Martha: A Story From Missolonghi (Xydakis) Athens 2021 Irini Derebei Tassis Christoyannis
Information on the Performance
- Work Title: Martha: A Story From Missolonghi
- Composer: Xydakis Nikos
- Libretto: Dionysis Kapsalis Libretto Text, Libretto Index
- Venue & Opera Company: Greek National Opera GNO, Athens, Greece
- Recorded: 2021
- Type: Staged Opera Live
- Singers: Irini Derebei, Tassis Christoyannis
- Conductor:
- Orchestra: POLIS Ensemble
- Chorus: Pleiades
- Stage Director: Vassilis Kehagias
- Costume Designer:
- Lighting Designer: Christos Tziogkas
Information about the Recording
- Published by: GNO
- Date Published: 2021
- Format: Streaming
- Quality Video: 4 Audio:4
- Subtitles: yessubs, ensubs, othersubs
- Video Recording from: GNO TV FULL VIDEO
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION ON THIS PERFORMANCE
The figure of Martha, the beleaguered mother “who stopped being jealous of the little bird that found a tiny seed and sang” from the fragments of Dionysios Solomos’ epic, unfinished poem The Free Besieged, lies at the centre of this musico-poetic synthesis that ventures to render one of the most prominent episodes of the Greek War of Independence: the Third Siege and Exodus of Missolonghi in the spring of 1826 – seen, this time, from the viewpoint of the besieged women.
Martha: A Story From Missolonghi is based on two sources that balance the popular and the learned in creative ways: the invaluable Memoirs of the revolutionary warrior and historian Nikolaos Kasomoulis, to whom we owe a first-hand account of the siege, and the lacerating poetic transubstantiation of the historical events by the genius of Solomos, the national poet of Greece, through lyrics from his poem The Free Besieged that are interpolated into the work.