The Fate of a Nation

Khovanshchina is not exactly a rarity: although it was left unfinished at the time of Mussorgsky’s death, a series of orchestrations and completions – by Rimsky-Korsakov, by Ravel and Stravinsky, and by Shostakovich – have kept it alive at the edges of the repertoire. It is nonetheless a work that demands great singers, a great choir and a director of uncommon vision in order to thrive; one could easily go through life without witnessing a truly remarkable staged performance.

The superb new production at the Staatsoper Unter den Linden not only met the opera’s demands, but surpassed them in nearly every way, systematically destroying any possible reservations one might have had about Mussorgsky’s unusual narrative structure or earnestly forceful music. Directed by Claus Guth and conducted by Simone Young, this Khovanshchina – performed in…