Khovanshchina (opera)

Main article: History of music in Russia

Actors

• Prince IVAN KHOVANSKY, chief of archers, bass
• PRINCE ANDREW KHOVANSKY, his son, tenor
• Prince VASILY GOLITSYN, tenor
• boyar SHAKLOVITNY, baritone
• DOSIFEI, head of schismatics, bass
• MARTHA, schismatic, mezzo-soprano
• SUSANNA, old schismatic, soprano
• PODYACHIY, tenor
• VARSONOFIEV, close to Golitsyn, bass
• EMMA, German Sloboda girl, soprano
• PASTOR, bass
• KUZKA, sagittarius, baritone
• STRESHNEV, chief of the "amusing" army, tenor
• 1-Y SAGITTARIUS, bass
• 2-Y SAGITTARIUS, bass

People, schismatics, archers, streltsy wives, hay girls

Plot: "Conspiracy of Princes" against the young and just beginning to reign Peter I

The path of retribution and strengthening of tsarist power that Peter І in real life passed in sixteen years (from 1682 to 1698) in Mussorgsky's opera, he passes in a matter of hours.

The chronological unification of several historical events served as a convenient historiographic basis for the composer for the conflict development of the plot, in which the decisive moment was the "conspiracy of princes" against the young and just beginning to reign Peter I.

Each of the participants in this conspiracy, by their birth, can claim the tsar's throne, and behind each of them is any of the social strata of the Russian state and the Russian people. Ivan Khovansky is in charge of secret political investigation services and archers. Almost all troops are subordinate to Vasily Golitsyn, except for the Petrovsky hired mounted warriors of the Reitars and the amusing regiment. Dosifei is followed by the forces of the Old Believers, and they are very likely to be joined by thousands of crowds of "newcomers" of desolate peasants who have lost their yards and ^[1].

The love triangle of Prince Andrei, Martha and Emma, the political line of Vasily Golitsyn, the fate of Ivan Khovansky's archers - none of these plots separately is able to fully dominate throughout the opera. She lives an inner life, a language life, a speech-sounding life, a life in which each of an infinite number of characters is actually part of a single whole. "Khovanshchina" is true to the not often rewritten letter of history, not dubious and contradictory ideals of any style, school or movement. She is faithful to the spirit of the time when the world is bursting at the seams, wrote Alexander ^[2].

Summary

Action one

Red Square in Moscow. Shines. Boyar Shaklovny protege of Princess Sophia dictates to the clerk a denunciation of Peter І to the head of the archers, Prince Ivan Khovansky, who planned to put his son on the throne and put the old order in Russia. Meanwhile, sentinel archers praise the recent crackdown on hated boyars. In memory of these bloody events, a pillar was erected on the square, where the names of the executed were carved. Newcomers stop at the pillar. They force the clerk to read the inscriptions to them.

Their idea of ​ ​ turmoil, of the Sagittarius self-power, plunders into grief.

Prince Ivan Khovansky appears to the greetings of the archers. He is followed by his son Andrei Khovansky, who pursues Emma, a girl from the German settlement, with his love claims. He tries to achieve Emma's love with promises and threats. The schismatic Martha, Andrei's recent lover, comes to her defense. This scene is seen by the returning Ivan Khovansky. He liked Emma himself, but Andrei is ready to kill her rather than give her to his father. The knife brought over the girl is imperiously taken away by Dosifei, the head of the schismatics.

Action Two

The office of Prince Vasily Golitsyn, the favorite of Princess Sophia. The prince is immersed in gloomy thought, overcome by fear of the future. The pastor of the German settlement comes to him with a complaint about the arbitrariness of the Khovansky, but the prince does not want to listen to him.

Martha penetrates the prince's chambers through a secret door. Appearing under the guise of a fortune teller, Martha predicts disgrace to the prince. Superstitious Golitsyn is in turmoil. To keep the prophecy secret, he tells the servant to drown the fortune teller, but Martha manages to hide.

Opponents of Peter І gather in Golitsyn's house. The conversation between Golitsyn and Khovansky's hidden rivals, who hate and fear each other, turns into a quarrel, which Dosifei stops. He urges them to humble the boisterous pride, to think about saving Russia. An agitated Martha runs in. She recounts the attempt on her life and the miraculous salvation that came from the soldiers of young Tsar Peter. The conspirators hear this name with alarm. But even worse is the news brought by Shaklovitny: the king learned about the conspiracy, branded him a hovanshchina and ordered him to "find."

Action three

Martha came to the Khovansky house in Zamoskvorechye. She is very worried about the betrayal of Prince Andrei. Dosifei, consoling, takes her with him. Woke drunk archers indulge in violent, reckless fun. He is interrupted to death by a frightened clerk. Trouble arose: mercilessly beating the inhabitants of the settlement, Peter's troops are approaching. Sagittarius stunned. They ask Khovansky to lead the regiments into battle. But, fearing Peter, the prince calls on the archers to submit and go home.

