Opera "The Queen of Spades" by P. I. Tchaikovsky, libretto based on the story of the same name by A. S. Pushkin. Tchaikovsky's opera "The Queen of Spades". history of creation, the best arias from the opera, the best performers Composition and vocal parts

Libretto by M.I. Tchaikovsky based on the story by A.S. Pushkin

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Petersburg. Summer garden. Passing by lively groups of people walking, Surin tells Chekalinsky about yesterday’s card game: as always, Herman was sitting near the gambling table; all night he looked gloomily at the game of others, but did not take part in it himself.

Herman and Count Tomsky come to the garden. Herman is in love with a girl whose name he does not know, he only knows that she is noble and therefore cannot be his wife.

Prince Yeletsky informs his friends that he is getting married. Herman asks who his fiancée is. “Here she is,” says Yeletsky, pointing to Lisa, who is accompanying her grandmother - the old countess, nicknamed the Queen of Spades. Lisa is the girl with whom German is in love.

“Happy day, I bless you!” - says Yeletsky. “Unfortunate day, I curse you!” - exclaims Herman.

Tomsky tells those around him that in her youth the Countess was a beauty. A passionate gambler, she once, while in Paris, lost completely.

Count Saint-Germain gave her three win-win cards, which helped the “Moscow Venus” regain her fortune. The Countess is predicted that death will be brought to her by the one who, burning with ardent passion, comes to her to find out what kind of cards these are. Tomsky's story makes a strong impression on German.

The garden is empty. A thunderstorm begins. The storm does not frighten Herman. He swears that Lisa will belong to him, or he will die.

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Lisa's room in the Countess's house. Lisa's friends have gathered. Lisa and Polina sing the duet “It’s already evening; The edges of the clouds have darkened..." Polina performs the sad romance “Darling Friends,” but immediately switches to the Russian dance song “Come on, Little Light Mashenka.” The fun is interrupted by a strict governess - the countess is angry: it’s already late, the girls are disturbing her sleep. The girls disperse.

Left alone, Lisa confides her deepest secret to the “queen of the night”: she loves Herman.

Herman appears at the door of the balcony. He confesses his love to Lisa.

But there is an authoritative knock on the door. The old countess herself comes to Lisa to find out the cause of the noise disturbing her peace. Having managed to hide in the depths of the balcony, Herman remembers the legend of the three cards. For a moment, love for Lisa gives way to a burning desire to find out the secret of the cards.

The Countess leaves, and Herman comes to his senses. With even greater passion, he tells Lisa about his love. At first, Lisa begs him to leave, but then, conquered by the strength of his feelings, she utters words of reciprocal confession.

Act 2

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A ball at a rich dignitary. Yeletsky notices that Lisa is sad and asks to tell him the reason for her sadness. But Lisa avoids explaining. She is not touched by the groom’s pleas, she is indifferent to Yeletsky.

Lisa gives Herman the key to the secret door of the Countess's house: they need to meet. The path to Lisa's room lies through her grandmother's bedroom. It seems to Herman that fate itself is helping him to recognize the three treasured cards.

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The countess's bedroom. From here, Herman must sneak into Lisa's room. Obsessed with the desire to know the three cards, Herman decides to stay here and get the coveted answer from the countess.

The countess, returning from the ball, having driven away the hangers-on and maids, recalls her youth, the brilliant balls in Paris.

Herman suddenly appears and asks the Countess to reveal to him the secret of the three cards. The old woman is silent. Herman, threatening with a pistol, demands to tell him these three cards. The Countess dies of fear.

Hearing the noise, Lisa runs into the bedroom. Seeing the dead countess, she exclaims in despair: “It wasn’t me you needed, but the cards!”

Act 3

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Herman's room in the barracks. Herman reads Lisa's letter. She asks him to come to the embankment for an explanation.

Memories of the death and funeral of the Countess haunt Herman: he imagines the ghost of an old woman. She orders Herman to marry Lisa, and then three cards - three, seven, ace - will win in a row.

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Kanavka embankment. It's approaching midnight. Lisa is waiting for Herman. But he’s still not there.
When Lisa loses hope, Herman comes. For a moment, it seems to both that happiness will not leave them, that all suffering is forgotten. But, obsessed with the thought of three cards, Herman pushes Lisa away and runs away to the gambling house. Lisa throws herself into the water.

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A card game in a gambling house is in full swing. Herman bets all his money on the card named by the ghost: three, and wins. The rate has been doubled. The second card - seven - again brings him luck.

Herman, extremely excited, challenges those around him to play with him again. Yeletsky accepts Herman's challenge. Herman's third card turns out to be not an ace, but a queen of spades. Bit map. Herman sees the ghost of the Countess. He goes crazy and shoots himself.

Based on the libretto by Modest Ilyich Tchaikovsky based on the story of the same name by A.S. Pushkin.

Characters:

HERMAN (tenor)
COUNT TOMSKY (baritone)
PRINCE ELETSKY (baritone)
CHEKALINSKY (tenor)
SURIN (tenor)
CHAPLITSKY (bass)
NARUMOV (bass)
MANAGER (tenor)
COUNTESS (mezzo-soprano)
LISA (soprano)
POLINA (contralto)
THE GOVERNESS (mezzo-soprano)
MASHA (soprano)
BOY COMMANDER (without singing)

characters in the interlude:
PRILEPA (soprano)
MILOVZOR (POLINA) (contralto)
ZLATOGOR (COUNT OF TOMSKY) (baritone)
NANIES, GOVERNESSS, NURSES, WALKERS, GUESTS, CHILDREN, PLAYERS, AND OTHER.

Time of action: the end of the 18th century, but no later than 1796.
Location: St. Petersburg.
First performance: St. Petersburg, Mariinsky Theater, December 7 (19), 1890.

Amazingly, before P.I. Tchaikovsky created his tragic operatic masterpiece, Pushkin’s “The Queen of Spades” inspired Franz Suppe to write... an operetta (1864); and even earlier - in 1850 - the French composer Jacques François Fromental Halévy wrote an opera of the same name (however, little remains of Pushkin here: the libretto was written by Scribe, using the translation of “The Queen of Spades” into French made in 1843 by Prosper Merimee; in this opera the hero's name is changed, the old countess is turned into a young Polish princess, and so on). These are, of course, curious circumstances, which can only be learned from musical encyclopedias - these works have no artistic value.

The plot of “The Queen of Spades,” proposed to the composer by his brother, Modest Ilyich, did not immediately interest Tchaikovsky (as the plot of “Eugene Onegin” had done in his time), but when it finally captured his imagination, Tchaikovsky began working on the opera “with selflessness and pleasure" (as with "Eugene Onegin"), and the opera (in clavier) was written in an amazingly short time - in 44 days. In a letter to N.F. von Meck P.I. Tchaikovsky talks about how he came up with the idea of ​​writing an opera on this plot: “It happened this way: my brother Modest three years ago began composing a libretto for the plot of “The Queen of Spades” at the request of a certain Klenovsky, but this latter finally gave up composing music, for some reason he was unable to cope with his task. Meanwhile, the director of the theaters, Vsevolozhsky, was carried away by the idea that I should write an opera on this very plot, and certainly for the next season. He expressed this desire to me, and since it coincided with my decision to flee Russia in January and start writing, I agreed... I really want to work, and if I manage to get a good job somewhere in a cozy corner abroad, it seems to me , that I will master my task and by May I will present it to the directorate of the keyboard, and in the summer I will be instrumentalizing it.”

Tchaikovsky went to Florence and began working on The Queen of Spades on January 19, 1890. The surviving sketches give an idea of ​​how and in what sequence the work proceeded: this time the composer wrote almost “in a row” (unlike “Eugene Onegin,” the composition of which began with the scene of Tatiana’s letter). The intensity of this work is amazing: from January 19 to 28, the first picture is composed, from January 29 to February 4, the second picture, from February 5 to 11, the fourth picture, from February 11 to 19, the third picture, etc.

