Ruslan and Ludmilla
Glinka's Ruslan & Ludmilla was first performed on December 9th 1842, in St. Petersburg.
Once a popular and influential composer, Mikhail Glinka (1804-1857) is primarily remembered today for two operas: A Life for the Tsar (1836) and Ruslan and Ludmilla (1842). The latter, based on the work that brought poet Alexander Pushkin his first success in 1820, seems both a perfect operatic subject and an impossibility.
A complicated fairy tale of love overcoming all obstacles, it features a flying dwarf who gets his power from his beard, a fight with a giant disembodied head, a rescue foiled, a slain hero resurrected, and a happy ending with the lovers reunited!
Glinka worked intermittently on the Opera for five years and left the composition of the overture to the last minute. Despite the inventiveness of the music and its many memorable melodies, the opera was a failure. Nevertheless, the Overture is a firm favourite and has enjoyed a long career in the concert hall.
This arrangement was commissioned by Black Dyke Band as part of the Arts Council Recovery Grant.