Adapted from a short story by Alexander Pushkin, “The Queen of Spades,” the lyrical masterpiece by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, will be performed four times: last Friday and Sunday, and again tonight and next Thursday on the stage of the Nice Opera.
To stage this monument of the Russian repertoire, haunted by the morbid frenzy of gambling and steeped in the sultry atmosphere reigning in Saint Petersburg at the end of the 19th century, it required a personality with incandescent artistic creativity. Thus, Olivier Py, director of the Avignon Festival, rises to the challenge: “The Queen of Spades” marks his 42nd opera staging.
Tchaikovsky’s music, which combines tempestuous force with heart-on-sleeve sensitivity, will be brought to life by the Nice Philharmonic Orchestra under the baton of its music director György G. Ráth, while the vocal parts will be performed by the Choir of the Nice Opera, the Choir of the Toulon Opera, and the Children’s Choir of the Nice Opera.