Action four

Picture one

Golitsyn's servant warns Khovansky, who has taken refuge in his estate near Moscow, that his life is in danger. Khovansky flashes anger - who dares to touch him in his own fiefdom? Shaklovny appears with an invitation from Princess Sophia to the Privy Council. Khovansky orders the front robes to be served. However, as soon as the prince leaves the chamber, the mercenary Shaklovitny hits him with a dagger.

Picture two

Reprisals await other conspirators: Prince Golitsyn was sent under escort into exile, the Reiters were ordered to surround schismatic monasteries. Only Andrei Khovansky does not know about the collapse of the conspiracy.

He does not believe Martha, who informed him of his father's murder, and blows his horn in vain, calling his regiment. However, seeing the archers, who are being executed, Andrei realizes that everyone has died, and in fear asks Martha to save him.

Sagittarius already bow their heads over the plaques, but the boyar Streshnev sent by Peter announces a decree of pardon at the last moment.

Action Five

Glade in a remote forest. Night. Alone, Dosifei mourns. He realizes the doom of the schismatics. Filled with courageous determination, he appeals to the brethren to burn in the fire in the name of the holy faith. The sounds of pipes come from the forest. Schismatics prayerfully pass into the monastery and set themselves on fire. Together with the brethren, Andrei also dies, whom Martha carried into the fire, dreaming of joining his beloved in death.

Character inconsistency

Ivan Khovansky - head of the Streletsky order

Prince Ivan Khovansky from the ancient, from the XIV century, the clan of the Lithuanian prince Gedimin. The head of the Streletsky order from 1680 to 1682, according to the contemptuous folk nickname Tararuy, that is, an empty house.

The image of Ivan Khovansky seems more integral, but the head of the secret police of that time, tyranny and a libertine containing two harems (Russian and Persian girls), was once a brave commander, defended the Russian land from enemy invasions and therefore now wants to become not only a strict boss, but also a native father, a "father" for his archers, whom ^[3]. Moreover, at this very moment he addresses them with a felt speech about the past military exploits, because he loves Russia with all his heart and wants to serve the salvation of the Russian power!

Andrey Khovansky

Prince Andrei Khovansky, the eldest son of Ivan Khovansky, headed the Court Order in 1682, but was executed almost immediately on charges of conspiracy.

Vasily Golitsyn

Prince Vasily Golitsyn, also from the Gedimin family, but inferior to Khovansky in gentility by one knee. The head of the Embassy Order, a powerful military leader, the first of the state husbands in the reign of Sophia, the princess's favorite and the subject of her passionate love.

Prince Vasily Golitsyn is a multilaterally educated and widely thinking politician of pro-Western views, but at the same time a very superstitious person, naturally good-natured, but capable of secret murder. At the time of his retribution, he rightly became famous for military victories and a skillful settlement of diplomatic relations with Ukraine and Poland. He decisively reorganized the Russian army and with numerous successes, as well as the extraordinary nature of his own personality, attracted the attention of Princess Sophia. True, later he "starved to death" two-thirds of the Russian army in the Crimean campaign against the Tatars, when the soldiers died out in hundreds in the steppes from diseases, but upon returning to Moscow he was declared the winner, since the Tatar army continuously retreated and never entered the battle. Focusing largely on Europe, he could become a sincere associate of Peter I, but fate developed so that, having fallen into favorites with his powerful sister, he joined the anti-Petrov conspiracy. He would also say to himself with full conviction that he is right: after all, he loves Russia with all his heart and wants to serve the salvation of the Russian power!

Old Believer monk Dosifei

Old Believer monk Dosifei nee Prince Myshetsky from the oldest, from the ІKh century walking, clan Rurik. One of the leaders of the split, authoritative in matters of faith. The prototype of this partly fictional character was Andrei Denisov, head of the Russian Old Believers, hegumen of the Vygovskaya Old Believer Desert, a well-educated writer-theologian and preacher.

The intelligent and disinterested Old Believer monk Dosifei also cares about the salvation of the Russian power and about love for the Russian people. He is by no means dogmatic - he stands up for the Lutheran Emma, and supports his spiritual daughter Martha in her fatal passion for Andrei Khovansky: "Endure, blueberry, love how you loved, and everything passed will pass." However, the thought of the audience involuntarily sharpens the worm of doubt: after all, Martha's love affair with Andrei will be politically beneficial for Dosifei if the young prince becomes king after the successful implementation of the conspiracy. In addition, none other than Dosipheus - in the great spiritual love for fellow believers - leads them to the monastery on a terrible fire.

Marfa

The nun in the world Martha nee Princess Sitskaya, the last representative of this ancient boyar family, maid of honor at the court of Peter and John, the spiritual daughter of Dosipheus and the abandoned mistress of the young prince Andrei Khovansky.

