This Autumn, as Opera North takes mainstage audiences deep into a darkly glittering gambling underworld with a spectacular new period production of Tchaikovsky’s The Queen of Spades, the Howard Assembly Room presents a season of events, film and performances inspired by the greats of Russian literature and music.  

The centrepiece of the Russian mini season will transform the Howard Assembly Room into a 19th century casino for an evening of Russian chamber music and performance in The Gambler: A Night in Dostoevsky’s Casino. Music including Rachmaninov’s Cello Sonata and movements from Tchaikovsky’s Piano Trio is performed by international soloists Chloe Hanslip (violin), Danny Driver (piano) and Oliver Coates (cello).  A tale of intrigue, greed and obsession unfolds around the music, with extracts taken from Dostoevsky’s novel The Gambler, set in the fictional town of Roulettenberg. Alan Lane of Slung Low Theatre Company directs the performance.  

Taking the season from 19th century gambling dens into the 21st century, the harsh realities of the Chechnyan conflict are examined in the 2007 Russian film Alexandra, directed by Aleksandr Sokurov (Russian Ark). The world-famous soprano and actress Galina Vishnevskaya, widow of cellist and conductor Mstislav Rostropovich, gives a mesmerising performance as Alexandra, an elderly woman who arrives at a desolate military outpost to visit her grandson, a soldier in the Russian army. 

Leading chamber ensemble Endymion perform a programme of 20th century music from Russia and Estonia in Goodbye Stalin!, featuring piano quintets by Shostakovich and Schnittke alongside Arvo Pärt’s Summa. Endymion’s performance follows their curated mini-series at King’s Place in London earlier this year, focusing on major composers of the Soviet era. 

Rounding off the Russian strand in style is soprano Joan Rodgers CBE, renowned as a leading performer of Russian repertoire, who gives a recital of Pushkin Romances. Alexander Pushkin’s writing has provided fertile ground for generations of Russian composers, from Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin and The Queen of Spades, to Mussorgsky’s Boris Godunov. This concert in the Howard Assembly Room features some of Pushkin’s most inspiring verses set to music by composers including Glinka, Rimsky-Korsakov, Shostakovich and Tchaikovsky. Joan Rodgers will be accompanied by pianist Christopher Glynn.  

Dominic Gray, Projects Director, Opera North comments: “We are delighted to have such a varied programme of Russian music, performance and film in the Howard Assembly Room, to complement Opera North’s mainstage production of The Queen of Spades this Autumn.  

“The programme takes its inspiration from the cultural vitality of Russia, from the towering figures of Russian literature and music to the more contemporary work of the filmmaker Aleksandr Sokurov and Estonian composer Arvo Pärt. We are very lucky to have the Howard Assembly Room as a second venue at the home of Opera North, providing us with an exciting performance space for all of these elements from different artforms to come together, enabling us to look more clearly at the known and unknown intimacies which exist between the classical and the contemporary.”  

The strand of Russian events programmed in the Howard Assembly Room accompany Opera North’s mainstage production of Tchaikovsky’s The Queen of Spades. Directed by inspirational theatre director Neil Bartlett with a stellar cast including Orla Boylan, Jeffrey Lloyd Roberts and Dame Josephine Barstow, The Queen of Spades will be conducted by Opera North’s music director, Richard Farnes. The Queen of Spades opens at Leeds Grand Theatre on Thursday 20 October, before touring to Nottingham, Newcastle, Salford and London. 

Programme of events in the Howard Assembly Room’s Russia strand: 

Saturday 22 October  - Alexandra      - 7.45pm

Friday 4 November  - Endymion: Goodbye Stalin!    - 7.45pm

Thursday 17 November - The Gambler: A Night in Dostoevsky’s Casino  - 7.45pm

Friday 18 November  - Joan Rodgers CBE: Pushkin Romances  - 7.15pm

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