The libretto of the opera differs to a very large extent from the original. Pushkin's work is prosaic, the libretto is poetic, with poems not only by the librettist and the composer himself, but also by Derzhavin, Zhukovsky, Batyushkov. Pushkin's Lisa is a poor pupil of a rich old countess; in Tchaikovsky she is her granddaughter, “in order,” as the librettist explains, “to make Herman’s love for her more natural”; it is not clear, however, why his love would be less “natural” for the poor girl. In addition, an unclear question arises about her parents - who, where they are, what happened to them. Pushkin’s Hermann (sic!) is from the Germans, which is why this is the spelling of his last name; in Tchaikovsky, nothing is known about his German origin, and in the opera “Herman” (with one “n”) is perceived simply as a name. Prince Yeletsky, who appears in the opera, is absent from Pushkin. Count Tomsky, whose relationship with the countess is not noted in any way in the opera, and where he was introduced by an outsider (just an acquaintance of Herman, like other players), is her grandson in Pushkin; this apparently explains his knowledge of the family secret. The action of Pushkin's drama takes place in the era of Alexander I, while the opera takes us - this was the idea of ​​​​the director of the imperial theaters I.A. Vsevolozhsky - to the era of Catherine. The endings of the drama in Pushkin and Tchaikovsky are also different: in Pushkin, Hermann, although he goes crazy (“He is sitting in the Obukhov hospital in room 17”), still does not die, and Liza, moreover, gets married relatively safely; in Tchaikovsky, both heroes die. One can give many more examples of differences - both external and internal - in the interpretation of events and characters by Pushkin and Tchaikovsky.

INTRODUCTION

The opera begins with an orchestral introduction built on three contrasting musical images. The first theme is the theme of Tomsky's story (from his ballad) about the old countess. The second theme describes the Countess herself, and the third is passionately lyrical (the image of Herman’s love for Lisa).

ACT I

Picture 1."Spring. Summer garden. Area. Nannies, governesses and nurses sit on benches and walk around the garden. Children play burners, others jump over ropes and throw balls.” This is the composer's first remark in the score. In this everyday scene, there are choirs of nannies and governesses, and a cheerful march of boys: a boy commander walks ahead, he gives commands (“Musket ahead of you! Take the muzzle! Musket to your foot!”), the rest carry out his commands, then, drumming and blowing a trumpet they leave. Other children follow the boys. The nannies and governesses disperse, giving way to other walkers.

Enter Chekalinsky and Surin, two officers. Chekalinsky asks how the game (of cards) in which Surin took part ended the day before. It’s bad, he, Surin, lost. The conversation turns to Herman, who also comes, but does not play, but only watches. And in general, his behavior is quite strange, “as if he has at least three atrocities in his heart,” says Surin. Herman himself enters, thoughtful and gloomy. Count Tomsky is with him. They are talking to each other. Tomsky asks Herman what is happening to him, why he has become so gloomy. Herman reveals a secret to him: he is passionately in love with a beautiful stranger. He talks about this in the arioso “I don’t know her name.” Tomsky is surprised by Herman’s passion (“Is it you, Herman? I confess, I wouldn’t believe anyone that you are capable of loving like that!”). They pass, and the stage is again filled with people walking. Their chorus sounds: “Finally, God sent a sunny day!” - a sharp contrast to Herman’s gloomy mood (critics who considered these and similar episodes in the opera unnecessary, for example V. Baskin, the author of the first critical essay on the life and work of Tchaikovsky (1895), apparently underestimated the expressive power of these mood contrasts. They walk in the garden and old women, old men, young ladies, and young men are talking about the weather, all of them singing at the same time.

Herman and Tomsky reappear. They continue the conversation that was interrupted for the viewer with their previous departure (“Are you sure that she doesn’t notice you?” Tomsky asks Germana). Prince Yeletsky enters. Chekalinsky and Surin go to him. They congratulate the prince on the fact that he is now the groom. Herman asks who the bride is. At this moment the Countess and Lisa enter. The prince points to Lisa - this is his bride. Herman is in despair. The Countess and Lisa notice Herman, and both of them are overcome by an ominous feeling. “I’m scared,” they sing together. The same phrase - a wonderful dramatic find of the composer - begins the poems of Herman, Tomsky and Yeletsky, which they sing simultaneously with the Countess and Lisa, each further expressing their feelings and forming a wonderful quintet - the central episode of the scene.

With the end of the quintet, Count Tomsky approaches the Countess, Prince Yeletsky approaches Liza. Herman remains aside, and the Countess looks at him intently. Tomsky turns to the Countess and congratulates her. She, as if not hearing his congratulations, asks him about the officer, who is he? Tomsky explains that this is German, his friend. He and the Countess retreat to the back of the stage. Prince Yeletsky offers his hand to Lisa; he radiates joy and delight. Herman sees this with undisguised jealousy and sings, as if reasoning to himself: “Rejoice, friend! Have you forgotten that after a quiet day there can be a thunderstorm!” With these words of his, a distant rumble of thunder can indeed be heard.

The men (here German, Tomsky, Surin and Chekalinsky; Prince Yeletsky left earlier with Lisa) start talking about the countess. Everyone agrees that she is a “witch,” a “bogeyman,” and an “octogenarian hag.” Tomsky (according to Pushkin, her grandson), however, knows something about her that no one knows. “The Countess, many years ago in Paris, was known as a beauty,” - this is how he begins his ballad and talks about how the Countess once lost all her fortune. Then the Count of Saint-Germain offered her - at the cost of only a "rendez-vous" - to show her three cards, which, if she bet on them, would return her fortune to her. The Countess got her revenge... but what a price! Twice she revealed the secret of these cards: first time to her husband, second time to a handsome young man. But a ghost who appeared to her that same night warned her that she would receive a fatal blow from a third person who, ardently in love, would come to forcefully learn the three cards. Everyone perceives this story as a funny story and even, laughing, advise Herman to take advantage of the opportunity. A strong clap of thunder is heard. A thunderstorm is brewing. People walking are hurrying in different directions. Herman, before he himself escapes from the thunderstorm, swears that Lisa will be his or he will die. So, in the first picture, Herman’s dominant feeling remains love for Lisa. Something will happen next...

Picture 2. Lisa's room. Door to balcony overlooking the garden. Lisa at the harpsichord. Polina is near her; friends are here. Lisa and Polina sing an idyllic duet to the words of Zhukovsky (“It’s already evening... the edges of the clouds have darkened”). Friends express delight. Lisa asks Polina to sing alone. Polina sings. Her romance “Dear Friends” sounds gloomy and doomed. It seems to resurrect the good old days - it’s not for nothing that the accompaniment in it sounds on the harpsichord. Here the librettist used Batyushkov’s poem. It formulates an idea that was first expressed in the 17th century in the Latin phrase that then became popular: “Et in Arcadia ego,” meaning: “And (even) in Arcadia (that is, in paradise) I (that is, death) (is) "; in the 18th century, that is, at the time remembered in the opera, this phrase was rethought, and now it meant: “And I once lived in Arcadia” (which is a violation of the grammar of the Latin original), and this is what Polina sings about : “And I, like you, lived happy in Arcadia.” This Latin phrase could often be found on tombstones (N. Poussin depicted such a scene twice); Polina, like Lisa, accompanying herself on the harpsichord, completes her romance with the words: “But what did I get in these joyful places? Grave!”) Everyone is touched and excited. But now Polina herself wants to add a more cheerful note and offers to sing “Russian in honor of the bride and groom!” (that is, Lisa and Prince Yeletsky). Girlfriends clap their hands. Lisa, not taking part in the fun, stands at the balcony. Polina and her friends start singing, then start dancing. The governess enters and puts an end to the girls' fun, reporting that the countess, having heard the noise, became angry. The young ladies disperse. Lisa sees Polina off. The maid (Masha) enters; she puts out the candles, leaving only one, and wants to close the balcony, but Lisa stops her.

Left alone, Lisa indulges in thought and quietly cries. Her arioso “Where do these tears come from” sounds. Lisa turns to the night and confides in her the secret of her soul: “She is gloomy, like you, she is like the sad gaze of eyes that took away peace and happiness from me...”

Herman appears at the door of the balcony. Lisa retreats in horror. They look at each other silently. Lisa makes a move to leave. Herman begs her not to leave. Lisa is confused, she is ready to scream. Herman takes out a pistol, threatening that he will kill himself - “alone or in front of others.” The big duet of Lisa and Herman is full of passionate impulse. Herman exclaims: “Beauty! Goddess! Angel!" He kneels in front of Lisa. His arioso “Forgive me, heavenly creature, that I disturbed your peace” sounds tender and sad - one of Tchaikovsky’s best tenor arias.

