Dreamlike 'Prince Igor' Brings Russian Drama to Met Live on March 1

POTSDAM, NY (02/20/2014)(readMedia)-- The Metropolitan Opera will present Alexander Borodin's historic Russian epic, "Prince Igor," for the first time in nearly 100 years, in an acclaimed new production. The Met: Live in HD will bring the operatic masterpiece to movie screens around the world on Saturday, March 1.

Borodin's defining Russian epic, famous for its "Polovtsian Dances," will come to the Met for the first time since 1917. Dmitri Tcherniakov's new production is a brilliant psychological journey through the mind of its conflicted hero, with the founding of the Russian nation as the backdrop.

Star bass-baritone Ildar Abdrazakov takes on the monumental title role, as the heroic Prince Igor, a 12th-century ruler who defended Russia against invading Polovtsian forces. Gianandrea Noseda, a specialist in Russian music, will conduct a new edition of the opera -- left unfinished by Borodin at the time of his death in 1887. The cast also includes Ukrainian soprano Oksana Dyka in her Met debut as Igor's wife, Yaroslavna.

"The wonderful staging is dreamlike, wrenchingly human and viscerally theatrical," The New York Times raved.

Borodin's "Prince Igor" will screen live from the Metropolitan Opera stage at noon on Saturday, March 1 at Potsdam's Roxy Theater. There will be an encore screening at 6 p.m. on Sunday, March 9.

The opera will be performed in Russian, with English subtitles. The approximate running time is four hours, 30 minutes, including two intermissions.

The 2013-14 season of The Met: Live in HD is sponsored in the North Country by SUNY Potsdam's Crane School of Music and J.S. Cinemas.

All productions will be shown live worldwide on Saturdays. There will also be encore presentations offered on Sundays locally. Doors open a half-hour before show time, and there is immediate seating for advance ticket holders.

In The Met: Live in HD, robotic cameras, strategically placed around and behind the stage, capture the beauty and power of live performance from striking angles, and heighten attention to both performance and production. Intermission features and English subtitles bring the stories to life.

Tickets prices are the lowest available in the nation: $18 for an adult, $15 for senior citizens, $12 for students and $9 for youth age 18 and under.

Tickets are available by calling the Community Performance Series Box Office at (315) 267-2277, or visiting the Roxy Theater or Northern Music & Video in downtown Potsdam or the CPS Box Office in the lobby of Sara M. Snell Music Theater. You can also reserve tickets online by visiting www.cpspotsdam.org or www2.potsdam.edu/cps/eventpgs/methd.html.

For more information on the 2013-14 The Met: Live in HD season, visit the Metropolitan Opera website at www.metopera.org/hdlive.

To learn more about SUNY Potsdam's Crane School of Music and its award-winning opera program, visit www.potsdam.edu/crane.

Founded in 1886, SUNY Potsdam's Crane School of Music has a long legacy of excellence in music education and performance. Life at Crane includes an incredible array of more than 300 recitals, lectures and concerts presented by faculty, students and guests each year. The Crane School of Music is the State University of New York's only All-Steinway institution.

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Posted Thursday February 20, 2014 at 01:37 pm by SUNY Potsdam
Last Updated Thursday February 20, 2014 at 04:16 pm