Kashchey the Immortal in the Mariinsky Concert Hall in St. Petersburg, Russia, the 19th of May, 2019

This year we celebrate the 175th anniversary of the birth of composer Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov. In honour of this Mariinsky Theatre has shown all his operas – even the more rare ones - during this spring. When his short (about an hour long) opera “Kashchey the Immortal” was performed as a matinee on Sunday, I simply had to go and see it. The opera was performed in the Mariinsky Concert Hall, but with simple set design and this time even with English texting (usually in the Concert Hall they only offer Russian texting), but due to the rather big set thingy hanging from the ceiling, the texting device had been moved to the front of the scene and it was also so high that you could only read it comfortably further back on the parquet. Though since it was based on a Russian folk tale, at least the direction (Vyacheslav Starodubtsev) of this opera was such that it would have been rather easy to understand approximately what happens based on the grand gesticulation even if you were not able to understand a word of the text.

In the opera a princess is captured by the immortal wizard Kashchey and she misses he beloved, prince Ivan. He has gone to seek a way to kill Kashchey and has ended up meeting Kashchey’s daughter Kashcheyevna. The daughter tries to seduce the prince, gives him a magic potion to drink so that he would forget the princess and when he falls asleep, she tries to kill him, but cannot. At the same time Kashchey has sent Storm Wind to find out what has happened. Storm Wind arrives to Kashcheyevna and wakes up Ivan. Together they leave and join the princess. The secret of Kashchey’s immortality is the fact that his daughter does not cry; her tears would kill him. Now she, desperately in love with Ivan, sheds tears, changes into a weeping willow and Kashchey dies. The prince and princess live happily even after.

If the story of the opera is – to put it mildly – rather traditional a fairy tale, the music of the opera was enchanting and it suited this type of story magnificently. The group of soloist was also excellent and  without weak links. The favourite of the audience seemed to be St. Petersburg born and bred mezzo-soprano Ekaterina Sergeeva, who indeed sang the role of Kashcheyevna very well. However, my personal favourite was Tajikistan born soprano Angelina Akhmedova. Her voice fit the role of the princess perfectly.   

But when we are speaking of a folk tale at its purest form, the thing that really made the story was the set design (Petr Okunev) and light design (Sergey Skornetsky). Taking into account the resources available at the Concert Hall, the result was almost breathtaking.