Footsteps are heard outside the door. The Countess, alarmed by the noise, heads towards Lisa's room. She knocks on the door, demands that Liza open (she opens it), and enters; with her are the maids with candles. Lisa manages to hide Herman behind the curtain. The Countess angrily reprimands her granddaughter for not sleeping, for the door to the balcony being open, for disturbing the grandmother - and in general for not daring to try anything stupid. The Countess leaves.

Herman recalls the fateful words: “Who, passionately loving, will come to probably learn from you three cards, three cards, three cards!” Lisa closes the door behind the Countess, approaches the balcony, opens it and motions for Herman to leave. Herman begs her not to drive him away. To leave means to die for him. "No! Live!” exclaims Lisa. Herman impulsively hugs her; she rests her head on his shoulder. "Gorgeous! Goddess! Angel! Love you!" - Herman sings ecstatically.

ACT II

The second act contains a contrast between two scenes, of which the first (in order in the opera - the third) takes place at the ball, and the second (fourth) - in the countess's bedroom.

Picture 3. A masquerade ball in the house of a rich metropolitan (naturally, St. Petersburg) nobleman. Large hall. On the sides, between the columns, there are boxes. Guests dance contradance. The singers sing in the choirs. Their singing reproduces the style of greeting cants of Catherine's era. Herman’s old acquaintances - Chekalinsky, Surin, Tomsky - gossip about the state of mind of our hero: one believes that his mood is so changeable - “At one time he was gloomy, then he became cheerful” - because he is in love (Chekalinsky thinks so), the other (Surin ) already says with confidence that Herman is obsessed with the desire to learn three cards. Deciding to tease him, they leave.

The hall is emptying. Servants enter to prepare the center of the stage for the performance of the sideshow, a traditional entertainment at balls. Prince Yeletsky and Lisa pass by. The prince is puzzled by Lisa's coldness towards him. He sings about his feelings for her in the famous aria “I love you, I love you immensely.” We don’t hear Lisa’s answer - they leave. Herman enters. He has a note in his hand and he reads it: “After the performance, wait for me in the hall. I have to see you...” Chekalinsky and Surin reappear, with several more people with them; they tease Herman.

The manager appears and, on behalf of the owner, invites guests to the sideshow performance. It's called "The Sincerity of a Cowgirl." (From the above list of characters and performers of this play in the play, the reader already knows which of the guests at the ball is participating in it). This pastoral stylization of the music of the 18th century (even genuine motifs of Mozart and Bortnyansky slip through). The pastoral is over. Herman notices Lisa; she's wearing a mask. Lisa turns to him (a distorted melody of love sounds in the orchestra: a turning point has occurred in Herman’s consciousness, now he is driven not by love for Lisa, but by the persistent thought of three cards). She gives him the key to the secret door in the garden so that he can enter her house. Lisa is expecting him tomorrow, but Herman intends to be with her today.

An excited manager appears. He reports that the Empress, of course, Catherine, is about to appear at the ball. (It is her appearance that makes it possible to clarify the time of action of the opera: “no later than 1796,” since Catherine II died that year. In general, Tchaikovsky had difficulties with introducing the empress in the opera - the same ones that N.A. Rimsky had previously encountered -Korsakov during the production of “The Woman of Pskov.” The fact is that even in the 40s, Nicholas I, by his highest order, forbade the appearance of the reigning persons of the Romanov house on the opera stage (and this was allowed in dramas and tragedies); this was explained by the fact that it will be good if the tsar or queen suddenly sings a song. There is a well-known letter from P.I. Tchaikovsky to the director of the imperial theaters I.A. Vsevolozhsky, in which he, in particular, writes: “I flatter myself with the hope that Grand Duke Vladimir Alexandrovich will settle the issue of the appearance of Catherine by the end of the 3rd picture.") Strictly speaking, this picture ends only with preparations for the meeting of the Empress: “The men take a position of a low court bow. Ladies squat deeply. Pages appear” - this is the author’s last remark in this picture. The choir praises Catherine and exclaims: “Vivat! Vivat!

Picture 4. The countess's bedroom, illuminated by lamps. Herman enters through the secret door. He looks around the room: “Everything is as she told me.” Herman is determined to find out the secret from the old woman. He goes to Lisa's door, but his attention is attracted by the portrait of the Countess; he stops to examine it. Midnight strikes. “Ah, here it is, “Venus of Moscow”!” - he reasons, looking at the portrait of the countess (obviously depicted in her youth; Pushkin describes two portraits: one depicted a man of about forty, the other - “a young beauty with an aquiline nose, with combed temples and a rose in her powdered hair”). The sound of footsteps frightens Herman; he hides behind the curtain of the boudoir. The maid runs in and hurriedly lights the candles. Other maids and hangers-on come running after her. The Countess enters, surrounded by bustling maids and hangers-on; their choir sounds (“Our Benefactor”).

Lisa and Masha enter. Lisa lets Masha go, and she realizes that Lisa is waiting for Herman to come to her. Now Masha knows everything: “I chose him as my husband,” Lisa reveals to her. They are going away.

The hangers-on and maids bring in the Countess. She is wearing a dressing gown and a nightcap. She is put to bed. But she, expressing herself rather strangely (“I’m tired... There’s no urine... I don’t want to sleep in bed”), sits down in a chair; it is covered with pillows. Cursing modern manners, she reminisces about her French life, while she sings (in French) an aria from Grétry's opera Richard the Lionheart. (A funny anachronism, which Tchaikovsky could not have known about - he simply did not attach importance to historical authenticity in this case; although, as regards Russian life, he tried to preserve it. So, this opera was written by Grétry in 1784, and if the action of the opera " “The Queen of Spades” dates back to the end of the 18th century and the Countess is now an eighty-year-old old woman, then in the year “Richard” was created she was at least seventy” and the French king (“The King heard me,” the Countess recalled) would hardly have listened to her singing; thus Thus, if the countess once sang for the king, it was much earlier, long before the creation of “Richard.”)

While performing her aria, the Countess gradually falls asleep. Herman appears from behind cover and confronts the Countess. She wakes up and silently moves her lips in horror. He begs her not to be frightened (the Countess silently, as if in a daze, continues to look at him). Herman asks, begs her to reveal to him the secret of the three cards. He kneels before her. The Countess, straightening up, looks menacingly at Herman. He conjures her. "Old witch! So I’ll make you answer!” - he exclaims and takes out a pistol. The Countess nods her head, raises her hands to shield herself from the shot, and falls dead. Herman approaches the corpse and takes his hand. Only now does he realize what happened - the countess is dead, but he did not find out the secret.

Lisa enters. She sees Herman here, in the countess's room. She is surprised: what is he doing here? Herman points to the countess’s corpse and exclaims in despair that he did not know the secret. Lisa rushes to the corpse, sobs - she is killed by what happened and, most importantly, that Herman did not need her, but the secret of the cards. "Monster! Murderer! Monster!" - she exclaims (compare with him, German: “Beauty! Goddess! Angel!”). Herman runs away. Lisa, sobbing, falls on the countess's lifeless body.

ACT III

Picture 5. Barracks. Herman's room. Late evening. The moonlight alternately illuminates the room through the window and then disappears. Howl of the wind. Herman is sitting at the table near a candle. He reads Lisa's letter: she sees that he did not want the countess to die, and will be waiting for him on the embankment. If he does not come before midnight, she will have to admit a terrible thought... Herman sinks into a chair in deep thought. He dreams that he hears a choir of singers singing the funeral service for the Countess. He is overcome with horror. He sees footsteps. He runs to the door, but is stopped there by the ghost of the Countess. Herman retreats. The ghost is approaching. The ghost turns to Herman with the words that he came against his will. He orders Herman to save Lisa, marry her and reveals the secret of three cards: three, seven, ace. Having said this, the ghost immediately disappears. A distraught Herman repeats these cards.

Picture 6. Night. Winter Canal. In the background of the scene are the embankment and the Peter and Paul Church, illuminated by the moon. Under the arch, all in black, stands Lisa. She is waiting for Herman and sings her aria, one of the most famous in opera - “Ah, I’m tired, I’m tired!” The clock strikes midnight. Lisa desperately calls for German - he is still not there. Now she is sure that he is a killer. Lisa wants to run, but Herman enters. Lisa is happy: Herman is here, he is not a villain. The end of the torment has come! Herman kisses her. “The end of our painful torment,” they echo each other. But we mustn't hesitate. The clock is running. And Herman calls on Lisa to run away with him. But where? Of course, to the gambling house - “There are piles of gold there for me too, they belong to me alone!” - he assures Lisa. Now Lisa finally understands that Herman is insane. Herman admits that he raised the gun on the “old sorceress.” Now for Lisa he is a killer. Herman repeats three cards in ecstasy, laughs and pushes Lisa away. She, unable to bear it, runs to the embankment and throws herself into the river.

