I began my first
morning in Prague by visiting Bedřich Smetana Museum, which is a charmingly old-fashioned small museum in the
old town, next to the Charles Bridge. At ten o’clock on a Saturday morning I got to enjoy the museum all by
myself, so it might not be the most popular place to visit in Prague, but
definitely worth seeing if you are an opera lover.
And what would be a
better way to end such a day than to see Smetana’s opera ”The Bartered Bride”
in the National Theatre. The theater itself is quite a pompous building by the
Vltava river and the main auditorium has plenty of golden decorations.
”The Bartered Bride”
tells a story about young lovers Mařenka
and Jeník, whose happiness is threatened by a plan to marry Mařenka off to another man called Vašek. After a few turns in the story the young
lovers end up together, when Jeník turns out to be the son of a rich man and
the intended bridegroom’s stepbrother.
This opera by Smetana
is rather charming and full of engaging music. In the overture strings play a
big role and at least I really liked that. The opera has lots of dances and in
this production the circus scene was spectacular (performers came from Continuo
Theater).
The National Theater
may not be acoustically perfect for opera (the main opera house is under
renovation); part of the music sounded dull and singers could hardly be heard
under the orchestra if they were singing further from the edge of the stage. But
both the orchestra and the soloists did good work. My absolute favourite was Zdenĕk Plech in the role of marriage broker Kecal. Beautiful
bass and a great actor. I also liked Aleš
Voráček (Vašek),
who managed to sing the stuttering scenes of his role beautifully and Jaroslav
Březina in the role of Jeník. His piano parts were lovely.
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| The Smetana Museum |
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| The National Theater |
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| The auditorium |
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| The performers |
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