Opera Boris Godunov Program Notes Sheet Music and Recordings

Program Notes & Analysis

A Music Drama of the People, Born of Chaos

During the 1870s, two young, brilliant, and fiercely ambitious composers shared an apartment in St. Petersburg, working at opposite ends of the same piano. They would work all day, sharing ideas, arguing, and playing their new creations for each other every evening. One was Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, and the opera he was writing was The Maid of Pskov. The other was Modest Mussorgsky, and his was Boris Godunov. It is impossible to overstate the importance of this shared kitchen in the history of music. Boris and Pskov are the two founding fathers of Russian music drama. Both are sprawling, un-Wagnerian historical epics based on Alexander Pushkin-esque themes. Both reject Italian bel canto in favor of a realistic Russian vocal style. And, most importantly, both feature a charismatic, psychologically complex, and guilty Tsar at their center, written for a bass. While Rimsky-Korsakov’s Pskov is the more lyrical and polished nationalist epic, Mussorgsky’s Boris is the raw, jagged, and revolutionary masterpiece.

A Manifesto for Musical Truth

Boris Godunov was not just an opera; it was a manifesto. Mussorgsky was a core member of The Mighty Handful (or The Five), a group of nationalist composers (Balakirev, Cui, Borodin, and Rimsky-Korsakov) who were dedicated to creating a true Russian art, free from the contamination of German symphonies and Italian arias. Mussorgsky’s ideal was musical truth. He was not interested in pretty tunes; he was interested in psychology and realism. He wrote his own libretto, directly from Pushkin's play and historical chronicles, and created a new kind of vocal music: a realistic, declamatory style that mimicked the natural cadence of Russian speech. He was, in short, writing an anti-opera.

A Tale of Two Borises: The Original vs. The Revised

Mussorgsky’s first, Original 1869 version is a dark, claustrophobic, and anti-theatrical masterpiece. It is a seven-scene psychological portrait of the Tsar and the People. It had no love story. It had no major female role. It ended not with a bang, but with the death of Boris. Mussorgsky submitted it to the Imperial Theatres, and the committee was baffled. They rejected it, complaining (not unreasonably) that it lacked a primary female character and had no conventional love interest.

A lesser composer might have abandoned the project. Mussorgsky, however, re-thought the entire opera. He did not just add a love scene; he composed an entirely new act—the Polish Act (Act III). This act provided everything the committee wanted: a fiery mezzo-soprano princess (Marina Mniszech), a political conspiracy (with the Jesuit Rangoni), and a grand, lyrical love duet at a fountain (a direct nod to Verdi). He also added the revolutionary Kromy Forest scene, which brilliantly shifts the opera's final focus from the death of the Tsar to the fate of the People. This longer, more operatic, and less austere version was finally staged in 1874. It was a popular success, but a critical failure, with critics (and Tchaikovsky) calling it a clumsy, amateurish mess.

The Rimsky-Korsakov Version: The Makeover

After Mussorgsky’s alcohol-fueled death in 1881, his scores were left in a chaotic state. His best friend, Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, in what he saw as an act of supreme friendship, decided to save Boris from obscurity. Rimsky-Korsakov, a master of orchestration, looked at Mussorgsky’s raw, stark, and un-polished score and saw only mistakes. He re-orchestrated the entire opera from top to bottom. He smoothed out the harmonies. He fixed the unconventional rhythms. He cut passages. He made it sound... polite. He transformed Mussorgsky’s black-and-white etching into a dazzling, colorful, Technicolor epic. It was this lush, brilliant, post-Wagnerian Rimsky version that the world came to know and love for the next 75 years, made famous by the legendary bass, Feodor Chaliapin. Only in the mid-20th century did scholars and conductors begin to champion Mussorgsky’s original, darker, harsher, and more modern scores.

The True Hero: The Russian People

The title role is Boris, but the opera's true protagonist is the Russian People. Mussorgsky’s radicalism was to make the chorus a main character. The opera opens with them (the mob, being beaten by a policeman, forced to beg Boris to be Tsar). And it ends with them (the mob, in the Kromy Forest, lynching a boyar, cheering a false Tsar, and being left alone to starve). They are not a polite Greek chorus; they are a fickle, stupid, violent, and deeply suffering animal. Their soul is represented by the opera's conscience: The Holy Fool (or Simpleton). His final, weeping lament for his starving, leaderless country (Flow, flow, bitter tears...) is the true, devastating moral of the opera.

