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Un ballo in maschera will close the opera season
The Mikhailovsky Theatre will close the 177th season premiering Un ballo in maschera.


     The opera considered the summit of Giuseppe Verdi’s work has never been staged at the Mikhailovsky Theatre before. The opera is rich in beautiful vocal parts, expressive ensembles, orchestra splendor and something called the ‘Shakespearian power’. Verdi built the musical drama on contrast tempers adding serene lyric to mysterious and dark scenes, framing the tragic ending with hijinks of the masked ball.

The plot was taken from a historical event – the political conspiracy intermingled with personal revenge. As the libretto underwent different transformations caused by censorship regulations, the stage directors of the recent productions think it possible to choose the place and time for the plot according to their stage concepts.

The stage director Andrejs Žagars (the general director of the Latvian National Opera) thinks that fin de siècle fits the opera best of all – it was the time of great empires falling into ruins as well as familiar routine. The stage designer Andris Freibergs also refers to art nouveau. The costumes are designed by Kristine Pasternaka. Musical director and conductor of the production is Peter Feranec. The production features soloists of the Mikhailovsky Opera.