an important Greek-Dutch composer recently awarded the title of Composer Laureate (Componist des Vaderlands), the highest compositional distinction in the Netherlands.

In one of the most romantic episodes of the Greek struggle for independence, Capodistrias and Sturdza (the former a promising politician and diplomat, the latter an educated noblewoman, offspring of a rich Greek Moldavian family) met at the Russian imperial court in 1809 and shared a longstanding, deeply spiritual bond; nevertheless, their love was unconsummated due to their class difference and Capodistrias' self-sacrificing commitment to the Greek cause. Their relationship blossomed around music: apart from their common political activism concerning the Philomuse Society of Vienna (a notable nexus of philhellenic activity at the time), Sturdza is reputed to have played the piano to Capodistrias during their more private moments...

Based on their extensive correspondence as well as on Sturdza's memoirs, the composer renders their moving story in non-narrative terms and sensitively "stages" a compassionate immersion in the shared interiority of two people who lived separately - but are brought together retroactively on stage, thanks to the empathetic power of Tsoupaki's music, full of sensuality and repressed passion.

English

Performance credits (Cast & Crew )

Cast

Crew