Organization

Conductor

Tugan Sokhiev

Stage director

Evgeny Pisarev

Set designer

Zinovy Margolin

Costume designer

Olga Shaishmelashvili

Lighting designer

Damir Ismagilov

Chorus master

Valery Borisov

Choreographer

Irina Kashuba

Mikahail Tatarnikov

Singer

Baritone

Elchin Azizov

Mazepa

Željko Lučić

Vladislav Sulimsky

Bass

Denis Makarov

Kochubey

Stanislav Trofimov

Mezzo-soprano

Ksenia Dudnikova

Lyubov

Agunda Kulaeva

Elena Manistina

Soprano

Anna Nechaeva

Maria

Anna Shapovalova

Tenor

Oleg Dolgov

Andrei

Sergei Skorokhodov

Alexander Borodin

Orlik

Valery Gilmanov

Nikolay Kazansky

Ilgam Valiev

Iskra

Roman Muravitsky

Ilya Selivanov

Alexander Chernov

Ivan Maksimeyko

A drunken Cossack

Maxim Paster

Bolshoi Theatre

Russu

Mazeppa -  (Mazepa)

Moscow

Russia

Mazepa Tchaikovsky,P

Public

Approved

The world premiere of the opera Mazeppa by Pyotr Tchaikovsky took place at the Bolshoi Theater on February 3 (according to the old style), 1884. The production was brilliant, also due to the composition of the performers. According to the composer's brother Modest Tchaikovsky, "never before has a new Russian opera in Moscow been more carefully furnished in terms of consistency of style and finishing of details." Among the soloists, Emilia Pavlovskaya (Maria) and Bogomir Korsov (Mazepa) had particular success.
Subsequently, renewals and new productions at the Bolshoi were carried out regularly: for almost a century and a half there were seven of them. The presence of "Mazeppa" on the Historical stage is natural: the opera was written for voices of a wide range and is incredibly difficult for singers (parts are quite comparable with Wagner's). Outstanding artists sang in this opera at the Bolshoi: Panteleimon Nortsov, Alexei Ivanov, Pavel Lisitsian, Yuri Mazurok (Mazepa), Ksenia Derzhinskaya, Tamara Milashkina, Nina Rautio (Maria), Ivan Petrov, Arthur Eisen, Evgeny Nesterenko (Kochubey, Nadezhda Obukhova, Vera Davydova, Irina Arkhipova (Love), Georgy Nelepp, Vladimir Atlantov (Andrey).
The libretto based on Pushkin's poem "Poltava", written by the poet and critic Viktor Burenin, was originally intended for Karl Davydov. Davydov's idea was never realized, and in 1881 he gave the text to Tchaikovsky. The changes made to the libretto by the composer himself turned out to be so significant that they allow us to consider him at least a full-fledged co-author. (The authoritative researcher of Tchaikovsky’s work, Polina Vaidman, believed that “all the documents of the creative archive that recorded the composer’s work on Mazepa testify that the text of the libretto was written by him independently”).
Pushkin's "Poltava" inspired the composer to create a musical canvas about the death of the family of the powerful nobleman Vasily Kochubey (his execution at the end of the second act becomes a large-scale climax of the opera). The same tragic outcome awaits all the heroes without exception: their life, idyllic in the first scenes, collapses irrevocably by the end.
Tchaikovsky, starting to work on the opera, was at first embarrassed both by the “too gloomy coloring of the entire libretto” and its plot, which obliges him to create an epic canvas with real historical persons and events: Peter the Great, Charles XII, the picture of the Battle of Poltava ... As a result, from the opera scenes with the participation of crowned persons were excluded, and the "Battle of Poltava" became a significant, but in fact an inserted episode, performed in purely orchestral colors and separating the finale from the entire previous action. Other changes and additions were also made: the tragic scene of the execution is preceded by the dashing song of a drunken Cossack, and in the finale, a lullaby sounds touching and at the same time scary, which the distraught Maria sings over the body of theCossack Andrei in love with her.
The sound atmosphere of the opera is born from a combination of intonations of soft South Slavic speech, which is heard surrounded by luxurious cherry orchards and quiet rivers, and a bloody tragedy playing out against this background. Starting the composition, the composer focused on the lyrical component of the plot. The first to be written was the great love duet of Mazepa and Maria from the second act. The lyrical climaxes were the arias of Maria, Andrei and Mazepa. (The famous monologue of the protagonist "Oh Maria" was written after the end of work on the opera at the request of Bogomir Korsov). As a result, the conflict scenes turned out to be shaded by love and landscape lyrics, and the hetman's insidious temper was softened by passionate music, warmed by tenderness for Mary.
Tchaikovsky admitted that not a single great work was given to him "as hard" as this opera. Indeed, in his work on it at first there was less enthusiasm, less spontaneous and intuitive than in the case of "Eugene Onegin" or "The Queen of Spades". However, this circumstance also had positive consequences: as a result, a real masterpiece appeared, which ideally corresponded to the “matrix” of a romantic opera. The plot of "Poltava" gave the composer material for large conflict duet scenes (comparable to Verdi's Aida), a classic love triangle (Maria, Andrey, Mazepa), large-scale choral episodes, and finally for a stunning finale: the madness and enlightened departure of the main character (recall " Lucia di Lammermoor" by Donizetti or the future "The Tsar's Bride" by Rimsky-Korsakov).
After a successful concert performance in March 2020, the opera has finally returned to the Historical Stage. The new production at the Bolshoi Theater was staged by chief conductor Tugan Sokhiev, stage director Evgeny Pisarev and set designer Zinovy ​​Margolin. Fully preserving the plot outline, the authors of the performance gradually change the historical background of events: “The production is like a journey through time: first it is 1709, then the First World War and the Civil War, the Second World War and the events of today” (Evgeny Pisarev). Thus, in the story told by Pushkin and after him by Tchaikovsky, the long-standing and so relevant for our days perception of Ukraine as a “territory of anxiety” is highlighted. The chain of tragic events culminates in a Christianly forgiving ending.

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