Legend of Tsar Saltan [VHS]

Badly cut but enjoyable
My introduction to Tsar Saltan was in the late 1960s via a badly worn out library copy of a Belgrade Opera performance. Since then I've enjoyed the 1954 Bolshoi recording over many listenings. I only recently became aware of this video and I've now watched it 3 times, once with libretto in hand. True, it is very badly cut. The Bolshoi recording comes in at about 147 minutes and this is only 98 - about 1/3 of the score is missing. The prologue is fairly complete but then the cuts get worse and only about 1/2 of Act IV is here. The most regrettable cuts, in my view, are the duet between Guidon and the Swan Princess in Act IV (and the tranformation) and the wonderful interlude in the same act. The transformation gets moved to the last scene and that necessitates some rearrangement of the action. It works ok but you have to ask why they did that. The other aggravating bit is the close of the opera where the credits roll and then roll again over the performance. Who made that editing blunder? (The full credits also appear at the beginning and between the Prologue and Act I...talk about overkill.) All of that said, I enjoyed the production, warts and all. I was concerned that it wouldn't wear well through repeated watchings but I still like it after #3. The performance is solid and lively. It's no where up to the standards of the other videos of Rimsky's operas (Sadko, Mlada, Coq d'Or and Tsar's Bride) but I'm glad that there is a video of Tsar Saltan. Hopefully this is a stop gap and there will be a decent DVD at some point in the not distant future. If the performance were complete I'd give this 4 stars. 50 minutes of cuts does hurt, at least if one is familiar with the work. Why they did so much cutting I've no idea. Maybe the Russian to German translator was paid by the word and they ran out of funds.

One of Nicolai Rimsky-Korsakov's Fairytale Operas
Sung in German with no English subtitles, this is the Harry Kupfer production from Dresden's Semper Opera House. The film was made in 1978, in what was then East Germany, and makes a hash out of Pushkin's original story. This version is so heavily cut as to render the storyline almost incomprehensible. Even the best piece in the opera (the lovely tenor aria from Act III) is gone! With its Russian origins so obscured by conventionally schlocky costumes and makeup, one would hope the cinematography would compensate for it. Alas, this is not the case either - most of the camera work is truly hokey. The singers do a good job (they are identified only at the end); kudos must go to the wonderful Semper orchestra and conductor. This is a video that should interest only the serious student of Russian opera. And, unfortunately, if you don't speak German, it will go over like a lead balloon.