Martha appears to be emotionally whole in nature. But external manifestations of this integrity come in paradoxical forms: a nun and mistress, a Christian and a pagan fortune teller, a humble spiritual daughter and a fanatical schismatic who lures her former lover to be burned.

Nun Susanna

The nun Susanna is also a schismatic, apparently a completely fictional character by the composer: her clash with Martha and Dosipheus displays the sharp disagreements of the two branches of the Old Believers on the issue of love and church marriage.

Fedor Shaklovny

All characters in the opera are highly controversial. Fyodor Shaklovyny is a duma clerk, a non-native person by origin. He is the favorite of Princess Sophia and the head of the Streletsky order after the murder of Ivan Khovansky (1682), in turn executed on October 11, 1689, after the failure of his conspiracy against Peter І.

A low schemer and scammer, a traitor and a secret murderer, he turns to God with sincere words of pain and thought about the sad fate of the Russian people; however, at the end of his soulful aria-prayer, he does not forget to hint that the Lord, on occasion, will not forget to raise him to the throne, because he loves Russia with all his heart and wants to serve the salvation of the Russian power.

Emma

Orphan Emma is a young parishioner of the Lutheran church in the German settlement of Moscow. The historical sources on which Mussorgsky relied in the scenes with Emma and Pastor have not been sufficiently studied.

Boyarin Varsonofiev

Boyarin Varsonofiev is one of the sons of the noble boyar Mikhail Vasilyevich Varsonofiev, a confidant of Prince Vasily Golitsyn.

Tikhon Streshnev - okolnichy

The okolnichy, and later boyar Tikhon Nikitich Streshnev from a noble family that advanced at the beginning of the 16th century, the "tsar's guardian," a man who, by skillfully suppressing the Streltsy riots, earned the respect of Peter І, who granted him the privilege of "not shaving beards."

Scribe

In this "folk musical drama" (a genre subtitle given by the composer), all the characters are tragically contradictory - and they all die: from the princes to the nameless Podyachy, who, under the dictation of Shaklovitny, wrote a denunciation, but for his own safety wrote in handwriting on the eve of the murdered clerk - "dead sram is not present." However, he did not predict that his mysterious customer, "the future of the future," becoming the head of the Streletsky order, would first want to remove all witnesses of his intrigue and unparalleled elevation.

Typical idealistic representations of the composer

Mussorgsky investigated the historical process under the slogan of the philosophy of history: "The past in the present is my task."

The composer, mindful of the past, referring to the present and anticipating the future, quite definitely wrote: "They said the unknown and confused: power! And the order hut lives on, and the investigation is the same "- and then made a distinct and radiant historical conclusion:" We went ahead! - lying, in the same place! Paper, the book is gone - we are there. So far, the people cannot check firsthand that they are soliciting from it until they want themselves to concoct this or that with it - in the same place! All sorts of benefactors are much to become famous, documents to fix the glorification, and the people moan, and so as not to moan, the likh revels and moans: in the same place! " (letter to V.V. Stasov dated June 16 (22), 1872; highlighted by Mussorgsky).

Like many other people, Mussorgsky acutely feels injustice, but as a representative of the creative profession, he is unable to understand the prerequisites for this social situation due to the geography and economy of such a large country as Russia. The composer is not familiar with the situation of ordinary citizens in other countries of the world and falls into the traditional trap described by the saying "Good where we are not."

Mussorgsky wrote only the clavier of the opera. All orchestrations were made by others

Mussorgsky's folk musical drama, on the composition of which the composer worked between 1872 and 1881, remained unfinished and unordered. In the clavier (arranged for singing accompanied by a piano), two fragments remained unfinished. But if one of them, the composer's afterword for the scene of the failed conspiracy of three Russian princes - Golitsyn, Khovansky and Myshetsky (Dosifey) - at the end of the second action, is a small gap in one or more bars, then the other, with the scene of the self-immolation of schismatics, is the finale of the entire opera, the culmination of the work, and this loss seems conceptually irreparable.

There is no score as such at all - Mussorgsky orchestrated only two numbers from the third action: Martha the schismatic song "The Little Girl Came Out" and the archers choir "Rise Well Done" (it has not been published until 2025). Thus, "Khovanshchina" can only get to the stage with the participation of a co-author-editor who will finish the finale and orchestrate the clavier.

In his article "Variations on the theme of" Khovanshchina "Evgeny Levashev and Nadezhda Teterina describe the editions of the work prepared by researchers and composers in different years.

1880. Two versions of Mussorgsky: redundant and abbreviated

The musical materials remaining at the death of Mussorgsky make it possible to talk about two author's versions of Khovanshchina. The first of these researchers call redundant, and the second abbreviated.