Picture 7. Gambling house. Dinner. Some players play cards. The guests sing: “Let's drink and have fun.” Surin, Chaplitsky, Chekalinsky, Arumov, Tomsky, Yeletsky exchange remarks regarding the game. Prince Yeletsky is here for the first time. He is no longer a groom and hopes that he will be lucky in cards, since he was unlucky in love. Tomsky is asked to sing something. He sings a rather ambiguous song “If only there were dear girls” (its words belong to G.R. Derzhavin). Everyone picks up her last words. In the midst of the game and fun, Herman enters. Yeletsky asks Tomsky to be his second, if necessary. He agrees. Everyone is struck by the strangeness of Herman’s appearance. He asks permission to take part in the game. The game begins. Herman bets on three and wins. He continues the game. Now - seven. And again a win. Herman laughs hysterically. Requires wine. With a glass in his hand, he sings his famous aria “What is our life? - A game!" Prince Yeletsky comes into play. This round really looks like a duel: Herman announces an ace, but instead of an ace he has the queen of spades in his hands. At this moment the ghost of the Countess appears. Everyone retreats from Herman. He's terrified. He curses the old woman. In a fit of madness, he stabs himself to death. The ghost disappears. Several people rush to the fallen Herman. He's still alive. Having come to his senses and seeing the prince, he tries to get up. He asks the prince for forgiveness. At the last minute, a bright image of Lisa appears in his mind. The choir of those present sings: “Lord! Forgive him! And rest his rebellious and tormented soul.”

A. Maykapar

Modest Tchaikovsky, ten years younger than his brother Peter, is not known as a playwright outside Russia except for the libretto of Pushkin's The Queen of Spades, set to music in early 1890. The plot of the opera was proposed by the directorate of the Imperial St. Petersburg Theaters, who intended to present a grandiose performance from the era of Catherine II. When Tchaikovsky got to work, he made changes to the libretto and partially wrote the poetic text himself, also introducing poems from poets who were Pushkin’s contemporaries. The text of the scene with Lisa at the Winter Canal belongs entirely to the composer. The most spectacular scenes were shortened by him, but nevertheless they add effectiveness to the opera and form the background for the development of the action. And even these scenes were handled masterfully by Tchaikovsky, an example of which is the text introducing the chorus of glorification of the queen, the final chorus of the first scene of the second act.

Thus, he put a lot of effort into creating an authentic atmosphere of that time. In Florence, where sketches for the opera were written and part of the orchestration was done, Tchaikovsky did not part with the music of the 18th century from the era of the “Queen of Spades” (Grétry, Monsigny, Piccinni, Salieri) and wrote in his diary: “At times it seemed that I was living in the 18th century.” century and that there was nothing further than Mozart.” Of course, Mozart is no longer so young in his music. But besides imitation - with an inevitable share of dryness - of Rococo patterns and the resurrection of expensive gallant-neoclassical forms, the composer relied primarily on his heightened sensibility. His feverish state during the creation of the opera went beyond normal tension. Perhaps in the possessed Herman, who demands the countess name three cards and thereby dooms himself to death, he saw himself, and in the countess his patron, Baroness von Meck. Their strange, one-of-a-kind relationship, maintained only in letters, a relationship like two disembodied shadows, ended in a break just in 1890.

The unfolding of the increasingly frightening action is distinguished by the ingenious technique of Tchaikovsky, who connects complete, independent, but closely interconnected scenes: minor events (outwardly leading to the side, but in fact necessary for the whole) alternate with key ones that make up the main intrigue. It is possible to distinguish five core themes that the composer uses as Wagnerian leitmotifs. Four are closely related: Hermann's theme (descending, gloomy), the theme of the three cards (anticipating the Sixth Symphony), the theme of Lisa's love ("Tristanian", according to Hoffmann's definition) and the theme of fate. The Countess' theme stands apart, based on the repetition of three notes of equal duration.

The score differs in a number of features. The coloring of the first act is close to Carmen (especially the boys' march), but Herman's sincere arioso remembering Lisa stands out here. Then the action suddenly shifts to a drawing room of the late 18th - early 19th centuries, in which a pathetic duet is heard, oscillating between major and minor, with the obligatory accompaniment of flutes. In Herman’s appearance in front of Lisa, the power of fate is felt (and his melody is somewhat reminiscent of Verdi’s “Force of Destiny”); the countess brings in a grave cold, and the ominous thought of three cards poisons the young man’s consciousness. In the scene of his meeting with the old woman, Herman's stormy, desperate recitative and aria, accompanied by angry, repetitive wooden sounds, mark the collapse of the unfortunate man, who loses his mind in the next scene with the ghost, truly expressionist, with echoes of "Boris Godunov" (but with a richer orchestra) . Then follows the death of Lisa: a very gentle, sympathetic melody sounds against a terrible funeral background. Herman's death is less majestic, but not without tragic dignity. This double suicide once again testifies to the decadent romanticism of the composer, which made so many hearts tremble and still constitutes the most popular aspect of his music. However, behind this passionate and tragic picture lies a formal structure inherited from neoclassicism. Tchaikovsky wrote about this well in 1890: “Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert, Mendelssohn, Schumann composed their immortal creations exactly as a shoemaker sews boots.” Thus, the skill of the artisan comes first and only then inspiration. As for “The Queen of Spades,” it was immediately accepted by the public as a great success for the composer.

G. Marchesi (translated by E. Greceanii)

History of creation

The plot of Pushkin’s “The Queen of Spades” did not immediately interest Tchaikovsky. However, over time, this novel increasingly captured his imagination. Tchaikovsky was especially moved by the scene of Herman’s fatal meeting with the Countess. Its deep drama captured the composer, causing a burning desire to write an opera. The work was begun in Florence on February 19, 1890. The opera was created, according to the composer, “with selflessness and pleasure” and was completed in an extremely short time - forty-four days. The premiere took place in St. Petersburg at the Mariinsky Theater on December 7 (19), 1890 and was a huge success.

Soon after the publication of his short story (1833), Pushkin wrote in his diary: “My “Queen of Spades” is in great fashion. Players punt on three, seven, ace.” The popularity of the story was explained not only by the entertaining plot, but also by the realistic reproduction of the types and morals of St. Petersburg society at the beginning of the 19th century. In the opera's libretto, written by the composer's brother M. I. Tchaikovsky (1850-1916), the content of Pushkin's story is largely rethought. Lisa turned from a poor pupil into the rich granddaughter of a countess. Pushkin's Herman, a cold, calculating egoist, seized only by the thirst for enrichment, appears in Tchaikovsky's music as a man with a fiery imagination and strong passions. The difference in the social status of the characters introduced the theme of social inequality into the opera. With high tragic pathos, it reflects the fate of people in a society subordinated to the merciless power of money. Herman is a victim of this society; the desire for wealth imperceptibly becomes an obsession with him, overshadowing his love for Lisa and leading him to death.

Music

The opera “The Queen of Spades” is one of the greatest works of world realistic art. This musical tragedy amazes with the psychological truthfulness of the reproduction of the thoughts and feelings of the characters, their hopes, suffering and death, the brightness of the pictures of the era, and the intensity of musical and dramatic development. The characteristic features of Tchaikovsky's style received their most complete and perfect expression here.

The orchestral introduction is based on three contrasting musical images: a narrative one, associated with Tomsky’s ballad, an ominous one, depicting the image of the old Countess, and a passionate lyrical one, characterizing Herman’s love for Lisa.

The first act opens with a bright everyday scene. Choirs of nannies, governesses, and the perky march of boys clearly highlight the drama of subsequent events. Herman’s arioso “I don’t know her name,” sometimes elegiacally tender, sometimes impetuously excited, captures the purity and strength of his feelings. The duet of Herman and Yeletsky confronts the sharply contrasting states of the heroes: Herman’s passionate complaints “Unfortunate day, I curse you” are intertwined with the calm, measured speech of the prince “Happy day, I bless you.” The central episode of the film is the quintet “I’m Scared!” - conveys the gloomy forebodings of the participants. In Tomsky's ballad, the chorus about three mysterious cards sounds ominously. The first picture ends with a stormy thunderstorm scene, against which Herman’s oath sounds.

