Article: A Shostakovich Surprise - 'Paradise Moscow' Hits the Stage.(Review)

With a flair that rivals the mandarin repertoire of London, Opera North puts a bright, sassy face on a little-known musical comedy by the last of the great Russian composers.

The cultural black hole of Stalinist Russia is not a likely source for an aggressively cheerful piece of musical theater. Nor is Shostakovich, with whom we normally associate massive symphonies and bitterly sarcastic scores like The Golden Age. In musical theater he is best known for Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District, a gloomy work that evokes the old Danny Kaye crack about playing a role in a Russian play: "Firrrst I was afraid I was going to die. Then I was afrrraid I wasn't going to ...

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