The Hungarian State Opera House participated in a series of performances in India. In three sold-out performances, the opera house of the Indian Opera Orchestra. Johann Strauss’s operetta The Bat and Ferenc Erkel’s opera Bánk bán were also received with great interest and appreciation between 12 and 16 October 2022 at the National Centre for Performing Arts (NCPA) in Mumbai, the press release said.
The performances of The Bat, in German with English subtitles, were a great success for audiences in India’s financial and entertainment metropolis of 12 million people (25 million including agglomeration). On all three occasions, the audience practically filled the 1,100-seat NCPA Jamshed Bhabha Theatre, the city’s leading cultural institution.
The audience in Mumbai was perhaps even more relaxed than at home, very open, living and breathing the performance
– Szilveszter Ókovács, Director General of the Hungarian State Opera House, said on the spot.
The audience of about 700 people at the Jamshed Bhabha Theatre was also receptive to the Hungarian opera production of Bánk bán, which, as the Opera’s general director said in his introduction to the performance,
“was conceived in the Hungarian composer’s own style: this music, inspired by Verdi’s romantic voice, verbunk motifs and rhythms, with its Hungarian historical theme and the inescapable drama of Katona, is a true masterpiece.”
While The Bat was presented by the Hungarian State Opera at the request of the Indian partner who invited it, the 15 October concert performance of Bánk Ban was included in the guest performance at the suggestion of the Hungarian side. The performance of Ferenc Erkel’s work is part of the Budapest Opera’s intention to make Hungarian national opera as widely known as possible. The production has been performed in New York, Berehovo in Transcarpathia and Tegu in the south of the country for the past five years. The Hungarian State Opera travelled with more than 90 people for the week-long tour. The Opera will then tour Japan from 25 October to 20 November 2022 with an ensemble of 115.
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