The second picture falls into two halves - everyday and love-lyrical. The idyllic duet of Polina and Lisa “It’s Evening” is shrouded in light sadness. Polina’s romance “Dear Friends” sounds gloomy and doomed. It is contrasted by the lively dance song “Come on, Little Svetik Mashenka.” The second half of the film opens with Lisa’s arioso “Where do these tears come from” - a heartfelt monologue full of deep feeling. Lisa's melancholy gives way to an enthusiastic confession: “Oh, listen, night.” Herman’s tenderly sad and passionate arioso “Forgive me, heavenly creature” is interrupted by the appearance of the Countess: the music takes on a tragic tone; sharp, nervous rhythms and ominous orchestral colors emerge. The second picture ends with the affirmation of the bright theme of love. In the third scene (second act), scenes of metropolitan life become the backdrop of the developing drama. The opening chorus in the spirit of welcoming cantatas of Catherine's era is a kind of screensaver of the picture. Prince Yeletsky’s aria “I love you” depicts his nobility and restraint. Pastoral “The Sincerity of the Shepherdess” is a stylization of 18th century music; elegant, graceful songs and dances frame the idyllic love duet of Prilepa and Milovzor. In the finale, at the moment of the meeting of Lisa and Herman, a distorted melody of love sounds in the orchestra: a turning point has occurred in Herman’s consciousness, from now on he is guided not by love, but by the persistent thought of three cards. The fourth scene, central to the opera, is full of anxiety and drama. It begins with an orchestral introduction, in which the intonations of Herman’s love confessions are guessed. The chorus of hangers-on (“Our Benefactor”) and the Countess’s song (a melody from Grétry’s opera “Richard the Lionheart”) are replaced by music of an ominously hidden nature. It contrasts with Herman’s arioso, “If you ever knew the feeling of love,” imbued with a passionate feeling.

At the beginning of the fifth scene (third act), against the background of funeral singing and the howling of a storm, Herman’s excited monologue appears, “All the same thoughts, still the same terrible dream.” The music that accompanies the appearance of the Countess's ghost fascinates with its deathly stillness.

The orchestral introduction of the sixth scene is painted in gloomy tones of doom. The wide, freely flowing melody of Lisa’s aria “Ah, I’m tired, I’m tired” is close to Russian drawn-out songs; the second part of the aria “So it’s true, with a villain” is full of despair and anger. The lyrical duet of Herman and Lisa “Oh yes, the suffering is over” is the only bright episode of the film. It gives way to a scene of Herman’s delirium about gold, remarkable in its psychological depth. The return of the intro music, sounding menacing and inexorable, speaks of the collapse of hopes.

The seventh picture begins with everyday episodes: a drinking song of the guests, Tomsky’s frivolous song “If only dear girls” (to the words of G. R. Derzhavin). With the appearance of Herman, the music becomes nervously excited. The anxiously wary septet “Something is wrong here” conveys the excitement that gripped the players. The rapture of victory and cruel joy can be heard in Herman’s aria “What is our life? A game!". In the dying minute, his thoughts are again turned to Lisa - a reverently tender image of love appears in the orchestra.

M. Druskin

After more than a ten-year period of complex, often contradictory searches, along the way of which there were bright interesting discoveries and annoying miscalculations, Tchaikovsky comes to his greatest achievements in operatic work, creating “The Queen of Spades,” which is not inferior in strength and depth of expression to his symphonic works. masterpieces like Manfred, the Fifth and Sixth Symphonies. He did not work on any of his operas, with the exception of Eugene Onegin, with such ardent enthusiasm, which, by the composer’s own admission, reached “self-forgetfulness.” Tchaikovsky was so deeply captured by the entire atmosphere of the action and the images of the characters in “The Queen of Spades” that he perceived them as real living people. Having completed the draft recording of the opera with feverish speed (The entire work was completed in 44 days - from January 19 to March 3, 1890. The orchestration was completed in June of the same year.), he wrote to his brother Modest Ilyich, the author of the libretto: “... when I got to the death of Herman and the final chorus, I felt so sorry for Herman that I suddenly began to cry a lot<...>It turns out that Herman was not just an excuse for me to write this or that music, but all the time a living person...” In another letter to the same addressee, Tchaikovsky admits: “I experience in other places, for example, in the fourth scene, which I arranged today, such fear, horror and shock that it is impossible for the listener not to experience at least part of it.”

Written based on Pushkin’s story of the same name, Tchaikovsky’s “Queen of Spades” largely deviates from the literary source: some plot moves have been changed, and the characters and actions of the characters have received different coverage. In Pushkin, German is a man of one passion, straightforward, calculating and tough, ready to put his own and other people’s lives on the line to achieve his goal. In Tchaikovsky, he is internally broken, in the grip of contradictory feelings and drives, the tragic irreconcilability of which leads him to inevitable death. The image of Lisa was subjected to a radical rethinking: Pushkin’s ordinary, colorless Lizaveta Ivanovna became a strong and passionate person, selflessly devoted to her feelings, continuing the gallery of pure, poetically sublime female images in Tchaikovsky’s operas from “The Oprichnik” to “The Enchantress.” At the request of the director of the imperial theaters I. A. Vsevolozhsky, the action of the opera was transferred from the 30s of the 19th century to the second half of the 18th century, which gave rise to the inclusion of a picture of a magnificent ball in the palace of Catherine’s nobleman with an interlude stylized in the spirit of the “gallant century” , but did not have an impact on the overall flavor of the action and the characters of its main participants. In terms of the richness and complexity of their spiritual world, the severity and intensity of their experiences, these are the composer’s contemporaries, in many ways akin to the heroes of the psychological novels of Tolstoy and Dostoevsky.

A compositional, dramatic and intonation analysis of “The Queen of Spades” is given in a number of works devoted to Tchaikovsky’s work as a whole or to its individual types. Therefore, we will dwell only on some of the most important, most characteristic features. “The Queen of Spades” is the most symphonic of Tchaikovsky’s operas: the basis of its dramatic composition is the consistent end-to-end development and interweaving of three constant themes, which are the carriers of the main driving forces of the action. The semantic aspect of these themes is similar to the relationship between the three main thematic sections of the Fourth and Fifth symphonies. The first of them, the dry and harsh theme of the Countess, which is based on a short motive of three sounds, easily amenable to various changes, can be compared in meaning with the themes of rock in the composer’s symphonic works. In the course of development, this motif undergoes rhythmic compression and expansion, its intervallic composition and modal coloring changes, but with all these transformations, the formidable “knocking” rhythm, which constitutes its main characteristic, is preserved.

Using the words of Tchaikovsky, spoken in another connection, we can say that this is the “grain”, “certainly the main idea” of the entire work. This theme serves not so much as an individual characteristic of the image, but as the embodiment of a mysterious, inexorably fatal principle that weighs on the fate of the central characters of the opera - Herman and Lisa. It is omnipresent, intertwined both in the orchestral fabric and in the vocal parts of the characters (for example, Herman’s arioso “If you ever knew” from the painting in the Countess’s bedroom). Sometimes it takes on a delusional, fantastically distorted appearance as a reflection of the persistent thought about three cards lodged in Herman’s sick brain: at the moment when the ghost of the dead Countess appears to him and names them, all that remains of the theme are three slowly descending sounds in whole tones. The sequence of three such segments forms a complete whole-tone scale, which has served in Russian music since Glinka as a means of depicting the inanimate, mysterious and terrible. This theme is given a special flavor by its characteristic timbre coloring: as a rule, it sounds in the dull low register of a clarinet, bass clarinet or bassoon, and only in the final scene, before Herman’s fatal loss, is it darkly and menacingly intoned by brass and string basses as an inevitable sentence of fate.

Closely related to the theme of the Countess is another important theme - three cards. The similarity is manifested both in the motivic structure, consisting of three units of three sounds each, and in the immediate intonational proximity of individual melodic turns.

Even before its appearance in Tomsky’s ballad, the theme of three cards, in a slightly modified form, sounds in the mouth of Herman (the “output” arioso “I don’t know her name”), emphasizing his doom from the very beginning.

In the process of further development, the theme takes on different forms and sounds sometimes tragic, sometimes mournfully lyrically, and some of its turns are heard even in recitative remarks.

