Fedora in Mariinsky Concert Hall in St. Petersburg, the 8th of December, 2017

The most famous operas of Italian composer Umberto Giordano are Andea Chénier and Fedora, which began my opera weekend in St. Petersburg. The story line of the opera is truly operatic. Princess Fedora Romazov is getting married in St. Petersburg and on the eve of her wedding her intended is killed. The villain is assumed to be count Loris Ipanov, to whom Fedora swears revenge. Fedora and Loris meet in Paris, Loris falls in love with Fedora and confesses that he has killed her ex-fiancé, but swears that there is a good reason behind it all. Before he has time to present the evidence of this, Fedora manages to name him and his brother for the murder to the Russian authorities. When Loris later does prove that there was a steaming affair between the ex-fiancé and his wife and the ex-fiancé shot at him first and he only returned the fire, Fedora confesses her love for Loris. Later their happiness is smashed in Switzerland, when they are informed that Loris’s brother has died in prison and also their mother has died of grief. Fedora is devastated by remorse and when Loris find out that it is Fedora, who has caused his brother’s imprisonment, he is not ready to forgive her, but wants to kill her. Fedora, however, makes it first and swallows poison, which shatters Loris. So, plenty of drama for one opera.

The music of the opera is very versatile. It contains dramatic (almost threatening sounding) pieces, romantic arias and happy, light tunes. So, even in that sense an opera that contains it all.

Out of the performers I got most excited this time of the low male voices. The absolute star of the performance was Dinar Dzhusoev, who sang the small role of Cirillo, the coachman. Great voice, the best pronunciation of Italian of them all and good acting. Also Pavel Shmulevich as the police inspector and Jaroslav Petryanik as the diplomat De Siriex did well. Tatiana Starkova who sang the leading role of Fedora also sang and acted well. However, her Italian pronunciation will require a lot of work still, if she intends to continue singing Italian operas. Unfortunately it was now impossible to recognize that she sang in Italian, which is rather common in Russia and therefore the safest bet is to go and see Russian operas.