Photo courtesy of the press service of the Vladimir-Suzdal Museum-Reserve
Last weekend Suzdal received congratulations on its anniversary. The city is a thousand years old (locals have no doubt that it is much older), but, by analogy with Moscow, they took as a reference point “The Tale of Bygone Years”. It is this chronicle that mentions a place called “Suzhdal” in 1024, when, due to poor harvests, a “magician revolt” occurred here, which Prince Yaroslav Vladimirovich came to settle:
“Wise Ya. V,” as they would write in the local housing office, where a layer of cement, like a grey powder, is sprinkled over its employees for eternity.
The quote from the popular opera “This is Suzdal”, performed in the local Kremlin, belongs to Evgeniy Vodolazkin. Until recently, the most successful Russian writer specialized exclusively in prose, but in Suzdal he made his debut with a poetic text.
Cucumbers for one hundred and fifty, strawberries for four hundred.
Suzdal was thoroughly preparing for its birthday. We celebrated for three days and invited Bilan, Pelageya and the Buranovsky grandmothers. A group of people who came from all volosts were presented with kokoshniks and entertained with water performances, excursions and immersive shows based on the filming that took place here. Of course, there were gastronomic shows where local residents and other people offered everything: from homemade mushroom soups, which should be diluted in water and eaten like a doshirak, to cucumber jam and ice cream. In the 12th century, Yuri Dolgoruky briefly made Suzdal the capital of the principality. Today, Suzdal began to be considered the capital, but no longer of the principality, but of the Russian cucumber, and this circumstance enriched local residents.
Photo courtesy of the press service of the Vladimir-Suzdal Museum-Reserve
– Lightly salted cucumbers are sold here for 150 rubles each! And a plot of land costs as much as an apartment in Moscow! – said Nikolai Livshits, an employee of the Vladimir-Suzdal Museum-Reserve, with quiet envy.
In addition to cucumbers, the prices of locally grown strawberries were also impressive. At different times they were called “Thai”, then “Suzdal” or “hybrid with raspberries” and cost four hundred rubles for a small glass.
Photo courtesy of the press service of the Vladimir-Suzdal Museum-Reserve
Photo courtesy of the press service of the Vladimir-Suzdal Museum-Reserve
Suzdal-style layer cake
The culmination of the holiday was the production of a folk opera, organized by the team of the Vladimir-Suzdal Museum-Reserve and the Red Square media group. The spectacle was announced as something incredible. The artistic director was Andrey Boltenko, director of the opening of the Sochi Olympics, who turned an insect with an unopened ring into an interesting feature. The person responsible for the set design was the award-winning theatre designer Zinovy Margolin. (“the brilliant Margolin”, as they say about him in theatre circles).
The public was intrigued by the names of the stars involved in the show: Dima Bilan and the star of the show “Three Chords”, singer Mia Boyka, appeared, and the name of the genre “folk opera” made it seem that the famous artists sang arias based on Vodolazkin’s poems. However, the action was more of a concert of pop artists, where the singing of several hits was interspersed with poetic texts performed by actor Alexei Rozin.
Photo courtesy of the press service of the Vladimir-Suzdal Museum-Reserve
Photo courtesy of the press service of the Vladimir-Suzdal Museum-Reserve
They said that the preparation of the scenery and the set design alone took two months. But the decision will be familiar to those who saw the play based on Vodolazkin’s novel “Laurel”, which was staged four years ago at the Moscow Art Theatre. In the open space of the Kremlin, the same structures were displayed, resembling a cross-section of a high-rise building, where a member of a choir or orchestra was “settled” in each cell of the house. (At one time, Eduard Boyakov, the artistic director of the theatre, was terribly proud of these designs and said that he got the idea of depicting life on stage, looking at the icon with seals in his office.)
Varvara Kotova, the singer of ancient songs who participated in the play, arrived with the scenery for the play “Laurel”. With the choir of Intrada a cappella (without instrumental accompaniment) Varvara sang Vysotsky’s hit “Dome”, which mentions the bird Gamayun and Sirin. The opening of the concert turned out to be loud, but it seemed that was what they wanted.
“They tried to give the arrangement the features of ancient Russian polyphony,” explained choir director Gleb Kardasevich, “because of the difference” with Vysotsky.
Dima Bilan was unexpectedly pleased. Dressed in a dark suit and looking like a modest monk, Dima performed Andrei Sapunov’s hit “Ringing”. It turned out very well.
But the one who made me laugh was Georgy Russkikh, the son of chansonist Sergei Sever. The young man was so furious with the guitar that he slipped on a wet spot and fell. The audience gasped, but the Russians pretended that they did. Without a quiver in his eyebrows or voice, the young man continued singing and playing while lying down.
Photo courtesy of the press service of the Vladimir-Suzdal Museum-Reserve
Vodolazkin is better
Hand on heart, the best number of the opera was the text by Evgeny Vodolazkin. In general, few people suspected that the prose writer was so skilled in hexametric trochee and rhyme. In the text, Evgeniy Germanovich used his favorite style: he combined different linguistic and temporal layers. His novel “Laurel” was highly praised for this discovery, but in poetry the technique seemed especially interesting:
“…I arrived at the wilderness of yesterday. I saw the characteristics of a new era everywhere. A celebrity would never have come here if these places were somehow bad.”
Vodolazkin closed the millennial history of Suzdal, creating a sense of continuous time. He also mentioned Metropolitan Seraphim (Chichagov), who was shot by “non-humans”; and the writer Nikolai Leskov, whose writing style was called “Suzdal” and, of course, Andrei Tarkovsky, who filmed his Rublev here. What was unexpected was the scattering of quotes from Tonino Guerro, who loved Suzdal and compared the city to a drop.
Poetry critics shuddered a little when the absolutely random “Gorky in Capri” emerged as a rhyme for “let go”; and with “Poland” was added the “more”, obvious as “roses and frost” and ridiculed in a modern popular text:
Let’s steal the Porsche from the condominium embassy.
There will be no more rhyme “Poland – more”
It seems that by the end of the opera, the classic, like the audience, was a little tired.
But, on the whole, it is fair to say that it was Evgeniy Germanovich (to a greater extent) and Dima Bilan (to a lesser extent) who deserved the lion’s share of the evening’s applause.
It is true that neither of them took their final bow. The literary classic is in Shanghai and the popular singer escaped to a nearby concert with Pelagia.
Unfortunately, the creators of the opera left and never promised to show it anywhere else. The performance was intended for a one-time performance: even the text of the quotes had to be restored from memory. But God bless him, I would like to hope that Evgeniy Germanovich’s extraordinary work will appear in the public domain and in print.
BY THE WAY
Despite the end of the birthday celebrations, exhibitions dedicated to the city’s millennium are still open. There are many of them and they are very different. Before October 1, you can visit the exhibition “The Russian Phoenix” that opened in the bishop’s office. For the first time, the best treasures were brought to the city, which were taken by Moscow princes in the 15th century, after the Vladimir-Suzdal principality lost the palm to Moscow.
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