The third, widely chanted lyrical theme of love with an excited sequential rise to the melodic peak and a smooth, undulating descending second half contrasts with both previous ones. It receives especially wide development in the scene of Herman and Lisa that concludes the second picture, reaching an enthusiastic, rapturously passionate sound. Subsequently, as Herman becomes more and more possessed by the crazy thought of three cards, the theme of love recedes into the background, only occasionally appearing in the form of brief fragments and only in the final scene of Herman’s death, dying with the name of Lisa on his lips, again sounds clearly and unclouded. There comes a moment of catharsis, purification - the terrible delusional visions dissipate, and the bright feeling of love triumphs over all the horrors and nightmares.

A high degree of symphonic generality is combined in “The Queen of Spades” with bright and colorful stage action, replete with sharp contrasts, changes of light and shadow. Acute conflict situations alternate with distracting background episodes of an everyday nature, and development proceeds in the direction of increasing psychological concentration and thickening of gloomy, ominous tones. Genre elements are concentrated mainly in the first three scenes of the opera. A kind of screensaver for the main action is a scene of festivities in the Summer Garden, children's games and careless chatter of nannies, nurses and governesses, against the background of which the gloomy figure of Herman stands out, completely absorbed in thoughts about his hopeless love. The idyllic scene of the entertainment of society young ladies at the beginning of the second picture helps to highlight the sad thoughtfulness and hidden spiritual anxiety of Lisa, who is haunted by the thought of a mysterious stranger, and Polina’s romance, with its gloomy coloring contrasting with the pastoral duet of two friends, is perceived as a direct premonition of the tragic end awaiting the heroine (As is known, according to the original plan, this romance was to be sung by Liza herself, and the composer then handed it over to Polina for purely practical theatrical reasons, in order to provide the performer of this part with an independent solo number.).

The third painting of the ball is distinguished by its special decorative splendor, a number of episodes of which are deliberately stylized by the composer in the spirit of 18th-century music. It is known that when composing the interlude “The Sincerity of the Shepherdess” and the final welcoming chorus, Tchaikovsky resorted to direct borrowings from the works of composers of that time. This brilliant picture of the ceremonial celebration is contrasted by two short scenes of Herman, pursued by Surin and Chekalinsky, and his meeting with Lisa, where fragments of the themes of three cards and love sound anxiously and confusedly. Moving the action forward, they directly prepare the central picture in its dramatic significance in the Countess's bedroom.

In this scene, remarkable in terms of dramatic integrity and steadily increasing power of emotional tension, all lines of action are tied into one tight knot and the main character comes face to face with his fate, personified in the image of the old Countess. Sensitively responding to the slightest shifts in everything that happens on stage, the music develops at the same time as a single continuous flow in the close interaction of vocal and orchestral-symphonic elements. Except for the song from Grétry’s opera “Richard the Lionheart”, put by the composer into the mouth of the falling asleep Countess (Many times attention was drawn to the anachronism made by Tchaikovsky in this case: the opera “Richard the Lionheart” was written in 1784, that is, approximately at the same time when the action of “The Queen of Spades” takes place and therefore could not be associated with memories of the Countess’s youth. But against the general background of the music of the opera, it is perceived as something distant, forgotten, and in this sense it corresponds to the artistic task set; as for historical authenticity, it apparently did not concern the composer very much.), then in this picture there are no completed solo vocal episodes. By flexibly using various types of musical recitation from monotonous recitation on one sound or short excited cries to more melodious constructions approaching ariatic singing, the composer very subtly and expressively conveys the spiritual movements of the characters.

The dramatic climax of the fourth scene is the tragically ending “duel” between Herman and the Countess (In this scene, the original Pushkin text was preserved by the librettist almost without changes, which Tchaikovsky noted with particular satisfaction. L.V. Karagicheva, expressing a number of interesting observations on the relationship between word and music in Herman’s monologue, states that “Tchaikovsky translated into the language of music not only the meaningful meaning, but also many of the structural and expressive means of Pushkin’s text." This episode can serve as one of the most remarkable examples of the sensitive implementation of speech intonation in Tchaikovsky’s vocal melody.). This scene cannot be called a dialogue in the true sense, since one of its participants does not utter a single word - to all Herman’s pleas and threats, the Countess remains silent, but the orchestra speaks for her. The anger and indignation of the old aristocrat give way to a stupor of horror, and the “gurgling” passages of the clarinet and bassoon (which are then joined by the flute) convey with almost naturalistic imagery the dying shudders of a lifeless body.

The feverish excitement of the emotional atmosphere is combined in this picture with great internal completeness of form, achieved both by the consistent symphonic development of the main themes of the opera, and by elements of thematic and tonal reprise. The expanded precursor is a large fifty-bar structure at the beginning of the picture with restlessly soaring and then mournfully sinking phrases of muted violins against the backdrop of a dully vibrating dominant organ point in the violas. The long-accumulated harmonic instability conveys Herman’s feelings of anxiety and involuntary fear of what awaits him. The dominant harmony does not receive resolution within this section, being replaced by a number of modulating moves (B minor, A minor, C sharp minor). Only in the stormy, rapid Vivace that concludes the fourth picture does a steadily sounding tonic triad of its main key of F-sharp minor appear and the same alarming melodic phrase is again heard in conjunction with the theme of the three cards, expressing Herman’s despair and Lisa’s horror at what happened.

The following picture, imbued with a gloomy atmosphere of insane delirium and terrible, chilling visions, is distinguished by the same symphonic integrity and intensity of development: night, barracks, Herman alone on duty. The leading role belongs to the orchestra, Herman's part is limited to individual cues of a recitative nature. The funeral singing of a church choir coming from afar, the sounds of a signal military fanfare, “whistling” passages of high wooden and strings, conveying the howling of the wind outside the window - all this merges into one ominous picture, evoking alarming forebodings. The horror engulfing Herman reaches its climax with the appearance of the ghost of the dead Countess, accompanied by her leitmotif, at first dull, hidden, and then sounding with increasing force in conjunction with the theme of the three cards. In the final section of this picture, an explosion of panic horror gives way to a sudden numbness, and the distraught Herman automatically, as if hypnotized, repeats in one sound the words of the Countess “Three, seven, ace!”, while in the orchestra the transformed theme of three sounds just as smoothly and dispassionately cards with elements of an enlarged fret.

Following this, the action quickly and steadily moves towards a catastrophic denouement. Some delay is caused by the scene at the Winter Canal, which contains vulnerable moments not only from a dramatic but also from a musical point of view (It has been noted, not without reason, by various authors that Lisa’s aria in this film does not quite correspond stylistically to the general melodic-intonation structure of her part.). But the composer needed it “so that the viewer would know what happened to Lisa,” whose fate would have remained unclear without this. That is why he so stubbornly defended this picture despite the objections of Modest Ilyich and Laroche.

After three “night” paintings, gloomy in color, the last, seventh takes place in bright light, the source of which is, however, not the daytime sun, but the restless flickering of candles in a gambling house. The chorus of players “Let’s sing and have fun,” interrupted by short, abrupt remarks from the participants in the game, then the reckless “Greek” song “This is how they gathered on rainy days” creates an atmosphere of frenzied excitement in which Herman’s last desperate game takes place, ending in loss and suicide. The Countess's theme, emerging in the orchestra, achieves a powerful, menacing sound here: only with the death of Herman does the terrible obsession disappear and the opera ends with the theme of love quietly and tenderly sounding in the orchestra.

Tchaikovsky's great creation became a new word not only in the work of the composer himself, but also in the development of the entire Russian opera of the last century. None of the Russian composers, except Mussorgsky, managed to achieve such an irresistible power of dramatic impact and depth of penetration into the most hidden corners of the human soul, to reveal the complex world of the subconscious, unconsciously driving our actions and deeds. It is no coincidence that this opera aroused such keen interest among a number of representatives of new young artistic movements emerging at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries. Twenty-year-old Alexander Benois, after the premiere of “The Queen of Spades,” was overcome, as he later recalled, by “a kind of frenzy of delight.” “There is no doubt,” he wrote, “that the author himself knew that he had managed to create something beautiful and unique, something in which his whole soul, his whole worldview was expressed.”<...>He had the right to expect that the Russian people would thank him for this<...>As for me, my delight in “The Queen of Spades” included precisely this feeling thanks. Through these sounds, a lot of the mysterious things that I saw around me were really revealed to me.” It is known that A. A. Blok, M. A. Kuzmin and other poets of the early 20th century were interested in “The Queen of Spades”. The impact of this opera by Tchaikovsky on the development of Russian art was strong and profound; a number of literary and pictorial (to a lesser extent musical) works directly reflected the impressions of acquaintance with it. And to this day “The Queen of Spades” remains one of the unsurpassed pinnacles of the classical operatic heritage.

