Chisinau National Opera

According to legend, the Devil once challenged a Moldovan to a singing competition.  So the Moldovan took the Devil on his back and the Devil sang all the songs he knew, until he was exhausted.

When it was his turn, the Moldovan got on the Devil’s back and began to sing one of his country’s folk songs.  He sang of pain, of loss and of sorrow, until he almost broke the Devil’s heart.  They continued for one, two, three days and still the Moldovan sang on.  The Devil by now was weary and broken down with crying and sighing at the song that seemed to have no end.  At last, he told the Moldovan “Get down from my back. You are the winner”.  And the moral is that in Moldova, the Devil does not have all the best songs.

In the light of this legend, it is not surprising that singing has in the last few years become Moldova’s main invisible export.   The Chisinau National Opera  can trace its origins back to the mid-Forties, coming of age as a fully-fledged professional company in 1956. It  is now housed in a large, prominent building in the main road of Chisinau, the capital of Moldova.  Built during the years of the Soviet Union, it has superb equipment and facilities, and it was eventually ranked as among the top ten soviet opera companies, alongside such greats as the Kirov and the Bolshoi.  Following the collapse of the USSR, it has become one of the few companies to have retained its own orchestra, chorus, soloists and ballet.

Partly this has been achieved through foreign tours, especially those in the UK and Ireland, which began comparatively modestly with Cav/Pag in 1996.  Since then, the company has gone from strength to strength, with increasingly successful productions, revitalising them with new scenery and costumes as is the case with the new Nabucco and employing distinguished soloists from many countries.  Already the company has performed acclaimed productions of Aida, Madama Butterfly, Turandot, Carmen, Tosca, La Boheme, La Traviata, Nabucco, Norma,  The Marriage of Figaro, Swan Lake and The Sleeping Beauty, several of which have been seen at the Royal Albert Hall in London. The company also performs the magical production of The Nutcracker, originally staged at the Bolshoi in 1996 and directed by the renowned choreographer Yuri Grigorovich.  It first toured the UK in 2001and returned regtularly after.

The performers have had many adventures on tour, the most notable of which was in 1999 when snowdrifts in Romania were so deep that the company’s  coaches were buried under ten feet of snow, as high as the roof.  Performers were removing the snow, sometimes with their bare hands; eventually soldiers with tractors cleared the way. The two coaches moved only eight kilometres in 12 hours and the company only just arrived at Southend in time for the first performance of Tosca.

Back in Chisinau, the company’s new-found fame in the west has won the gratitude of people and politicians alike: at an opening night, performers were honoured by a visit from the then President Yeltsin. Meanwhile, a full programme of events is maintained.  The highlight of the season is an arts festival, called Maria Biesu Presents, performed bi-annually in the early autumn.  Soprano Ms Biesu was famed throughout the Soviet Union and was a key performer in the company’s early years, often partnered by Mihai Munteanu, who is singing the tenor roles on this tour. Ms Biesu’s festival includes many notable foreign singers, following in the footsteps of Caruso and Shalyapin, who performed in Chisinau at the turn of the 19th century.