In the 42nd season, the Hvorostovsky Krasnoyarsk Opera and Ballet Theatre is going to introduce several premières of operas by contemporary Russian composers. They are The Haze by Kirill Shirokov, A Feast in Time of Plague by Alexander Manotskov, and  Night at the Museum by Pyotr Pospelov. The creators of these extraordinary cultural events will give the opera’s presentations to let the audience encounter with the performances.

The first shot is the opera The Haze. On September 5, its creators - composer Kirill Shirokov, director Elizaveta Korneyeva, production artist Varvara Timofeyeva - summoned a meeting with the staff of the Krasnoyarsk Opera House and discussed their work. On September 6, a meeting with future spectators of the opera will be held at the Hvorostovsky Siberian State Institute of Arts.

The Haze opera is a project of the ProvMyza art group, it’s co-written along with Mark Buloshnikov. It was first staged in 2013, selected for the Mask Plus programme (the out of competition one) and received the Innovation Prize of the Golden Mask festival. The author of the libretto is Anton Shramenko, a poet from Kyiv.

“The story takes place on a car accident scene that has just happened and that the opera’s protagonists are involved in. They are father, mother, son and daughter. The accident also kills a dog, two pigeons and a bush. The characters stay between life and death, in a kind of “haze” - a specific moment of death, and the opera itself is an extended split second of disaster. Musically, this opera is beyond any classical canons. The opera scenes consist of seven "songs about the afterlife", based on the minimum amount of material. In fact, on one or two notes, but they produce the most expressive effect. The voice and instrument constantly slide from these basic notes; a beating occurs between very close tones. It fills the space and has the maximum emotional impact on the audience. This is absolutely unconventional orchestral chamber music,” said Kirill Shirokov.

Now the production group including soloists and the orchestra (it’ll also become the opera’s protagonist!) will have to create an experimental opera based on the libretto and score. Then, spectators will be involved in the creative process at this immersive performance.

“The opera does not have a clearly defined plot, which means that there is a space for some emotional work, a spectator can independently construct a picture of what is happening,” explained the artist Varvara Timofeyeva.