A Kind of Wasteland - about the Premiere of »Khovanshchina«

Modest Mussorgsky started the project in 1872 while still working on the opera »Boris Godunov«. The composer began a compulsive investigation into a dark part of Russian history, the 17th century rebellion of the Streltsy, soldiers armed with muskets. The events, full of conspiracies and ruthless violence, did not leave the composer alone – and are strikingly similar to those in today’s Russia: »Khovanshchina« is a unique opera in that, with only a few changes to the names and details, it could be a tale from our own time«, says conductor Esa-Pekka Salonen. »The coup plans of a private army implode and go up in smoke. There is an attempt to exploit religion to promote political aspirations. Ruthless operators produce fake news, the people don’t know who to believe and ultimately end up distrusting pretty much everyone. The rebels face heavy punishments, but suddenly, without explanation, all are pardoned.
Sounds familiar?«

The history of »Khovanshchina« is fascinating and complex. It is Modest Mussorgsky’s last opera, left unfinished at the time of the composer’s death in March 1881. He only left fragmentary sketches and no piano score of the final two scenes.

The first performing version of the whole opera was completed by Mussorgsky’s friend Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov in 1882, for which Rimsky provided an ending. In 1913 a new ending was added by Igor Stravinsky – with the help of Maurice Ravel – for Sergei Diaghilev and the Paris performances as part of the »Ballets Russes«. Finally, in 1958, Dmitri Shostakovich made his orchestration from an edition of Mussorgsky’s sketches by scholar Pavel Lamm and composer Boris Asafiev and added his own new ending – from then on, Shostakovich’s version has dominated the opera-houses of the world.

It was the fragmentary and incomplete nature of what Mussorgsky left behind – especially of the ending – that first drew the fascination of director Simon McBurney: »Mussorgsky died in very tough circumstances: he was an alcoholic and passed prematurely before the opera was finished. Both artists that worked on the opera after his death – Stravinsky and Shostakovich – imposed their vision and their will on the piece. But there are notes and sketches from Mussorgsky that indicate he wanted to go in a different direction. So for us, it is not only about trying to present this extraordinary opera in its entirety but also to respond to what it seems that Mussorgsky had been searching for.«

The Salzburg performance will present a version of the ending that tries to stay as close as possible to Mussorgsky’s surviving manuscript sketches before leading into Stravinsky’s early 20th century finale. Work on these sketches has been led by Simon McBurney’s brother and frequent collaborator, the Russia-specialist, composer and orchestrator Gerard McBurney, making especially close use of a single, but extremely revealing page in Mussorgsky’s handwriting, which was discovered several decades after Shostakovich completed his version, and is now housed in the Glinka Museum in Moscow. »I saw«, comments Gerard McBurney, »that that fragmentation of the surviving music allows us to modulate from Shostakovich’s wonderful version across a kind of wasteland where all we have is Mussorgsky’s fragmentary sketches right through to the beautiful redemption of Stravinsky’s ending. We wanted to make sure the audience hears every note that Mussorgsky wrote.« Renowned sound artist Tuomas Norvio created an electronic sound world to help weave together the fragments.

The Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra will be conducted by Esa-Pekka Salonen, currently Music Director in San Francisco. Born in Finland, he has devoted himself primarily to the symphonic repertoire in recent years, conducting his last staged operas – »Das Rheingold« and »Aufstieg und Fall der Stadt Mahagonny« – at the Finnish National Opera in 2019. His fascination with the Russian repertoire runs through his artistic biography. For example, together with Gerard McBurney, he worked on the world premiere of Dmitri Shostakovich’s long-lost opera fragment »Orango« in 2011. »There are moments of breathtaking beauty in »Khovanshchina«, for instance the very beginning, the sunrise by the Moskva river – meanwhile, you start to understand that this is the morning after a bloodbath that killed thousands of people. So it’s that kind of piece, there are always two opposites happening at the same time«, says the conductor. »The piece has all kinds of challenges, but it is well worth the effort.«

The British director Simon McBurney chooses his opera projects very carefully – his outings in this field are rare and a must-see for theatre lovers and journalists alike. In winter 2023, McBurney presented his production of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s »The Magic Flute« at the Metropolitan Opera in New York. Other opera productions include Alexander Raskatov’s »A Dog's Heart« (De Nationale Opera Amsterdam, 2010), Igor Stravinsky’s »The Rake's Progress« (Festival d’Aix-en-Provence, 2017) and Alban Berg’s »Wozzeck« (Festival d’Aix-en-Provence, 2023). The theatre and film actor (»The Manchurian Candidate«, »Harry Potter«, »Mission Impossible«) has been creating theatre productions since the mid-1980s with the theatre company »Complicité« which he co-founded.