Sunday Afternoon at the Opera - Tchaikovsky: Iolanta

Sunday Afternoon at the Opera host Keith Brown writes:

Today's opera program begins late- after 2:00, so as to accommodate broadcast earlier in the afternoon of a University of Hartford women's basketball game. A smaller scale lyric theaterwork is called for--one that will fit into the shorter timeslot.

It has been a long, long time since I last broadcast Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky's one act opera Iolanta (1892). That was on Sunday, May 27, 1984. Iolanta was Tchaikovsky's last such composition. Its Russian language libretto was prepared by the composer's brother Modest after a play by the Danish poet Hendrik Hertz. That play is a sort of fairy tale about a blind princess. It is also something of a parable about insight and a superficial way of looking at life.

Back in 1984 I presented Iolanta on Columbia stereo LPs, the recording originally released in the USSR in 1976 through the Soviet state Melodiya record label. Mark Ermler directed the orchestra and chorus of Moscow's Bolshoi Theatre. The Bolshoi's singing cast, of course, was made up entirely of native Russian speakers. Starring in the title role was soprano Tamara Sorokina.

Today you get to hear Russia's new star soprano of the 21st century, Anna Netrebko, joined by three other Russians in the principal roles. This new recording of Iolanta is, however, German in origin. It was released in 2015 through Deutsche Grammophon, and presents a concert performance of the opera given at the Philharmonie hall in Essen in 2012. The orchestra and chorus were brought in from Slovenia. A French conductor, Emmanuel Villaume directs the Slovenian Philharmonic Orchestra and Slovenian Chamber Chorus.