Yu. Keldysh

Discography: CD - Dante. Dir. Lynching, German (Khanaev), Lisa (Derzhinskaya), Countess (Petrova), Tomsky (Baturin), Eletsky (Selivanov), Polina (Obukhova) - Philips. Dir. Gergiev, German (Grigoryan), Lisa (Guleghina), Countess (Arkhipova), Tomsky (Putilin), Eletsky (Chernov), Polina (Borodina) - RCA Victor. Dir. Ozawa, German (Atlantov), ​​Lisa (Freni), Countess (Forrester), Tomsky (Leiferkus), Yeletsky (Hvorostovsky), Polina (Catherine Chesinski).

Lying on the bed of the psychiatric ward of the St. Petersburg Obukhov hospital, surrounded by other patients, doctors, nurses, Herman thinks again and again about what led him to madness. The events of the recent past pass before him in a continuous series of painful visions. Herman recalls his unexpected, ardent love for the beautiful Liza, engaged to Prince Yeletsky. German understands what a gulf lies between him and Lisa and how groundless hopes for joint happiness are. Gradually, he becomes imbued with the idea that only a large card win could bring him both a position in society and the hand of his beloved. It is at this moment that Count Tomsky, mocking Herman, tells a secular joke about the old countess, Lisa’s grandmother: the eighty-year-old old woman supposedly keeps a secret, the solution to which could solve all of Herman’s problems at once. In her youth, the Countess was distinguished by her rare beauty; in Paris she spent every evening playing cards, which is why she was nicknamed the Queen of Spades. Once in Versailles, at court, the countess lost all her fortune and could not pay off her debts. A well-known expert in occult sciences and a connoisseur of female beauty, Count Saint-Germain, invited the countess to reveal the secret of three winning cards in exchange for a night with her. Unable to resist the temptation to recoup, the countess gave herself to Saint-Germain and, with the help of the secret he told him, she returned all her loss. Legend has it that the countess conveyed the secret to her husband, and then to her young lover. And then the ghost of Saint Germain appeared to her and predicted that a third one would come to her, eager to become the owner of the secret, and at the hands of this third she would die. Tomsky, Chekalinsky and Surin clownishly offer Herman to become the same predicted “third” and, having learned the answer to the mystery, at once receive both money and the opportunity to marry his beloved. More and more new visions visit Herman’s sick mind: he promises himself that he will win Lisa’s heart; now Lisa is already in his arms. There is very little left - to find out the secret of the three cards. Herman dreams of a ball, the guests at this ball are all those who surround him in the hospital. His secular friends drag him into an ominous game: Herman rushes between Lisa and the Countess.

PART TWO

Herman's memories become more and more vivid. He sees himself in the countess's house: Lisa agreed to meet him secretly at night. But he himself is waiting for the old mistress - he intends to get the countess to solve the mystery of the three cards. Lisa arrives at the agreed upon place, but the date is disrupted due to the appearance of the Countess. She, as usual, is dissatisfied with everything; Eternal companions - loneliness and melancholy - burden her nights. The Countess remembers her youth; Herman, who suddenly appears, seems to her like a ghost from the past. Herman begs the Countess to reveal to him the secret of the three cards, and she suddenly understands: this is the third one who is destined to become her killer. The Countess dies, taking the secret with her to the grave. Herman is in despair. He is haunted by memories of the countess's funeral, and he sees her ghost, who allegedly tells him three treasured cards: three, seven, ace. Lisa does not leave the bedside of the delirious Herman. She wants to believe that he loves her and that he did not cause the countess’s death. Herman is getting worse: the hospital ward, and the whole world, seem to him like a gambling house. Having captured the secret of three cards in his sick imagination, he boldly places bets. Three wins, seven wins twice: now Herman is fabulously rich. He makes a third bet - on an ace - but instead of an ace in his hand there is a queen of spades, in which he imagines the countess who died because of his greed. Herman's mind goes dark. From now on, in his madness, he is doomed to go through all the circles of hell again and again, the author and victim of which he himself essentially became.

Lev Dodin

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Amazingly, before P.I. Tchaikovsky created his tragic operatic masterpiece, Pushkin’s “The Queen of Spades” inspired Franz Suppe to write... an operetta (1864); and even earlier - in 1850 - the French composer Jacques François Fromental Halévy wrote an opera of the same name (however, little remains of Pushkin here: the libretto was written by Scribe, using the translation of “The Queen of Spades” into French made in 1843 by Prosper Merimee; in this opera the hero's name is changed, the old countess is turned into a young Polish princess, and so on). These are, of course, curious circumstances, which can only be learned from musical encyclopedias—these works have no artistic value.

The plot of “The Queen of Spades,” proposed to the composer by his brother, Modest Ilyich, did not immediately interest Tchaikovsky (as the plot of “Eugene Onegin” had done in his time), but when it finally captured his imagination, Tchaikovsky began working on the opera “with selflessness and pleasure" (as with "Eugene Onegin"), and the opera (in clavier) was written in an amazingly short time - in 44 days. In a letter to N.F. von Meck P.I. Tchaikovsky talks about how he came up with the idea of ​​writing an opera on this plot: “It happened this way: my brother Modest three years ago began composing a libretto for the plot of “The Queen of Spades” at the request of a certain Klenovsky, but this latter finally gave up composing music, for some reason he was unable to cope with his task. Meanwhile, the director of the theaters, Vsevolozhsky, was carried away by the idea that I should write an opera on this very plot, and certainly for the next season. He expressed this desire to me, and since it coincided with my decision to flee Russia in January and start writing, I agreed... I really want to work, and if I manage to get a good job somewhere in a cozy corner abroad, it seems to me , that I will master my task and by May I will present it to the directorate of the keyboard, and in the summer I will be instrumentalizing it.”

Tchaikovsky went to Florence and began working on The Queen of Spades on January 19, 1890. The surviving sketches give an idea of ​​how and in what sequence the work proceeded: this time the composer wrote almost “in a row.” The intensity of this work is amazing: from January 19 to 28, the first picture is composed, from January 29 to February 4, the second picture, from February 5 to 11, the fourth picture, from February 11 to 19, the third picture, etc.

Eletsky's aria "I love you, I love you immensely..." performed by Yuri Gulyaev

The libretto of the opera differs to a very large extent from the original. Pushkin's work is prosaic, the libretto is poetic, with poems not only by the librettist and the composer himself, but also by Derzhavin, Zhukovsky, Batyushkov. Pushkin’s Lisa is a poor pupil of a rich old countess; for Tchaikovsky she is his granddaughter. In addition, an unclear question arises about her parents - who, where they are, what happened to them. Pushkin’s Hermann is from the Germans, which is why this is the spelling of his last name; in Tchaikovsky, nothing is known about his German origin, and in the opera “Herman” (with one “n”) is perceived simply as a name. Prince Yeletsky, who appears in the opera, is absent from Pushkin

Tomsky's couplets to Derzhavin's words "If only dear girls.." Please note: in these couplets the letter "r" does not appear at all! Sung by Sergei Leiferkus

Count Tomsky, whose relationship with the countess is not noted in any way in the opera, and where he was introduced by an outsider (just an acquaintance of Herman, like other players), is her grandson in Pushkin; this apparently explains his knowledge of the family secret. The action of Pushkin's drama takes place in the era of Alexander I, while the opera takes us - this was the idea of ​​​​the director of the imperial theaters I.A. Vsevolozhsky - to the era of Catherine. The endings of the drama in Pushkin and Tchaikovsky are also different: in Pushkin, Hermann, although he goes crazy (“He is sitting in the Obukhov hospital in room 17”), still does not die, and Liza, moreover, gets married relatively safely; in Tchaikovsky, both heroes die. One can give many more examples of differences - both external and internal - in the interpretation of events and characters by Pushkin and Tchaikovsky.