The redundant version developed gradually and involuntarily, during the first seven years (1872-1879). As you know, Mussorgsky composed not only music and libretto, but also the plot itself, selecting the episodes he needed from huge historical and memoir factology. In the process of work, he refused many spectacular scenes he invented: for example, from the scene of a lottery with a spinning barrel, from which lottery tickets were taken, or from a picture of life in the German settlement, or from the "trial of schismatics over Martha, who committed adultery." But even after the exclusion of these scenes, the storylines remained overloaded and required new bills.

An abridged version appeared in 1879 or even 1880, when musical material matured and the composer began to think about submitting the text of the libretto to the censorship committee for permission to stage. That's when fourteen important cuts were made. Among them are a significant part of the dialogue between the Newcomers and Podyachy and Martha's conversation with Andrei Khovansky about his violation of the Streletsky oath (in the first picture), Vasily Golitsyn's conversation with the Lutheran pastor (in the second picture), a large section from Susanna's fierce dispute with Martha and Susanna with Dosifey (in the third picture) and, finally, a detailed episode from the opera's finale.

The author's redundant version in the musical manuscript became known to musicians almost immediately after the death of Mussorgsky (1881), when access to the composer's autographs was opened in the St. Petersburg Public Library. And in the form of a printed edition, this version appeared much later, fifty years later, as a result of the scientific and editorial work of the Moscow musicologist and textologist Pavel Lamm (1931).

The author's abridged version was released even later: in 1972, another outstanding musicologist-textologist, Mikhail Pekelis, found an abridged libretto of Khovanshchina in one of the Moscow archives and published it with comments.

1883. Editing by Rimsky-Korsakov

The creative edition and orchestration of Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, completed two years after Mussorgsky's death, was intended to immediately prepare the opera for performance in the theater and introduce the Russian audience to the masterpiece as soon as possible.

At Mussorgsky's funeral in 1881, when the coffin with the body of the deceased composer had already been lowered into the grave, Rimsky-Korsakov, according to the memoirs of his friend Ilya Tyumenev, "passing in the crowd, deliberately loudly (probably by prior persuasion) told Stasov that he would revise and edit everything that remained after the deceased and everything that was possible would be completed and released, starting with" Khovanshchina. " The process of redevelopment and editing lasted for two years and proceeded at Rimsky-Korsakov with a high degree of psychological tension and creative dedication. Exhausted by many works and worries, the composer sometimes could not stand the emotional overload and tore off his annoyance in autobiographical notes, later called the Chronicle of My Musical Life. But the irritated tone of the memories cannot provide a basis for superficial conclusions about the weaknesses of Mussorgsky's music. The situation is much more complicated.

The aesthetic positions of the two friends differed significantly, which did not interfere with their relationship during their lifetime, but led to an internal contradiction when Rimsky-Korsakov, who continued to live, took on a noble mission to introduce the work of the deceased Mussorgsky into the artistic world. The paradox is that if someone else's work adds an epigon, then this inevitably reduces its aesthetic value, if an independent, original artist is taken up, then a clash of creative attitudes of the co-authors is inevitable. The whole history of the editorial offices of Khovanshchina and its stage versions serves as confirmation of this.

It is impossible to instrument Mussorgsky's opera, relying on a complex of his technological composer's solutions, since Mussorgsky sought to convey the dramatic idea, without isolating the spheres of melody and accordion, rhythm and tempo, dynamics and timbre in some harmonious space, since they were not structurally self-sufficient for him, but performed an official role. Rimsky-Korsakov, being a great master of instrumentation, repeatedly heard "Khovanshchina" performed by the author on the piano. And in his score he tried to capture the sound, which, as he believed, corresponded to the artistic image revealed by Mussorgsky, who played the piano. Roman-Korsakov had to solve similar problems with understanding the events from the Russian history of the Time of Troubles.

Friends turned to the era of the XVII-XVIII centuries back in the early 1870s, when they lived together in a rented apartment, where one of them worked on Boris Godunov, and the other wrote the clavier and score of Pskovityanka. Then they repeatedly talked about the same era with art critic Vladimir Stasov, philologist and historian Vladimir Nikolsky.

To abandon his own perception of music, to assess the facts of Russian history, Rimsky-Korsakov was not able, which he spoke directly and sometimes sharply. Creative divergences were inevitable. In addition to reducing the plot by about one third, Rimsky-Korsakov completed two episodes - the end of the second act and the ending of the entire opera. At the end of the scene in the house of Ivan Khovansky, Fyodor Shaklovitny announces the denunciation and anger of Princess Sophia and Peter: "He called the khovanshchina and ordered to find it," Rimsky-Korsakov added the stage remark "Everyone is in bewilderment" and composed a large orchestral conclusion based on the theme of the introduction "Dawn on the Moscow River." The final, dying choir of schismatics was founded by Rimsky-Korsakov on the theme of the prayer "My Lord, the defender and patron, grazes Toy me. Gentlemen of truth are sinful. It will deprive us of nothing. " He adds an imitation of a flaring flame to the orchestral accompaniment; thanks to the composer's techniques of processing the theme, this scene becomes the culmination of the entire opera.

