In 1865, Georges Bizet meets Celeste Venard on the train: she impresses him with her colorful personality and greatly influences the composer. Most probably, she has served as the prototype for Carmen of the opera of the same name.
“How true and how rude it all is!” Bizet comments after the spectacular failure of the premiere of “Carmen” in 1875. He is accused of immorality only for daring to show for the first time on the opera stage not knights and princesses but actual living people: a female worker in a tobacco factory, an ordinary soldier, a village maiden, smugglers and gypsies.
A few months after the composer’s untimely death, “Carmen” reaps a phenomenal success in Vienna and becomes one of the most popular and most performed operas in the world.
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Plamen Kartaloff delivers a quite unusual interpretation of Bizet’s masterpiece: an attractive combination of elements of ancient Greek tragedy and theater. It is no coincidence this performance achieved such a huge success during the Sofia Opera’s tour in Japan, in 2018.
On the 13th of October, we will see Violeta Radomirska as Carmen, Daniel Damyanov as Don Jose, Veselin Mihaylov as toreador Escamillo and Aleksandrina Mihaylova who was awarded a scholarship from the “Raina Kabaivanska” fund; she will debut in the role of Michaela. The Sofia Opera orchestra and choir will perform under the directorship of Zhorzh Dimitrov.