Organization

Admin

National Theatre Prague

Direction d'orchestre

Andrea Sanguineti

Mise en scène

Mise en scène (+3)

Zuzana Gilhuus

Décors

Costumes

Boris Hanečka

Chorégraphie

Acteur (+4)

Martin Dvorak

Lumières

Martin Bronec

Direction de choeur

Pavel Vaněk

Soprano (+2)

Ewa Vesin

La Princesse Turandot

Soprano (+1)

Maida Hundeling

Baryton-basse (+3)

František Zahradníček

Timur

Basse (+3)

Jiří Sulženko

Ténor (+1)

Alejandro Roy

Calaf

Alžběta Poláčková

Liù

Baryton (+6)

Jiří Hájek

Ping

Baryton (+4)

Jiří Brückler

Ténor (+6)

Jaroslav Březina

Pang

Ténor (+2)

Josef Moravec

Pong

Martin Šrejma

Miloš Horák

Un mandarin

Ténor

Jan Vacík

L'Empereur Altoum

Ténor (+5)

Jan Ježek

Marek Lhotsky

Le jeune Prince de Perse

Orchestra

Ópera Checa de Praga

Chorus

Kühn Choir of Prague

Prague National Theatre Chorus

Kühn Children's Choir

Ballet

National Theatre Opera Ballet Prague

Národní divadlo (National Theatre)

Giacomo Puccini’s final opera, Turandot, may be deemed to be the “last of the Mohicans” of the Golden Age of Italian Romantic opera. The greatest of Verdi’s heirs, the composer, however, did not get bogged down in this tradition, but went on to boldly develop and enrich it with the flavours of the new artistic styles that emerged in the late 19th and the early 20th centuries. Consequently, his Turandot, written between and 1921 and 1924, does not feature many Romantic traits.

Puccini based the opera on the eponymous commedia dell’arte play by Carlo Gozzi, an author much admired by the early 20th-century avant-garde artists. The subject hails from Persia or Mongolia, whose cultures were mainly marvelled at by votaries of the decorative style, while the libretto’s story is set in medieval Beijing and foregrounds fairy-tale, or better said mythological, elements, favoured by the Symbolists. The theme of passionate love, essential for Romantic opera, is veiled in mysterious motifs of ice, fire, moon, while an erotic flame enigmatically blazes along with intense, unrelenting hatred, which we would rather expect to be present in works inspired by decadence or psychoanalysis.

Yet all that which, notwithstanding its modernism, gives Turandot the Romantic opera hallmark is Puccini’s musical idiom, which too encompasses plenty of “eccentric” facets – ranging from Oriental paraphrases, through a brutal orchestral sound, dissonant harmonies to wildly complex chorus and ensemble scenes – but what prevails is Puccini’s masterful melodic invention in the spirit of the legacy of his great Italian opera predecessors, yet utterly original – by and large, Puccinian.

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