The premiere of "Khovanshchina" in the art edition of Rimsky-Korsakov took place in February 1886 in the popular "public space," which in the KhІKh century entrepreneurs often rented for concerts of guest performers, lectures and dance evenings - in the St. Petersburg hall Kononov on the embankment of the Moika River, 61 (for 2024, the entire building is occupied by St. Petersburg University of Telecommunications). The opera was performed by the amateur forces of the Music and Drama Circle under the direction of conductor Eduard Goldstein. A modest performance was given eight times, met with sympathy by the public, but then it did not become an artistic event and subsequently did not resume.

1898: Chaliapin productions at the Private Opera of Savva Mamontov and later at the Mariinsky and Bolshoi Theaters

The popularity of the composition gradually and especially clearly appeared on the tour of the Moscow Private Opera of Savva Mamontov in St. Petersburg in 1898, where Fyodor Chaliapin played the role of Dosifei. Performances took place on the stage of the Great Hall of the Conservatory, on the same Theater Square, where the Mariinsky Theater is located. Twenty-four-year-old Chaliapin, who was missed by the state scene a year earlier, was a vivid example of a "living attitude to art." In his work on the roles of Dosifei and Boris Godunov, he used the advice of the historian Vasily Klyuchevsky, who told him many details about historical eras. The images of the heroes "sculpted" with the artists Korovin, Vrubel, Serov, prepared musical parts with Sergei Rachmaninov, conductor of the Private Opera. Seeing the result, critic Vladimir Stasov loudly stated in the press: "Great happiness fell from heaven on us. A new great talent has been born. " There is a lot of evidence about Chaliapin the director: he passed with each of the soloists his part at the piano, worked a lot on the stage with the choir, sought the meaningfulness of the action of each artist, checked his views, intonations, gestures. He himself gladly recalled this, dictating later "Pages of My Life": "At the rehearsal, I saw that this opera was sung like" Rigoletto "or" Madame Butterfly "- that is, as an opera, the drama of which is not at all important, the libretto does not matter and which can be sung without words - everything is on" a "or on" oh, "on" y. " People come out in the appropriate era of attire - and this is not necessary, they go out and sing: one -a-a-a-a, the other - oh-o-o, the third - uh-e, and the choir itches - u-u-u! It can be done in a lot of fun, very scary, very boring - but it has nothing to do with the text of the opera and Mussorgsky's music. " This is how, according to the memoirs of tenor Andrei Labinsky, Chaliapin showed the performer how Martha should sing: "He began to sing quietly, swaying" The little girl came out. " In his voice he heard the inescapable longing of a Russian woman, fields scorched by the sun, but more and more carried away, the singer amplified the sound and somehow suddenly sang "Secret Forces" in full voice. And there was no passive woman, a powerful sorceress arose, it seemed that his wave could enchant everyone. "

Being finally the main thing in the play (as he had long dreamed of), Chaliapin involuntarily sidelined even the conductors. The long-term leader of the troupe of the Russian Opera, Eduard Napravnik, attending one of the rehearsals, removed himself from conducting Khovanshchina, realizing that he would be forced to obey Chaliapin's instructions in matters of pace. The premiere was released by 27-year-old Albert Coates.

The audience admired the artistic side of the productions. So, the scenery of "Khovanshchina" was created according to the sketches of Apollinarius Vasnetsov, it was with the design of Mussorgsky's opera that the artist began his study of old Moscow. The audience saw almost documented urban landscapes of the 17th century on stage.

The mammoth performance with Chaliapin made a great impression on Diaghilev. In 1907, when he organized "Historical Concerts" in Paris from the works of Russian composers, in one of the programs he included the fifth act of "Khovanshchina" (in the editorial and orchestration of Rimsky-Korsakov). This performance, judging by the memoirs of Maurice Ravel, did not pass without a trace for the audience. The next year, the French applauded the Diaghilev troupe already in a full-scale production of Boris Godunov on the stage of the Paris Opera. In 1909 Chaliapin was invited to sing "Boris" at La Scala, where the opera was hastily translated into Italian. After the international recognition of Chaliapin-interpreter Mussorgsky, Russian state theaters did not stand aside: in 1910, Boris and Chaliapin returned to the stage of the Mariinsky Theater, and in 1911, the director of the Imperial Theaters, Vladimir Telyakovsky, decided to stage the once rejected Khovanshchina.

In the Moscow performance, due to the dominance of Chaliapin, Joseph Suk refused to conduct Khovanshchina already at the dress rehearsal, and Telyakovsky was forced to send conductor-assistant Daniil Pokhitonov to the Bolshoi Theater. He successfully held the premiere and since then has become an approved "Chaliapin" conductor, it was with him that the singer preferred to perform in Paris and Petrograd. Daniil Pokhitonov will conduct almost all the performances of Khovanshchina at the Mariinsky (Kirov) Theater for another forty years - until the new production of 1952, the musical director of which will be the new chief conductor of the theater Boris Khaikin.

