Ticket sales end onFriday, June 1st 2012. 19:00

ABOUT THE EVENT

The Latvian National Opera presents The Heiress of Vilkači by Bruno Skulte, an opera with rich, tuneful music that reflects influences of Wagner, Dvořák, and Smetana, subtly combined with elements of Latvian folk music.

Set in rural Latvia in 1896, The Heiress of Vilkači tells the story of two neighboring estates connected by an impending marriage and by a union that produces an illegitimate child. One of the houses has always been more prosperous than the other, and there are suspicions that this situation is the result of witchcraft. Bruno Skulte wrote the vocal score after he fled Latvia from the Soviets, in the late 1940s in Germany, before he emigrated to New York. However, the Heiress was never performed during Skulte's lifetime. It was orchestrated in by Andrejs Jansons, who also conducted the first-ever concert performance of the piece in 2005. The LNO premiere is the first staged production of this opera.
 
Production:
Conductor: Andrejs Jansons, Aigars Meri
Stage Director: Ināra Slucka
Set and Costume Designer: Ieva Jurjāne
Lighting Designer: Egils Kupčs

Cast:
Maruta: Dana Bramane, Ance Purmale
Raitis: Andris Ludvigs, Raimonds Bramanis
Ieva: Inga Šļubovska, Gunta Davidčuka, Laura Grecka
Pēters: Imants Erdmans, Rihards Mačanovskis
Dievlodzinš: Armands Siliņš, Krišjānis Norvelis
Grieta: Olga Jakovļeva, Ieva Parša
Dace: Kristīne Zadovska, Andžella Goba
Bērtulis: Nauris Puntulis, Guntars Ruņģis
Andis: Reinis Bagāts, Patriks Stepe

Last update 2012 Editorial Team Classictic.com

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Artists of The Heiress of Vilkači: Latvian National Opera

Latvian National Opera Orchestra

, Orchestra

The LNO Orchestra is a company of more than 100 musicians. The Orchestra's large scale repertoire includes more than 50 operas and ballets of different styles from baroque to contemporary works. The Orchestra performs approximately 250 times a season. At least four times a year, the musicians participate in different symphonic and opera music concerts.

Andris Nelsons, today one of the internationally most acclaimed young conductors, began his astonishing career at the LNO. Such outstanding musicians as Mariss Jansons, Mstislav Rostropovich, Tadeusz Woiciechowski, Cornelius Meister, Julian Reynolds and others have worked with the Orchestra as guest conductors. The LNO Orchestra has appeared in concerts together with Gidon Kremer, Marta Sudraba and great opera and ballet soloists from the entire world. Since the beginning of the 2009/10 season, the Lithuanian maestro Modestas Pitrenas is the Chief Conductor of the LNO, being the successor of Gintaras Rinkevicius.

Latvian National Opera Chorus

, Choir

The opera’s choir was founded in 1918, the same year as the Latvju Opera, established in Russia by Professor Jāzeps Vītols, returned to Riga. The first choir master was Pauls Jozuus. Since that time, opera performances in Riga have been unimaginable without the remarkable work of the choir. Though audiences were often critical of performances during the opera’s early years, the choir has always been highly regarded, as it continues to be today.

In 1995, following the reconstruction of the Latvian National Opera building, a new creative period began for the LNO Choir. The opera was praised not only by local audiences by also by foreign critics, who lauded the choir as a unified and very compatible ensemble. “The team of soloists and the choir’s achievement was remarkable – Shostakovich’s works have rarely sounded so adequate, tense, and precise,” wrote Sergei Hodnyev of the newspaper Kommersant, after the LNO’s guest performance in Moscow in October of 2007. The LNO Choir’s main qualities today are its temperament, stage sense, and steady tone, which won the choir the Latvijas Gāze Annual Award in 2006 and received a nomination for the Latvian Great Music Award in 2007, in the category “for a remarkable achievement by an ensemble.” Many LNO soloists blessed with superb vocal and acting talent have also come up from the ranks of the choir, including Kristīne Opolais, Antra Bigača, Evita Raituma, Dace Volfarte, Aleksandrs Antoņenko, Miervaldis Jenčs, Aivars Krancmanis, Rihards Mačanovskis, Armands Siliņš, Andris Lapiņš, and the remarkable chamber-music singer Ieva Parša.

The most famous LNO choir masters, under the direction of whom the choir has achieved a particular musical quality, include Pauls Jozuus (from 1919 to 1935), Teodors Kalniņš (from 1921 to 1940), and Haralds Mednis (from 1945 to 1969). Many others have been praised for their work with the choir during various time periods, such as Rūdolfs Vanags, Ansis Alberings, Juris Radiškevičs, Ilgvars Matrozis, Vilmārs Vasulis, Edgars Račevskis, Jānis Zirnis, Mārcis Katajs, Didzis Kauliņš, Normunds Vaicis, Mārtiņš Ozoliņš, and Andris Veismanis. Since 2006 the chief choir master at the LNO has been Aigars Meri.