Modest Ilyich Tchaikovsky

Modest Tchaikovsky, ten years younger than his brother Peter, is not known as a playwright outside Russia except for the libretto of Pushkin's The Queen of Spades, set to music in early 1890. The plot of the opera was proposed by the directorate of the Imperial St. Petersburg Theaters, who intended to present a grandiose performance from the era of Catherine II.

Aria of the Countess performed by Elena Obraztsova

When Tchaikovsky got to work, he made changes to the libretto and partially wrote the poetic text himself, also introducing poems from poets who were Pushkin’s contemporaries. The text of the scene with Lisa at the Winter Canal belongs entirely to the composer. The most spectacular scenes were shortened by him, but nevertheless they add effectiveness to the opera and form the background for the development of the action.

Scene at the Kanavka. Tamara Milashkina sings

Thus, he put a lot of effort into creating an authentic atmosphere of that time. In Florence, where sketches for the opera were written and part of the orchestration was done, Tchaikovsky did not part with the music of the 18th century from the era of the Queen of Spades (Grétry, Monsigny, Piccinni, Salieri).

Perhaps in the possessed Herman, who demands the countess name three cards and thereby dooms himself to death, he saw himself, and in the countess his patron, Baroness von Meck. Their strange, one-of-a-kind relationship, maintained only in letters, a relationship like two disembodied shadows, ended in a break just in 1890.

In Herman’s appearance in front of Lisa, the power of fate is felt; the countess brings in a grave cold, and the ominous thought of three cards poisons the young man’s consciousness.

In the scene of his meeting with the old woman, Herman's stormy, desperate recitative and aria, accompanied by angry, repetitive wooden sounds, mark the collapse of the unfortunate man, who loses his mind in the next scene with the ghost, truly expressionist, with echoes of "Boris Godunov" (but with a richer orchestra) . Then follows the death of Lisa: a very gentle, sympathetic melody sounds against a terrible funeral background. Herman's death is less majestic, but not without tragic dignity. As for “The Queen of Spades”, it was immediately accepted by the public as a great success for the composer

History of creation

The plot of Pushkin’s “The Queen of Spades” did not immediately interest Tchaikovsky. However, over time, this novel increasingly captured his imagination. Tchaikovsky was especially moved by the scene of Herman’s fatal meeting with the Countess. Its deep drama captured the composer, causing a burning desire to write an opera. The work was begun in Florence on February 19, 1890. The opera was created, according to the composer, “with selflessness and pleasure” and was completed in an extremely short time - forty-four days. The premiere took place in St. Petersburg at the Mariinsky Theater on December 7 (19), 1890 and was a huge success

Soon after the publication of his short story (1833), Pushkin wrote in his diary: “My “Queen of Spades” is in great fashion. Players punt on three, seven, ace.” The popularity of the story was explained not only by the entertaining plot, but also by the realistic reproduction of the types and morals of St. Petersburg society at the beginning of the 19th century. In the opera's libretto, written by the composer's brother M. I. Tchaikovsky (1850-1916), the content of Pushkin's story is largely rethought. Lisa turned from a poor pupil into the rich granddaughter of a countess. Pushkin's Herman, a cold, calculating egoist, seized only by the thirst for enrichment, appears in Tchaikovsky's music as a man with a fiery imagination and strong passions. The difference in the social status of the characters introduced the theme of social inequality into the opera. With high tragic pathos, it reflects the fate of people in a society subordinated to the merciless power of money. Herman is a victim of this society; the desire for wealth imperceptibly becomes an obsession with him, overshadowing his love for Lisa and leading him to death.

Music

The opera “The Queen of Spades” is one of the greatest works of world realistic art. This musical tragedy amazes with the psychological truthfulness of the reproduction of the thoughts and feelings of the characters, their hopes, suffering and death, the brightness of the pictures of the era, and the intensity of musical and dramatic development. The characteristic features of Tchaikovsky's style received their most complete and perfect expression here.

The orchestral introduction is based on three contrasting musical images: a narrative one, associated with Tomsky’s ballad, an ominous one, depicting the image of the old Countess, and a passionate lyrical one, characterizing Herman’s love for Lisa.

The first act opens with a bright everyday scene. Choirs of nannies, governesses, and the perky march of boys clearly highlight the drama of subsequent events. Herman’s arioso “I don’t know her name,” sometimes elegiacally tender, sometimes impetuously excited, captures the purity and strength of his feelings.

The second picture falls into two halves - everyday and love-lyrical. The idyllic duet of Polina and Lisa “It’s Evening” is shrouded in light sadness. Polina’s romance “Dear Friends” sounds gloomy and doomed. The second half of the film opens with Lisa’s arioso “Where do these tears come from” - a heartfelt monologue full of deep feeling.

Galina Vishnevskaya sings. "Where do these tears come from..."

Lisa's melancholy gives way to an enthusiastic confession: “Oh, listen, night.” German’s tenderly sad and passionate arioso “Forgive me, heavenly creature”

Georgiy Nelepp is the best German, sings “Forgive me, heavenly creature”

interrupted by the appearance of the Countess: the music takes on a tragic tone; sharp, nervous rhythms and ominous orchestral colors emerge. The second picture ends with the affirmation of the bright theme of love. Prince Yeletsky’s aria “I love you” depicts his nobility and restraint. The fourth scene, central to the opera, is full of anxiety and drama.

At the beginning of the fifth scene (third act), against the background of funeral singing and the howling of a storm, Herman’s excited monologue appears, “All the same thoughts, still the same terrible dream.” The music that accompanies the appearance of the Countess's ghost fascinates with its deathly stillness.

The orchestral introduction of the sixth scene is painted in gloomy tones of doom. The wide, freely flowing melody of Lisa’s aria “Ah, I’m tired, I’m tired” is close to Russian drawn-out songs; the second part of the aria “So it’s true, with a villain” is full of despair and anger. The lyrical duet of Herman and Lisa “Oh yes, the suffering is over” is the only bright episode of the film.

The seventh picture begins with everyday episodes: a drinking song of the guests, Tomsky’s frivolous song “If only dear girls” (to the words of G. R. Derzhavin). With the appearance of Herman, the music becomes nervously excited. The anxiously wary septet “Something is wrong here” conveys the excitement that gripped the players. The rapture of victory and cruel joy can be heard in Herman’s aria “What is our life? A game!". In the dying minute, his thoughts are again turned to Lisa - a reverently tender image of love appears in the orchestra.

German's aria "That our life is a game" performed by Vladimir Atlantov

Tchaikovsky was so deeply captured by the entire atmosphere of the action and the images of the characters in “The Queen of Spades” that he perceived them as real living people. Having completed the draft recording of the opera with feverish speed(The entire work was completed in 44 days - from January 19 to March 3, 1890. The orchestration was completed in June of the same year.), he wrote to his brother Modest Ilyich, the author of the libretto: “... when I got to the death of Herman and the final chorus, I felt so sorry for Herman that I suddenly began to cry a lot<...>It turns out that Herman was not just an excuse for me to write this or that music, but all the time a living person...”

In Pushkin, German is a man of one passion, straightforward, calculating and tough, ready to put his own and other people’s lives on the line to achieve his goal. In Tchaikovsky, he is internally broken, in the grip of contradictory feelings and drives, the tragic irreconcilability of which leads him to inevitable death. The image of Lisa was subjected to a radical rethinking: Pushkin’s ordinary, colorless Lizaveta Ivanovna became a strong and passionate person, selflessly devoted to her feelings, continuing the gallery of pure, poetically sublime female images in Tchaikovsky’s operas from “The Oprichnik” to “The Enchantress.” At the request of the director of the imperial theaters I. A. Vsevolozhsky, the action of the opera was transferred from the 30s of the 19th century to the second half of the 18th century, which gave rise to the inclusion of a picture of a magnificent ball in the palace of Catherine’s nobleman with an interlude stylized in the spirit of the “gallant century” , but did not have an impact on the overall flavor of the action and the characters of its main participants. In terms of the richness and complexity of their spiritual world, the severity and intensity of their experiences, these are the composer’s contemporaries, in many ways akin to the heroes of the psychological novels of Tolstoy and Dostoevsky.

And another performance of Herman's aria "What is our life? A game!" Sung by Zurab Andzhaparidze. Recorded in 1965, Bolshoi Theatre.

In the film-opera “The Queen of Spades” the main roles were performed by Oleg Strizhenov-German, Olga-Krasina-Liza. Vocal parts were performed by Zurab Andzhaparidze and Tamara Milashkina.