Chaliapin's performance gained huge success both in the Mariinsky and in the Bolshoi theaters. During the 1911-1912 and 1912-1913 seasons alone, Khovanshchina passed thirty-eight times, with the fees ahead of Evgenia Onegin.

Further stage successes of the creative edition and orchestration of Rimsky-Korsakov could not hide from experts its incomplete compliance with Mussorgsky's ideas. Outstanding music critic Vyacheslav Karatygin, who undertook at the beginning of the 20th century to catalog the composer's heritage, did not dare, however, to go further than preparing those episodes that were excluded by Rimsky-Korsakov. But the Karatygin definition of "Khovanshchina" as a "religious and political tragedy" was close to Mussorgsky's plan.

1913. Diaghilev's stage version: from folk musical drama to choral mystery

In 1913, a new version of Khovanshchina was created by Sergey Diaghilev. After the success of Boris Godunov, shown by his troupe in Paris in 1908, Diaghilev decided to introduce the Parisian audience to Mussorgsky's second opera. After studying the composer's manuscripts at the Public Library, he ordered his employees - Igor Stravinsky and Maurice Ravel - new orchestrations of individual numbers and a new opera finale.

The creative contaminated version of Diaghilev, Ravel and Stravinsky, created for the 1913 Paris production, was, on the one hand, an approximation to the original musical text (albeit with significant use of the Rimsky-Korsakov edition), and on the other hand, a significant departure from the plot of Mussorgsky's "folk musical drama." The opera was interpreted as a fashionable choral mystery in that era, almost as an oratorio with a worldview orientation to the religious motives of painting by Mikhail Nesterov.

The line of Vasily Golitsyn was completely excluded from the plot, for which the entire second act was thrown aside with scenes of Martha's fortune-telling and the conspiracy of the princes. The bustling world of archers turned out to be oratorially opposed to the spiritual world of schismatics. The culmination of the opera was to be Shaklovitny's aria "Spit Streletsky Nest," which Diaghilev planned to convey to Dosifey. However, Fyodor Chaliapin, the performer of the party of the head of the schismatics, flatly refused to make such a blasphemous change, did not teach musical text, and as a result this ingenious aria was also stopped. The score, which lay on the console of the Moscow conductor Emil Cooper, alternated numbers in the Rimsky-Korsakov orchestration with numbers instrumental by either Ravel or Stravinsky. The first performances on June 5, 7, 9 went with the final of Rimsky-Korsakov, and on June 16, 18 and 20 with the final of Stravinsky. At the same time, Ravel's instrumentation of Martha's song "The Little Girl Came Out" and the large final choir of schismatics, composed by Stravinsky in an ascetic-restrained manner, became a great creative success.

One way or another, both the directorial willfulness of the editors and their close attention to Mussorgsky's musical manuscripts subsequently prompted practitioners and textual scientists to carefully study the composer's autographs and to a detailed objective fixation of his plans.

Twelve Paris and London performances sparked a lively controversy in European music circles about Mussorgsky's legacy. In 1922, Khovanshchina entered the repertoire of the Paris Opera (in French). According to box office reports leaked to the press, Mussorgsky's folk dramas at that moment aroused more interest from the public than the operas of Verdi and ^[4].

1931. Scientific and academic edition of Pavel Lamm and orchestration of Boris Asafiev

The scientific and academic edition of Pavel Lamm, published in 1931 as a clavier, became a huge event in musical science and artistic culture. She had a great influence on the understanding of Mussorgsky's thinking by scientists and practical figures of the opera house, aroused the interest of major composers and conductors in the problems of creative editing and in the tasks of fundamentally new productions of Khovanshchina.

However, the Lammov edition was not created in anticipation of an imminent theatrical embodiment. She brought together and, if possible, scientifically systematized all the episodes and fragments of the "redundant version" of the author's version. The scientist especially stipulated that his task was "to print Mussorgsky's folk musical drama on the composer's autographs in full, with all versions of both musical and verbal texts." In the Lammov edition, the opera consisted of five acts, fundamentally different from the structure conceived by Mussorgsky himself, who was talking about six films (without dividing them into actions). In this respect, Lamm fully followed Rimsky-Korsakov, literally copying the five-act construction of the big opera to a historical plot.

The creative orchestral edition of Boris Asafiev, completed in 1931, was created in parallel with the textual work of Lamm, and both musicians actively collaborated for several years. But later their paths diverged: they fundamentally did not agree on their views on Mussorgsky's work.

