IL PRINCIPE IGOR

Speranza

Prince Igor

Ballets Russes

Premiere

May 19, 1909

Prince Igor was first performed in St.Petersburg, Russia, in 1890. 

It is an opera by Alessandro Borodine, written in four acts with a prologue.

The composer adapted the libretto from the East Slavic epic The Lay of Igor's Host, which recounts the campaign of Russian Prince Igor Svyatoslavich against the invading Polovtsian tribes in 1185.

The opera was left unfinished upon the composer's death in 1887 and was edited and completed by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov and Alexander Glazunov.

The world premiere of the ballet was given in St. Petersburg on November 4, 1890 at the Mariinsky Theatre.

Set designers were Yanov, Andreyev, and Bocharov, while Lev Ivanov was balletmaster.





















Moscow premieres followed later.


The first was given in 1892 by The Russian Opera Society, conducted by Iosif Pribik.

The Bolshoi Theatre premiere was given in 1898 and was conducted by Ulrikh Avranek


Other notable premieres were given in Prague in 1899, and in Paris on May 19, 1909, with Sergei Diaghilev's Ballets Russes and Fokine’s choreography.

London saw the same production in 1914 conducted by Thomas Beecham.
 
In 1915, the United States premiere took place at the Metropolitan Opera, but staged in Italian and conducted by Giorgio Polacco.