The event, held at the city’s National Opera, is one of the highlights of the year-long commemoration marking the 80th anniversary of the start of Warsaw’s post-World War II reconstruction.
An Opera about Warsaw – The Best City in the World is a musical tribute to the massive national effort to rebuild Warsaw from the ruins of the war. It is the work of composer Cezary Duchnowski and writer Beniamin Bukowski, with the libretto based on motifs from Grzegorz Piątek's book The Best City in the World: Rebuilding Warsaw 1945-1949.
The text blends archival documents, excerpts from politicians’ speeches, urban design language, and street sounds. According to press materials, however, the libretto “is not a dry historical chronicle but a living drama of interwoven lives of architects, journalists, and city inhabitants.”
The opera’s two main heroines are women. One is a modernist architect modeled on Helena Syrkus, one of the leading figures of Poland’s post-war urban planning avant-garde and a member of the Warsaw Reconstruction Bureau. She firmly believes that, because too little of the town’s pre-war fabric has survived, the Polish capital must be rebuilt from scratch.
The other protagonist, an American press correspondent, is inspired by US reporter Anne Louise Strong, who traveled across war-torn Poland with the Soviet Red Army to confront her communist beliefs with reality.
Their encounter, during which they change their perspectives, serves as a pretext for reflection on people’s dreams, responsibilities, and the difficult dilemmas that shape both individual lives and communities.
Duchnowski’s score combines orchestral and choral sections with electronic music. “I wanted to create a sonic panorama of destruction and hope; to re-create, in sound, Warsaw as it was raised from the ruins of war,” the composer told the media.
The opera was commissioned by the Sinfonia Varsovia orchestra with financial support from the City of Warsaw. The official statement about the premiere was released on Thursday afternoon.
The Warsaw Autumn Festival runs until September 27. Established in 1956, the festival is being held this year for the 68th time.
(mk/mp)