The main and especially difficult task of Asafiev when working on the new instrumentation of Khovanshchina was to get rid of auditory inertia from the orchestral solutions of Rimsky-Korsakov. It was necessary to learn to hear the author's clavier in a different manner. Asafyev sought to approach Mussorgsky's "wise simplicity," his orchestration performed in accordance with the aesthetic principles of extreme modesty and timbre restraint. However, even at the time of the highest creative rise, the astute Asafiev still doubted that his version of Khovanshchina would not only be staged, but even published. The fears were confirmed: the Asafiev score was neither published nor used in the theater. The reason for this was not only the unavailability of the clavier and the dramatic weakness of the fifth action reconstructed by Lamm, but also socio-political circumstances. "Khovanshchina" at that time began to be assessed as a worldview unpredictable composition. The sharp change in the political situation in the 1930s and the ideological restructuring of all spheres of art that followed also played a negative role.

1950. Conductor Nikolai Golovanov's version: big style at the Bolshoi Theater

Fedor Fedorovsky Khovansky with security. Sketch. 1948. Paper, gouache. 31 × 43. Bolshoi Theater Museum

Red Square. Scene I of the action, 1950. Scenery by Fyodor Fedorovsky

Fedor Fedorovsky. Sagittarius. Makeup sketch. 1950. Paper, watercolor. 45 × 30.5 Bolshoi Theater Museum

The creative contaminated edition of Nikolai Golovanov, made by an outstanding domestic conductor, is based on the revision of Rimsky-Korsakov, but with the addition of scenes from the second act: the dialogue between Prince Golitsyn and the Lutheran pastor, Dosifey's messages about his origin from the Rurik family and a number of others, stopped by Rimsky-Korsakov.

Кабинет Голицына, сцена II действия, 1950. Декорации Fedor Fedorovsky

It was a continuation of the Asafiev decision, but already in the social context of the 1950s, in the era of awareness of the "historical roots of Russian statehood" and the exaltation of "Russian progressive historical traditions."

Fedor Fedorovsky. Streletskaya settlement. Sketch of the scenery for the opera. Oil on canvas. 1950. Bolshoi Theater Museum

Streletskaya settlement. Scene II of the action

The fundamental idea of ​ ​ the Bolshoi Theater performance, where Leonid Baratov directed, and Fyodor Fedorovsky as an artist, is the imminent death of all forces opposing progress: "Old, feudal Russia is opposed to the genius of Peter I and therefore doomed and dies" ^[5]

In the choirs of Khovansky. Scene III action. 1950

The main character is Peter I. The through line of counter-action is the motive for the doom of old Russia.

Fedor Fedorovsky. Execution of archers. Sketch of the scenery for the opera. ІІІ action, 2nd picture. 1950. Oil on canvas. 84,5 × 120. Bolshoi Theater Museum

Execution of archers. Scene III action. 1950

Skeet. Scene IV action. 1950

The bright future of the Russian people is a symbolic picture of dawn over the Moscow River.

After the premiere of the opera Khovanshchina in 1950, They sit: Golovanov - the second from the left, Fedorovsky - the far right.

Fyodor Fedorovsky decided the scenery and costumes for the performances so that they were perceived as a single picture that corresponded to the nature of the music. As his daughter, also an artist of the Bolshoi Theater, recalled, he said that Mussorgsky was a pasty, oil painting of dark, "hot" colors. Tchaikovsky is lighter, calmer paints, well, like gouache, and Glinka is a transparent watercolor. Music and painting for him was inextricable.

1959. Dmitry Shostakovich version

In 1952, the chief conductor of the Kirov Theater, Boris Khaikin, turned to Dmitry Shostakovich with a request to orchestrate several scenes. Shostakovich willingly took up this work. Back in 1920, as a student at the Conservatory and answering questions from a questionnaire on the creative process, among "favorite composers," he calls Mussorgsky and clarifies that he loves "everything," that is, all his works.

The creative edition and orchestration of Dmitry Shostakovich has been separated from the Golovanov version for only nine years, but how many changes have occurred during this time: a period of thaw has come, "enemies of the people" have returned from prisons and links, and the Russian people themselves have begun to comprehend the past in a slightly different way. Therefore, in the creative interpretation of Mussorgsky's opera, other accents were outlined: Newcomers appeared on the stage, who read the names of those executed on a stone pillar in the middle of Red Square and try to reach everything with their own understanding. Recall that this episode was in full form only in the redundant version of Mussorgsky.

Shostakovich relied in his work on the editorial office of Lamm and not only (after Mussorgsky) strengthened the dramatic line of the Newcomers, but also, contrary to Mussorgsky, brought its function to beyond limits.

Shostakovich's sound of the opera gained a darker flavor, including due to the appearance in the orchestra of low woodwinds that Rimsky-Korsakov did not have.

