The Sofia Opera and Ballet will visit the Macedonian stage with “Electra” by Richard Strauss. This will be the first tour of our ballet troupe at the National Opera and Ballet in Skopje, reports the institution. The event will take place on May 15, 2024 in the May Opera Evenings festival program.
The reason for the tour of the native ballet troupe in Skopje is a Memorandum of Cooperation between the Sofia Opera and Ballet and the National Opera and Ballet, Skopje. The document was signed on November 14 in Sofia by the directors of the two institutions, Plamen Kartalov and Vaso Ristov. At a special meeting, the two talked about establishing cultural exchange and carrying out activities to promote joint cooperation in the field of culture and art, about artistic exchange, co-productions, sharing of experience and other activities for the realization of opera and ballet projects.
Ristov himself has already seen productions of the Sofia Opera. This summer he was a guest at the festival dedicated to the 210th anniversary of the birth of Richard Wagner.
“I watched Tristan and Isolde and I was thrilled – he commented. – It was beautiful. Very high quality and amazing organization of the festival. This tour is the first step towards further joint projects and, if health is good, we will invite the Sofia Opera with one of Wagner’s productions”.
The good relations between the two institutions also became clear with the restored staging of the opera “Lydia of Macedonia” by Risto Avramovski, presented on September 16 in Skopje in the directorial concept of Plamen Kartalov. This title started the new season of the Skopje Opera, it was also played at the Ohrid Summer International Festival.
The opera “Electra” has already achieved international success. The performance was presented for the first time in Bulgaria on November 26, 2020, conducted by Evan-Alexis Christ and directed by Plamen Kartalov. This year, on October 20 and 21, with this production, the Sofia Opera was invited to the twentieth anniversary edition of the International Opera Festival in Daegu, South Korea. After the rapturous reception of the audience, the production of the Sofia Opera received the Grand Prize of the festival.
Look more: 13 MINUTES OVATION FOR THE SOFIA OPERA IN SOUTH KOREA
