Organization

Tenor (+3)

Yusif Eyvazov

Herman

Baritone (+5)

Vladislav Sulimsky

Count Tomsky

Baritone (+1)

Igor Golovatenko

Prince Yeletsky

Tenor (+2)

Vasily Gafner

Chekalinsky

Bass (+3)

Denis Makarov

Surin

Tenor

Ivan Maksimeyko

Chaplitsky

Vladimir Komovich

Narumov

Konstantin Artemiev

Master of Ceremonies

Mezzo-soprano (+3)

Svetlana Shilova

Countess

Soprano (+2)

Anna Nechaeva

Lisa

Mezzo-soprano (+2)

Alina Chertash

Polina

Contralto (+3)

Irina Berezina

Governess

Tatiana Vetrova

Masha

Soprano (+1)

Albina Latipova

Prilepa

Milovzor

Zlatogor

Stage director

Rimas Tuminas

Conductor

Conductor (+3)

Tugan Sokhiev

Lighting designer

Damir Ismagilov

Costume designer

Maria Danilova

Set designer

Set designer (+1)

Adomas Jacovskis

Choreographer

Anzelica Cholina

Chorusmaster

Chorusmaster (+1)

Valery Borisov

Bolshoi Theatre

Stage director (+1)

Anželika Cholina

The Queen of Spades is the pinnacle of Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's opera and one of the most famous Russian operas in the world. The highest emotional tension of the key scenes captivates the audience of our time in the same way as it captivated the composer's contemporaries.

The Queen of Spades was created by Tchaikovsky in less than five months. The composer worked with feverish enthusiasm, often overtaking the librettist, who was his own brother Modest. The text for some numbers (dancing in the second picture, Yeletsky's chorus and aria in the third, Lisa's aria in the sixth picture and others), being unable to wait for the finished libretto, Tchaikovsky composed himself.

The opera was first performed on December 7, 1890 in St. Petersburg, and eleven months later it was staged at the Bolshoi Theater in Moscow. The Moscow production brought together an excellent ensemble of performers, of which the author especially liked the part of Lisa, Maria Deisha-Sionitskaya.

The Queen of Spades almost immediately begins to sound abroad: in Prague (1892), Zagreb (1898), Darmstadt (1900), Vienna (1902), Milan (1906), Berlin (1907), Stockholm (1909), New York (1910), Paris (1911), and then many other cities.

In the first half of the 20th century, the Bolshoi Theater constantly turned to this opera. Literally every decade was marked by new readings: in 1918, 1920, 1927, 1931, 1942. The era of stormy searches was followed by decades of stability: the play, staged in 1944 by Leonid Baratov with scenery by Vladimir Dmitriev, became a real long-liver. This production was staged at the Bolshoi for more than sixty years (since 1964, directed by Boris Pokrovsky). The premiere was conducted by Alexander Melik-Pashaev, later Vasily Nebolsin, Boris Khaikin, Evgeny Svetlanov, Gennady Rozhdestvensky, Dmitry Kitaenko, Mark Ermler, Yuri Simonov, Andrey Chistyakov, Alexander Lazarev and other outstanding conductors were at the podium. Famous Bolshoi soloists sang in this production: Galina Vishnevskaya, Tamara Milashkina, Makvala Kasrashvili, Valentina Levko,

Now the "Queen of Spades" is again experiencing a period of search and experimentation. The current production is already the third in the 21st century. In 2007, a “black-and-white” version by Valery Fokin with Mikhail Pletnev at the conductor’s stand was released on the New Stage, in 2015 the famous production by Lev Dodin, designed by David Borovsky (conductor Mikhail Yurovsky) was shown.

In the work on the new "Queen of Spades" the chief conductor of the Bolshoi Tugan Sokhiev and the chief director of the theater. Vakhtangov Rimas Tuminas, who already had a successful experience of cooperation in the work on the opera "Katerina Izmailova" by D. Shostakovich. The production team included Tuminas' constant collaborators - set designer Adomas Jacovskis, choreographer Anzhelika Kholina, costume designer Maria Danilova, lighting designer Damir Ismagilov. Their work is distinguished by a complex plastic drawing, sometimes close to choreographic paintings. Avoiding external effects, the authors of the play focused on the inner world of the characters, who are close and understandable to the audience.

Életrajz