Sergei Prokofiev (1891–1953)
War and Peace, op. 91 (1941-52) 
Libretto by Sergei Prokofiev and Mira Mendelson-Prokofieva, after the novel of the same name by Lev Tolstoy
Prince Andrei Bolkonski – Andrei Zhilikhovsky
Natasha Rostova – Olga Kulchynska
Count Pierre Bezukhov – Arsen Soghomonyan
Bayerischer Staatsopernchor
Bayerisches Staatsorchester/Vladimir Jurowski
rec. live, 3 March, 2023, National Theatre, Munich, Germany
BSO Recordings BSOREC2006 Blu-ray [258]

This production of Prokofiev’s opera War and Peace was named “Best New Production” by the International Opera Awards for 2023 and “Staging of the Year” by Opernwelt, the influential monthly German magazine that also covers operetta and ballet. There is little doubt that the production and performances of War and Peace presented at the Bavarian State Opera in 2023 were hugely successful among audiences and critics alike. Audience reaction at the end of this Blu-ray disc was very enthusiastic and approving of this treatment of Prokofiev’s masterpiece, despite its numerous cuts and stage director Dmitri Tcherniakov’s rather radical production. 

Conductor Vladimir Jurowski and Tcherniakov were planning a presumably more conventional and probably more complete  performance of this opera when in February of 2022, Russia invaded Ukraine. For a time it appeared the project might be canceled, but the two managed to put together a version and music that downplayed Russia’s victory in the Leo Tolstoy story and portrayed events to show the futility and brutality of war. Beside the many cuts, the opera’s glorious choral ending was eliminated and replaced with new scoring for orchestra only by Jurowski who used music in piano score from an earlier version of the opera. Much of this is explained by Tcherniakov and Jurowski in an interview in one of the bonus features on the disc. Thus, this is hardly the War and Peace you are familiar with and in the end must be judged a most unusual version. 

Unusual, indeed; the set is a replica of sorts of the grand hall of Moscow’s House of the Unions, a large hall with many pillars, ornate chandeliers and a long balcony. It was a rather notorious place during the Soviet era of Russia as it served as the courtroom for Stalin’s political trials, or “show trials”, and where that leader and Lenin had lain in state as throngs of admirers and mourners passed through. It was also the place where Prokofiev, Shostakovich and other composers were denounced for incorporating “formalism” in their music by the government cultural overseer Andrei Zhdanov. 

The opera’s story is presented in a somewhat chaotic fashion: the stage is crowded with people throughout, apparently refugees from some unspecified war. Some are mulling about while others are shown on field mattresses and cots. They present the action on stage through stories about love, grand balls, war or war games, etc. As Tcherniakov explains in an interview in the bonus section, “they tell a story that didn’t happen but which could happen.”

Russian patriotic aspects are removed or minimized and there is often a light-heartedness to the action as it proceeds through the early stages, but gradually the tension grows and the mood turns deadly serious and you get the message about the horrors of war. Along the way, you see the leaders of the opposing forces, Field Marshal Kutuzov and Napoleon Bonaparte, depicted in mostly unflattering ways. Kutuzov is rather supercilious and slovenly, striking you as a sort of repulsive slob. Napoleon is portrayed as an arrogant clown, a truly laughable character whose musings over battle strategies and reminiscences of his previous military successes only serve to emphasize his pompous fatuousness. On the other hand, the leading characters, the lovers Natasha Rostova and Prince Andrei Bolkonski, and Count Pierre Bezukhov, are treated as victims of the brutal happenings. 

On the whole, this production and its radical approach to the opera, work quite well—that is, if you find Regietheater fare to your liking. Traditionalists will likely view the performance on this disc as distasteful and confusing because of the plethora of people and puzzling activity taking place on stage throughout the story, not to mention the numerous changes in the story line and the current day costuming of street clothes for most of the characters. Some characters are clothed in special attire: Napoleon wears a blue jacket, red satin trousers and knee-high boots, collectively striking one as being more appropriate for a children’s fantasy story. Kutuzov and Platon Karatayev wear military fatigues, the former rather sloppily. A few others in the background can be seen in similar military garb. 

