State Opera Ruse has received an invitation to participate in the prestigious Bucharest Opera Festival 2025 with the ballet production Carmen, set to the iconic music of Georges Bizet. From June 15 to 24, leading opera and ballet theaters from Romania and abroad will gather in Bucharest. This year’s edition is expected to feature over 1,500 artists, musicians, and stage professionals from around the world. The participation of the Ruse State Opera was arranged following working meetings initiated by H.E. Mr. Radko Vlaykov, Ambassador of the Republic of Bulgaria to Romania, between the management of the State Opera Ruse and the leadership of the National Opera and the Bucharest Philharmonic.
In recent years, the Ruse Opera has had notable appearances on stages in Bucharest. In March 2022, the Romanian National Opera hosted the Ruse company with Ernani by Giuseppe Verdi, conducted by José Cura, directed by Orlin Anastassov, with set design by Denis Ivanov and performances by Petar Kostov, Ventseslav Anastassov, Tsvetelina Vassileva, Neli Petkova, Stoyan Stoyandzhov, and Ivan Penchev. On September 1, 2024, the Ruse Opera Chorus took part in the opening of the prestigious Masters of Classic festival at Sala Palatului in Bucharest. In the opera gala concert, conducted by Stelyana Dimitrova-Hernani, the chorus performed excerpts from Turandot, La Bohème, Madama Butterfly, and - together with the Sofia Philharmonic - accompanied world opera stars Anna Netrebko and Yusif Eyvazov. The company also took part in another performance during the festival, again with the Sofia Philharmonic, performing Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony.
The creative ties between Ruse opera artists and their Romanian colleagues date back to 1956 with the first tours of conductor Romeo Raichev and reciprocal guest appearances with the opera in Timișoara. Ruse presented The Pearl Fishers, Cavalleria Rusticana, Mazeppa, and the ballet Rivals, while the Romanians brought to Ruse The Marriage of Figaro, Lakmé, the Romanian operetta Ana Lugojana, and the ballet The Fountain of Bakhchisaray. At that time, the Ruse Opera invited renowned Romanian ballet master and teacher Mercedes Pavelic, who greatly contributed to the development of the ballet ensemble and soloist ballerina Elisabetta Ferretti.
But “the grand adventure,” as the first director of the Ruse Opera, Georgi Chendov, writes in The Peacock Feather, was the invitation extended to the Bucharest Opera for a creative partnership: „As early as the summer of 1957, the chief director of the Bucharest Opera, Ion Rânzescu, came to us to inspect the stage and discuss the staging. He brought several carefully crafted models, and we immediately gained a sense of what our Carmen would look like. Shortly after, we received the costume sketches. In the young artist Lidia Iovanescu, we discovered a uniquely talented designer. Both Rânzescu and Lidia stayed in Ruse throughout the production, meticulously overseeing the creation of the sets, costumes, and props...
Rânzescu faced the challenge of working with very young performers in demanding roles. Whenever communication became difficult due to the language barrier,” Chendov continues, “he would climb on stage and act out the scenes with rare skill and contagious artistic temperament. His bright eyes gleamed with passion and determination. The actors quickly grew fond of him and followed him with ease...
One of the main difficulties was set construction and stage transitions. The designer Teodor Kiryakov - Suruchanu had only slightly altered the sets he had originally made for the Bucharest production of Carmen... Suruchanu - a frail old man with dark features, resembling a down-on-his-luck operetta nobleman - would constantly wander between the stage and workshops, worried about every detail. His sets were heavy and solid - one could live inside them, not just perform. They portrayed beautiful fragments of Spanish architecture, allowing for spectacular staging and dynamic group movement. Suruchanu, a mix of Romanian, Greek, and Russian, born in Bessarabia, spoke Russian with an accent. He was entirely devoted to the theater... Together with all the cast and crew, he joyfully accepted the thunderous ovations of the grateful audience, unaware that he had only two months left to live. Exhausted from overwork, he fell ill with pneumonia upon returning to Bucharest and soon passed away. The Ruse Carmen became his swan song.”
The premiere took place on January 16, 1958. “I stepped onto the stage,” Chendov recalls, looked at the sets, the curtains, the lights... and the wheel began to turn. In the corridors, the tobacco workers of Seville waited breathlessly to storm the stage. Ana Georgieva, a rose in her mouth, gracefully tugged her wide skirt, practicing Carmen’s feline walk... Throughout the performance, our singers gave focused, expressive performances. They were not just mannequins who sang; they lived their roles, moved with the unique rhythm and energy of the Spanish characters, breathed the sultry, passionate air of Seville. Rânzescu, with his skill and pedagogy, had taught them all that.
The curtain opened, and light poured onto the Seville piazzetta. Colorful couples descended the curved stone staircase. Soldiers marched past the guardhouse. A lace awning hung diagonally from the stage frame, shaping the scene like a Spanish maja’s shawl. Dyalov had brought it - it was beautiful... Now it became clear what our costume workshop had been busy with for the past three months. At a glance, it was obvious: no opera had a more striking, more vivid wardrobe than Carmen. A few years later, the National Opera in Sofia would choose our costumes for the Sofia International Competition for Young Opera Singers.
“Carmen” connected us to the Bucharest Opera. Soon, names like Zenaida Pally, Elena Cernei, Magda Ianculescu, Nicolae Herlea, Octav Enigărescu, and Ion Piso regularly appeared on our stage. With them, our audience became somehow... closer. "
On June 19 at 7:00 PM, on the stage of the National Opera in Bucharest, as part of the Bucharest Opera Festival 2025, Ruse Opera will present Carmen – the ballet, choreographed and directed by Natalia Osipova, conducted by Maestra Viliana Valcheva, with Sebastian Malasch as set designer, Kate Hester and Kasiana Angelova in charge of multimedia, Boyan Georgiev as lighting designer, and Anton Ivanov as rehearsal coach. The ballet company is artistically directed by Vesela Vassileva. Special guest opera soloists will include Petya Tsoneva (mezzo-soprano) as Carmen, Petar Kostov (tenor) as Don José, and Alexander Krunev (baritone) as the Toreador. Also appearing on stage will be soloists and ensembles from the Ballet, Chorus, and Orchestra of the State Opera Ruse.
Before the performance, the opera foyer will host an exhibition of 100 original costume sketches by artists Teodor Suruchanu and Lidia Iovanescu, created for Carmen in 1957 and carefully preserved in the Ruse Opera’s Art Archive. This exhibition stands as a tribute to these exceptional Romanian artists and a symbol of the long-standing friendship between the Bulgarian and Romanian cultural communities.
Dr. Veselina Antonova, Archivist of the State Opera Ruse
Images – Archival materials from the archives of the State Opera Ruse