With all the dramatic features of Shostakovich's editorial office and with the phenomenal talent of the master of instrumentation, there are still musical shortcomings in his orchestral version, which can be defined by the word "overload." The composer instrumented all the numbers of the scientific and academic, that is, the combined Lammovsky, clavier, based in addition on the redundant version of Mussorgsky (the abbreviated version was not yet known to either Lamm or Shostakovich). The orchestra sounds expressionist, almost every fragment is presented at the extreme emotional level, while large lines of psychological upheavals and recessions are therefore devalued.

However, the most sensitive conductors, for example Valery Gergiev in the performance of the Mariinsky Theater, relieve such tensions, rushing development to strategically important climaxes, to the final scenes that complete each act, and with a special, almost inhuman force to the orchestral conclusion of the opera, to the picture of the terrible, essentially apocalyptic, fire of all ancient Russia.

Shostakovich also proposed his end of the musical drama: in his version, "Khovanshchina" ends not with a devastating fire with a sacrifice that leaves the audience in despair (like Rimsky-Korsakov), but with a weak hope for a better future. The self-immolation of the Old Believers, the Petrovsky soldiers breaking the gate of the monastery, where the schismatics locked themselves, is watched by the Newcomers - peasants who came to Moscow from ravaged villages. Then these witnesses of the disaster wander into the distance and see a new dawn on the Moscow River - Shostakovich repeats the introduction to the opera in the finale. Dawn squeals, a new day begins, a new circle of Russian history. Nameless witnesses from the people may be able to change something about it.

Film-opera of Vera Stroyeva

Shostakovich's orchestration of Khovanshchina was not immediately in demand. At first, a new version of the opera was performed in the film-opera of Vera Stroyeva, which was released in 1959. The main roles in it were played by the singers of the Bolshoi Theater. The success of the picture was not prevented either by the cool reaction of criticism, or by memos to the Central Committee reporting on "ideological mistakes," a few years later the film was nominated for an Oscar.

In the film version, Shostakovich also handed over to the "voice of the people" Shaklovitny's aria "Ah you, in the fate of ill-fated, native Russia" (which in Diaghilev's version Chaliapin refused to sing). And in the final, the Newcomers have their own word. The fire of the schismatic monastery is watched not by Petrovites who have fallen from horror, but by all those who understand and are wise with their hearts. Newcomers who repeat the words that once sounded at the beginning of the opera: "Oh, you, Mother Rus. You lived, you lived, you moaned. Who, now, will console you, comfort you... " After that, the scenery changes and the audience again admires the picture of dawn over the Moscow River.

1988. Version of the orchestration of Shostakovich Mariinsky Theater

The performance, created on the initiative of Valery Gergiev for the 150th anniversary of Mussorgsky, relied on the "classical" production, which has been going on at the Kirov Theater since 1952, but in the orchestration of Dmitry Shostakovich (edited in 1960). Gergiev made several more important conductor-production decisions. So, the second act after Shaklovitny's remark "Called the khovanshchina and ordered to find" ended in Shostakovich's editorial office with an orchestral conclusion built on the theme of the Preobrazhensky Peter's march with fanfare sounding backstage. Gergiev ends the scene according to Mussorgsky's intention, stated by the composer in a letter to Stasov: "Confusion is allowed by the entrance of Shaklovitny (scammer), announcing the receipt of a denunciation and the anger of Sophia and Peter. The picture (ends) on one formidable chord with the<...> curtain down. "<...>

The scenography of the final fire, in the fire of which schismatics along with Dosifei, Martha and Andrei Khovansky die, is another version of the end of the opera not Rimsky-Korsakov, Stravinsky or Shostakovich. The audience will not hear either the Petrovsky march of the amusing company, or the moralizing of the Newcomers, they will not console her goodbye with the music of dawn on the Moscow River. On the empty stage, Martha sets fire to a skete, engaged in fire devours people locked inside, blood-scarlet flames metaphorically absorb all the light that shimmers in the half-darkness of the scene. Mariinsky "Khovanshchina" ends with an ultra-strong sound of the orchestra, which, almost as in the biblical legend, burns, but does not burn.

Music

Final Chorus: A chant of Old Believers rising to the bonfire

My Lord grazes me. The final choir of Khovanshchina, a chant of Old Believers rising to the fire, exists only in the form of a sketch of the choral line, to which a clavier melody is attributed in the second stanza, imitating a light pizzicato of strings. To crown the opera with endless interweaves of destinies, eras and a tightly connected tangle of conflicting thoughts, it was supposed to be "coloratura (there are suggestions that the word was used in the meaning of" archaic ") church chant by all choir in unison," as Mussorgsky wrote to Stasov. The melody vaguely resembles one of the variations of the introduction, "Dawn on the Moscow River," in "Khovanshchina" everything is literally connected with everything. Leittems are not given explicitly, but are gradually formed in the mind of the listener, float to the surface through the thickness of verses, repetitions and ^[6].

Painting death as purification, as the highest point of the earth's path, as the moment of resolving contradictions and clarifying consciousness, Mussorgsky, who is on the verge, scares and delights.

Notes