The Tale of Tsar Saltan

The titles of some operas are in themselves sufficient to capture the imagination. For the centenary of Pushkin's birth in 1899, Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov drew inspiration from one of his celebrated fairy tales and composed a delightfully imaginative opera, with the 'Flight of the Bumblebee' as instant hit. The work is 'Once Upon A Time' story in song, where the composer's gift for melody and orchestration combines perfectly with the poet's often absurd humour and overflowing imagination. Alain Altinoglu can here revel in the role of orchestral wizard, as he did recently in The Golden Cockerel, while, following his highly acclaimed production of Il Trovatore, the Russian director Dmitri Tcherniakov returns with a many-layered psychological conclusion to the opera season.