The National Opera in Kyiv hosted Ivan Franko Lviv Opera’ s centennial October 19-20
Back in 1900, the newly built Opera House of Lviv (designed by architect Zygmund Gorgolewski) opened with a premiere of Wladislaw Zelenski’s Janek. Contemporary accounts have it that people visiting what was generally regarded an expensive toy were in for a pleasant surprise. All were impressed by the rich interior, sculpturing, excellent paintings, gilded wall relief composition, the splendid marble stairway, and of course the lyre-shaped audience shining with hundreds of candelabra. And excellent acoustics (with bamboo imbedded in the walls).
At various periods the Lviv Opera featured stars like Solomiya Krushelnytska, Oleksandr Myshuha, Mykhailo Holinsky, Orest Rusnak, and Oleksandr Nosalevych.
“We are proud of our company, its tradition and history,” says Lviv Opera Director Tadei Eder. “We have 555 persons on the payroll, including 300 creative personnel, and the repertoire boasts over 30 operatic and ballet performances.
“We brought to Kyiv our recent premiere, Verdi’s Nabucco staged by Italian director Giuseppe Vicilia. The gala concert includes arias from La Boheme, Cavilleria Rusticana, Stolen Happiness, Bohdan Khmelnytsky, Taras Bulba, scenes for the ballet Creation of the World, and Grand Classical Pas based on Tchaikovsky’s music.”
The Lviv Opera has retained its singular visage at all times, and the cast, stage directors, and orchestra conductors all point to a positive creative atmosphere within the company. Theater critic Yuri Stanishevsky reminds us of ballet stars like Natalia Slobodian (described as Ukraine’s Ulanova) and Mykola Trehubov. And one ought to remember that the outstanding Ukrainian choreographer Anatoly Shekera also hails from Lviv. Svitlana Dobronravova, soloist with the National Opera, warmly recalls conductor Ihor Vasanych who “was not afraid to risk putting me, a debutante, in the [title] role in Puccini’s Tosca. Nina Tychynska was the prima donna at the time, she had a unique voice and strong character. Many of the cast were openly afraid of her razor-sharp tongue. Imagine: she an established star and I a rookie was suddenly to sing her part! I remember I was so nervous after I learned that she was in the audience. After the opera she was the first to approach and congratulate me on such a baptism of fire. From then on, we remained friends, despite the difference in status and age. And it was at the company that I met my future husband, ballet dancer Yevhen Kartsov. We are still together.”
The Lviv Opera’s current debutant, “velvet” baritone Stepan Stepan, first appeared on stage as a musical college student. He sang his first part as Sultan in Hulak-Artemovsky’s Zaporozhzhian Cossack Beyond the Danube. His latest success is the title part in Verdi’s Nabucco which is very popular with the public, largely due to his brilliant work.
The Lviv Opera, like all the other Ukrainian performing companies, faces a host of problems: keeping the building tidy and all services operational, as befits an architectural site and getting money for new performances (they are working on Myroslav Skoryk’s Moses based on Ivan Franko’s poem), while trying to keep the cast and personnel in one piece. It is generally known that operatic musicians, singers, and ballet dancers in the West earn ten times more than in Ukraine. The Lviv Opera’s artistic director and conductor Myron Yusypovych believes it high time that Ukraine’s “operatic structure” (six companies in all, each struggling to scrape up enough for two or three new renditions a year) underwent basic changes. “We should combine efforts, exchange stage props, costumes, and soloists. This would allow audiences in various cities to watch different performances and the companies to considerably reduce their expenses. At present, the repertoire is dictated by the market. Abroad, they expect us to play Italian operas. We have six Verdis on the repertoire. But what about Ukrainian operas? We have enough to show the rest of the world and feel proud of, yet we like the Covetous Knight, sit on, our wealth and no one else can watch or hear it. No CDs are produced. Contemporary recollections and old newspaper praising reviews? Our bureaucrats in charge of culture should waken from their lethargic sleep. The times have changed and many continue working the old way.”
