Opera-lecture Mikhail And Mikhail Are Playing Chess, Latvian National Opera, March 12, 13 and 21; May 23; June 7 and 10
Riga-born chess Grandmaster Mikhail Tal triumphed at the world chess championship in 1960, defeating the seemingly unbeatable Soviet chess legend Mikhail Botvinnik, and becoming the youngest ever world chess champion (at that time) at the age of 23.
The legendary match between the two chess greats, both named Mikhail, inspired Latvian composer Kristaps Pētersons to pen the opera Mikhail And Mikhail Are Playing Chess ((Mihails un Mihails spēlē šahu)). During the opera performance, the game is played out in the form of a multimedia lecture, highlighting Tal's intuition- and improvisation-based playing tactics, which let him beat the rational and academically-minded Botvinnik, as well as the ideological significance of chess in the USSR. During the communist era, the game was keenly supported by the government, making the Soviet Union an "Eldorado of chess", in the words of former world champion Max Euwe of the Netherlands.
The format of an "opera-lecture" provides an innovative and original approach to the presentation of a cultural performance, not only at the Latvian National Opera, but in the world of the arts as a whole.
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www.opera.lv
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