The singing, straight down through the cast is absolutely impressive. There isn’t a weak or merely passable performance by any of the cast members. Even the lesser roles are sung convincingly: Madame Peronskaya and the Shopkeeper, for example, are sung by Olga Guryakova, who was a superb Natasha on the TDK DVD recording derived from the Paris Opera production of War and Peace in 2000. (I’ll have more to say later about this recording.) There are about seventy roles in this opera, and thus the excellent casting is quite miraculous, even considering that Scene 10 (of 13) is cut and some characters are eliminated. There are so many highlights here that one could pick out scenes almost at random to cite examples of superb singing and great dramatic skills. 

The opening scene featuring Andrei Zhilikhovsky (Andrei), Olga Kulchynska (Natasha) and Alexandra Yangel (Sonya) is beautifully sung by all parties and here Prokofiev’s writing with those lush melodies and warm harmonies captures the mood and mixtures of emotions so brilliantly. The later death scene between Natasha and Andrei is very touching too—many have regarded this powerful tragic scene as the finest in this opera. I won’t argue the point. Again both sing beautifully and with intense passion. By the way, in this version Andrei dies from a self-inflicted wound. In the final scene Dmitry Ulyanov (Kutuzov) too, suffers a different fate from that in the libretto and in other performances of this opera; with usual artistic sensitivity, Ulyanov sings his last solo, supposedly in triumph, and then after declaring “Russia is saved now” unexpectedly climbs onto a bed decorated with flowers, streaming sashes and other ornate trimmings and lies in state, his character apparently succumbing to a war wound or to war itself. Or is his sudden death symbolic, indicating that in war no one triumphs, that there are no winners, only losers. 

The chorus must also be given high praise for their excellent singing throughout the opera. Try the Epigraph entitled “The forces of two and ten European nations”, which launches the War section. This is one of the highlights of the opera, simply one of the great choruses from this work. Yet it’s not just the fine singing of the chorus that makes this number so compelling but also Maestro Jurowski’s deft balancing between the chorus and orchestra. You hear so much meaningful detail and in tempos that some other conductors tend to rush. 

Jurowski in fact consistently demonstrates a thorough grasp of Prokofiev’s music throughout this opera. For example, the waltzes at the Grand Ball in Scene 2 are played as well as I’ve ever heard them. His reading of the score is as vital and insightful as one might find in any other fine performance. Too bad politics intervened and couldn’t allow a complete performance of Prokofiev’s score. He would likely do wonders with it. Orchestral balances are always well judged and tempos seem perfectly appropriate. Jurowski’s orchestra plays in world-class style too. In the end, you can’t fault anything significant on the musical side of the performances here.

The picture quality and camera work are state of the art, and the sound reproduction is excellent. As for the competition, on video you have the aforementioned Paris Opera production of stage director Francesca Zambello, led by Gary Bertini and with splendid performances by Ms. Guryakova, Nathan Gunn as Andrei and Robert Brubaker as Pierre. Though there are some cuts, it is the best “traditional” rendering of War and Peace on video. Gergiev in a 1991 Mariinsky Theatre production (Graham Vick, stage director) is reasonably good (and complete) but the 4:3 picture format detracts significantly. There was a Seattle Opera production led by Mark Ermler once available on a label called Encore that is rather forgettable. 

On CD Mstislav Rostropovich, with Galina Vishnevskaya as Natasha, on Erato offer a complete version in excellent sound from 1986 and it is still the first choice in this format. Richard Hickox, on Chandos, leads a fine complete version (from 1999) that is also worthy of consideration. The pioneering Alexander Melik-Pashayev War and Peace from the early 1960s on Melodiya features a Natasha in the person of the young Galina Vishnevskaya in great form and it too, despite dated sound and cuts, is worth attention. 

