1994 Edinburgh Festival most ambitious for years
1994 Edinburgh Festival most ambitious for years
By James Forrester [10 pts ML]
EDINBURGH, (Reuter): An Ancient Greek play performed in Russian at an ice rink and a drama acted out by 300 silent characters will be among offerings in the most ambitious and costly Edinburgh International Festival for many years.
Announcing details on Tuesday of the Scottish capital's annual three week arts extravaganza starting on Aug. 14, festival director Brian McMaster also unveiled wide-ranging programs of music and dance.
The modern dance highlight is the third consecutive season by America's Mark Morris Dance Group. Morris, a sellout in 1992 and 1993, is giving one of his most daring pieces, Handel's musical evocation of John Milton's pastoral poems L'Allegro, il Penseroso and il Moderato.
Classical dance is represented by Miami City Ballet with two works by George Balanchine.
Music includes all nine Beethoven symphonies, his opera Fidelio, the five piano concertos and an overview of works by Emmanuel Chabrier, all performed by world-renowned orchestras, soloists and conductors.
Australian Opera, making its first overseas trip with Britten's Midsummer Night's Dream, will hope to emulate the critical and public acclaim obtained last year by the Toronto- based Canadian Opera on its first visit abroad.
The major art exhibition, Monet to Matisse, is devoted to landscape painting in France from 1874 to 1914.
This year's festival has cost around 4.5 million pounds (US$6.7 million) to assemble. McMaster has managed to get more than a million pounds ($1.5 million) in sponsorship despite the recession but needs to sell more seats than ever before.
Some prices have risen, but at the lower end seats have been cut to four or five pounds ($6 to $7.50). The opening of the new Festival Theater and the use of some other large venues means an extra 24,000 seats are on sale.
Mahler's Symphony of a Thousand performed by the Royal Scottish National Orchestra conducted by Donald Runnicles opens the festival on Aug. 14, a Sunday.
The same orchestra gives the final concert on Saturday, Sept. 3, when the Australian Sir Charles Mackerras conducts Elgar's Dream of Gerontius.
The Scots-born Runnicles is virtually unknown in his homeland, though highly regarded in musical circles for his work in Europe and with the San Francisco Opera.
In between, Pierre Boulez conducts the British premiere of his latest work and Carl Maria Giulini makes his first appearance for 16 years to conduct the European Community Youth Orchestra.
Visiting orchestras include the Cleveland Orchestra from the United States, Stavanger Symphony from Norway, the London Philharmonic and Nord Deutsche Rundfunk from Hamburg.
Much of 1994's increased cost is for drama.
Peter Stein's mammoth 7-1/2 hour staging of Aeschylus' Oresteia was designed for Moscow's Army Theater, where it had its premiere in January.
Meadowbank Sports Stadium, originally built for the Commonwealth Games, is being used for the world premiere of Robert Lepage's view of Hiroshima, The Seven Streams of the River Ota.
The Schaubuehne Theater Berlin occupies the Festival Theater for the final four days with Peter Handke's wordless The Hour We Knew Nothing of Each Other.
More conventional drama is provided by J.M. Synge's The Well of the Saints from the Abbey Theater Dublin and John Arden's Armstrong's Last Goodnight.
There are two plays by Shakespeare -- one in German and the other in French -- and one by Goethe, in English.
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