Mariinsky too busy for Golden Mask festival

The decision, announced Wednesday, means that all Mariinsky's productions and artists nominated for this year's Golden Mask awards, will not participate in the festival.

"This year, the Mariinsky Theater is unable to perform the nominated works for the festival's jury neither in February, nor in March," said spokeswoman Oksana Tokranova. "The theater realizes the level of responsibility involved in that decision. We also regret that the performers' work will not be encouraged within the prestigious Russian theatrical award," the theater said in a statement.

The Golden Mask event is not new to cancellations. Last year, the Mariinsky's version of Mozart's opera "Cosi fan tutte" was removed from the schedule just weeks before the festival started. The Mariinsky said it couldn't find a compromise that met its obligations abroad and attend the festival.

"It is difficult to work with the Mariinsky Theater, but [Mariinsky Artistic Director Valery] Gergiev and his troupe have enormous responsibilities and a titanic amount of work, especially connected with the 300th anniversary of St. Petersburg," festival director Eduard Boyakov told The St. Petersburg Times last year . "Gergiev's theater is internationally acclaimed and, perhaps naturally, it is rather hard for our festival to compare with, say, a tour to Covent Garden and arrangements made with Placido Domingo."

This year, the Mariinsky had 14 nominations, with most of them for their rendition of the famous Wagner tetralogy, including, in particular, as best opera production, Gergiev as best conductor, Georgy Tsypin as best opera designer, Larissa Gogolevskaya as best female singer, Vladimir Vaneyev and Mikhail Petrenko as best male singers - all for their works in "Der Ring des Nibelungen." The "Golden Mask" opens in Moscow on March 27 and runs until April 12.

News source: www.sptimes.ru