How does this new Bavarian Opera performance compare with the others? As suggested above, it’s in a category by itself: if you favor (or tolerate) Regietheater fare, then you will find this a quite fine effort. Still, one can argue that it’s too bad it was influenced by events surrounding the Russia-Ukraine war. Consider this: at the time of their recording of this opera the dissident couple Mstislav Rostropovich and his wife soprano Galina Vishnevskaya lived abroad as expatriates, the Soviet Union having stripped them of their citizenship in the late-1970s. (The two would eventually return after the USSR’s dissolution in 1990.) Arguably their main project in exile was that recording of War and Peace. If they had thought the work was a hymn to Stalin or to the Soviet Union, as some have claimed, I’m sure they would not have done it. Rostropovich was a friend of Prokofiev, and knew the composer intended the work to be one of great art, not a political statement even though he had to weather pressure by the cultural bosses to beef up the war section of the opera and make some changes to the libretto. 

I should think then that the current political situation should not make one concerned that a traditional production of this work would be tantamount to supporting Russia over Ukraine. The irony of all this is that Prokofiev was born in Ukraine. True, he had Russian parentage and, like many from Eastern Ukraine, tended to identify as Russian. At any rate, let’s get politics out of music, out of opera, whenever it is feasible. I may be a voice in the wilderness, but there you have it.

Robert Cummings

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Other cast
Sonja – Alexandra Yangel
New Year’s Eve Ball Host – Kevin Conners
New Year’s Eve Ball Footman – Alexander Fedin
Maria Dmitrievna Akhrossimova – Violeta Urmana
Peronskaja – Olga Guryakova
Count Ilya Andreyevitch Rostow – Mischa Schelomianski
Countess Helene Bezukhova – Victoria Karkacheva
Anatoly Kuragin – Bekhzod Davronov
Lieutenant Dolokhov – Alexei Botnarciuc
The Bolkonskis’ old footman – Christian Rieger
The Bolkonskis’ maid – Emily Sierra
The Bolkonskis’ valet – Martin Snell
Princess Maria Bolkonskaya – Christina Bock
Prince Nikolai Andreievich Bolkonski – Sergei Leiferkus
Balaga – Alexander Roslavets
Matryosha – Oksana Volkova
Dunyasha – Elmira Karakhanov
Gavrila – Roman Chabaranok
Metivier – Stanislav Kuflyuk
French Abbot – Maxim Paster
Denissov – Dmitry Cheblykov
Tikhon Shcherbaty – Nikita Volkov
Fyodor – Alexander Fedorov
Matveyev – Sergei Leiferkus
Vassilissa – Xenia Vyaznikova
Trishka – Solist(en) of the Tölzer Knabenchors
Field Marshal Mikhail Kutuzov – Dmitry Ulyanov
Adjutant to Kutuzov – Alexander Fedin
1st Staff Officer – Liam Bonthrone
2nd Staff Officer – Csaba Sándor
Napoleon – Tómas Tómasson
Aide-de-Camp to General Compans – Alexander Fedorov
Aide-de-Camp of Murat – Alexandra Yangel
Marshal Berthier – Stanislav Kuflyuk
General Belliard – Bálint Szabó
Prince Eugene’s aide-de-camp – Granit Musliu
Backstage voice – Aleksei Kursanov
Aide de camp of Napoleon’s suite – Thomas Mole
De Beausset – Kevin Conners
Captain Ramballe – Alexander Vassiliev
Lieutenant Bonnet – Aleksey Kursanov
Captain Jacqueau – Csaba Sándor
Gérard – Liam Bonthrone
A young factory worker – Granit Musliu
Shopkeeper – Olga Guryakova
Mavra Kusminichna – Xenia Vyaznikova
Ivanov – Alexander Fedorov
Marshal Davout – Bálint Szabó
French Officer – Andrew Hamilton
Plato Karataiev – Mikhail Gubsky
Two God-fearing men  Kevin Conners, Christian Rieger
Two French actresses – Jasmin Delfs, Jessica Niles

Production & Video Details
Director and set designer – Dmitry Tcherniakov
Choirmaster – David Cavelius
Costumes – Elena Zaytseva
Lighting – Gleb Filshtinsky
Master of Arms – Ran Arthur Braun
Dramaturgy – Analena Weres, Malte Krasting

Picture format: UHD/NTSC 16:9 
Sound format: PCM Stereo and DTS HD MA 5.1
Region Code: A, B, C
Language: Russian – Subtitles: German, English, Russian, French, Ukrainian, Japanese, Korean