Minnie: Maria Bayankina
Dick Johnson: Akhmed Agadi
Jack Rance: Vadim Kravets
Nick: Alexander Mikhailov
Ashby: Oleg Sychov
Sonora: Sergei Romanov
Jake Wallace: Gleb Periazev
Ensemble of soloists of the Mariinsky Academy of Young Opera Singers
World premiere: 10 December 1910, Metropolitan Opera, New York
Russian premiere: 2 October 1913, Zimin Opera Company on the stage of the Solodovnikov Theatre, Moscow (performed in Russian, translated by Vladimir Alekseyev)
Premiere at the Mariinsky Theatre and premiere of this production: 24 May 2019
Running time 3 hours 15 minutes
The performance has two intervals
When completing work on the score of La fanciulla del West in the summer of 1910, Giacomo Puccini, who had by then already composed La Bohème, Tosca and Madama Butterfly, had no doubt that of all of his operas this was the very best. "Believe me, this has everything: it's an epic piece, touching, it's a true spectacle and ends beautifully," he wrote to his publisher Giulio Ricordi. As the basis of the plot, he had taken David Belasco's popular Broadway play The Girl of the Golden West, which he had seen during his visit to the American continent. The most popular Italian composer was to write an opera based on an ultra-American subject. The Metropolitan Opera in New York, which purchased the western, prepared for the premiere with all due pomp. Success was guaranteed: Toscanini was conducting, the lead tenor role was sung by Caruso, Belasco was in charge of the production and the composer himself led the rehearsals. At the premiere he received countless curtain calls.
La fanciulla del West is a typical melodrama for soprano, tenor and baritone. The soprano is the owner of a saloon in the Wild West and the baritone is a fearless sheriff. The price on the head of the tenor, who appears in the somewhat faded romantic image of a noble brigand, even before the plot starts to unfold is set at five thousand dollars, an incredible sum for 1850. Like the mermaids in Das Rheingold, the saloon-owner keeps a stash of gold, only in Wagner's opera the gold is stolen while here its keeper is abducted. In La fanciulla Puccini turned for the first time to a fourth group of wind instruments – just as in Der Ring des Nibelungen. The roles, with the exception of two female heroines, are all male, and the orchestra makes use of markedly brutal sounds and energetic rhythms. There are also many dreamy and nostalgic moments in La fanciulla del West.
In opera houses today, Puccini's La fanciulla del West is not seen as often as his Tosca or La Bohème. In Russia the opera has been staged on just a handful of occasions, and it has never been performed at the Mariinsky Theatre at all. The title was suggested to Valery Gergiev by French stage director Arnaud Bernard, who at the Mariinsky has already staged Verdi's opera I vespri siciliani and shown himself to be a specialist in operatic "Hollywood".
Musical materials provided by G. RICORDI & CO., Bühnen- und Musikverlag GmbH, Berlin (Germany)
Supported by the Carmel Endowment for the Arts
The highlighting of performances by age represents recommendations.
This highlighting is being used in accordance with Federal Law N436-FZ dated 29 December 2010 (edition dated 1 May 2019) "On the protection of children from information that may be harmful to their health"