Russian rewards

The Bolshoi Opera’s production of Boris Godunov, which they brought to Covent Garden last week, is in almost all respects in a time warp, though it turned out to be a most agreeable one. For the first time in many years, we were able to hear Rimsky-Korsakov’s version of the opera, which has been so widely execrated for its well-meant efforts to ‘correct’ Mussorgsky’s barbarous harmonies, and to enrich his orchestration, that one would only admit to enjoying it to one’s most confidential musical confessor. There are of course recordings of this allegedly vandalistic act easily available, among them one featuring the great Boris Christoff, who insisted (almost always) on using this version, which certainly provides the singer of the title role with a much bigger ego trip. But all we have seen recently have been either the extremely austere first version (the Mariinsky bought it to the Royal Opera last year) or the fuller but still pretty ascetic second, with more scenes, but still with the suffering Russian people as the centre of the action, rather than the anti-hero Boris (but why does Mussorgsky provide him with such undeniably noble music?).

Not only that, this production dates from 1948, and is to be retired next year. It was hard, I found, not to treat it as camp for the first scene, especially since the chorus still makes those gestures beloved of all opera choruses, but especially of Russian ones, turning to one another in horror or amazement, raising their arms in helpless gestures of supplication, and the rest of it. But with the arrival of the Boris, 29-year-old Mikhail Kazakov, a performer of immense power, grand of appearance and with a medium-sized but wonderfully beautiful and expressive voice, things attained their proper seriousness, and didn’t lose it. The celebrations, as pepped up by Rimsky, had superb élan, the whole show emerged from the inverted commas in which it had begun, and we settled down for an evening of convincing grandeur, intimacy, epic suffering and the intricate relations of private anguish and public courage.