“A people can best be known through their folk songs,” claimed Zoltán Kodály, one of the crucial proponents of Hungarian music, whose main ambition as a composer, collector of folk songs and music teacher was to inculcate a love for Hungarian folk song and to cultivate a knowledgeable audience.
The Spinning Room is the epitome of Kodály's efforts. When the Opera commissioned a full-length version of the work from the composer in 1931, it wasn't an opera that Kodály intended to write – instead his aim was to re-discover the Hungarian folk song and relay its simple dramatic power.
Kodály was of Polish extraction on his mother's side. And now, breaking with convention, audiences will get the chance to see through the eyes of a Polish director, Michał Znaniecki, how a foreign artist perceives this quintessentially Hungarian work.
In the first part, István "Szalonna" Pál and his Band's dance house will get the audience tuned in and keyed up for the Hungarian folk melodies.
General cast:
Conductor: Balázs Kocsár
The lady of the house: Erika Gál / Atala Schöck
Her suitor: Levente Molnár / Zsolt Haja
A young man: Adorján Pataki / Gergely Ujvári
Neighbour/The mother of the young man: Andrea Ulbrich / Bernadett Wiedemann
A girl: Andrea Rost / Rita Rácz / Orsolya Sáfár
The flea: Lajos Geiger / Zoltán Gradsach
The mother of the girl: Erika Kiss
Prologue: István “Szalonna” Pál and His Band
Featuring the members of the Duna Art Ensemble
Credits:
Director: Michał Znaniecki
Set designer: Luigi Scoglio
Assistant to the set designer: Alejandro Contreras Cortés
Costume designer: Magdalena Dabrowska
Animation and lighting designer: Bogumił Palewicz
Choreographer: Zsolt Juhász
Assistant to the choreographer: Edit Marosi
Dramaturg: Judit Kenesey
English surtitles: Elisabeth M. Lockwood
Chorus director: Kálmán Strausz
Premiere: Oct. 1, 2016
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