Boris: A Shakespearian Portrait of Guilt

The role of Boris is one of the greatest bass-baritone roles in history. He is not a one-dimensional villain like Verdi’s Macbeth. He is a complex, Shakespearian figure. He is a good ruler, a progressive leader, and a loving father. But he is a man with an original sin: he murdered the rightful heir, the Tsarevich Dmitri, to gain the throne. The entire opera is a study of his psychological disintegration under the weight of this guilt. His two great monologues are not lyrical arias; they are terrifying descents into madness. In Act II, his monologue I have attained the highest power (Dostig ya vyshey vlasti) is a study in paranoia. And his Act II finale, the Clock Scene, is a masterpiece of Expressionism. As the clock's pendulum swings, Boris begins to hallucinate, seeing the ghost of the murdered child in the corner. It is a terrifying musical panic attack.

The Sound of Bells and Folk Song

Mussorgsky’s score is the sound of Russia. The famous Coronation Scene is not a joyful march; it is a heavy, ominous, and terrifying processional, built on the clashing, dissonant clangor of Orthodox church bells. The music is filled with the sound of folk song. The most famous is the Song of the Gnat from the Inn Scene, but more importantly, the bawdy, drunken Song of Kazan sung by the vagabond monk, Varlaam. This is not a polite bel canto aria; it is a raw, explosive, and realistic character sketch. From the austere chant of Pimen the chronicler to the mad, childlike piping of the Holy Fool, Boris is an opera of unprecedented realism, a work that rejected the past and defined the future.

The Story of the Opera

(Based on the standard, "Revised" 1872 version)

Prologue

Scene 1: In the courtyard of a monastery, a Policeman with a whip orders a crowd of peasants to kneel and beg Boris Godunov to accept the throne, which he has been refusing. The people are indifferent and confused, mechanically wailing by rote. Scene 2: The Coronation. In the Kremlin. Bells clash as the boyars (nobles) process. Boris Godunov is crowned Tsar. He delivers his first monologue, "Skorbit dusha" (My soul is sad). He is filled with a dark foreboding and prays to God for mercy.

Act I

Scene 1: A cell in the Chudov Monastery. The old monk, Pimen, is writing the final chapter of his chronicle of Russia. A young, ambitious novice, Grigory, awakes from a nightmare. Pimen tells him the story of the murder of the true heir, the Tsarevich Dmitri, in Uglich many years ago, an act ordered by Boris. Grigory is horrified and, realizing he is the same age as the slain Tsarevich, a plan forms in his mind. He vows to avenge the boy. Scene 2: An inn on the Lithuanian border. Grigory has escaped the monastery and is now fleeing to Poland. He is traveling with two drunken, vagabond monks, Varlaam and Misail. Varlaam sings his explosive, bawdy Song of Kazan. Guards enter, searching for the fugitive monk, Grigory. They have a warrant but cannot read. Grigory, who can read, takes the warrant and, pretending to read it, describes Varlaam. But Varlaam, suspicious, snatches the paper and slowly, syllable by syllable, reads the true description... of Grigory. In the ensuing chaos, Grigory pulls a knife and leaps out the window, escaping to Poland.

Act II

The Tsar's apartments in the Kremlin. Boris's children, Xenia and Feodor, are with their Nurse. Xenia is weeping for her dead fiancé. Boris enters and comforts her. He looks at his son, Feodor, studying a map of Russia, and sings his great monologue, I have attained the highest power. He is haunted by the memory of the murder and the unhappiness of his people. Prince Shuisky, a cunning and treacherous advisor, arrives. He comes to tell Boris that a Pretender has arisen in Poland, claiming to be the dead Tsarevich Dmitri. Boris, in a panic, dismisses him and is left alone. The Clock Scene begins. As a large clock chimes, Boris begins to hallucinate, seeing the bloody ghost of the child. He collapses, sobbing, begging God for mercy.

Act III

The Polish Act in Sandomir Castle. The ambitious Polish princess, Marina Mniszech, is in her boudoir. She plans to seduce the Pretender Dmitri, marry him, and become Tsarina of Russia. She is being manipulated by a Jesuit priest, Rangoni, who demands she use her influence to convert Russia to Catholicism. Later, at a fountain, she meets Grigory (now Dmitri). He is passionately in love with her. She, in a cold, calculating duet, mocks his love, telling him she is only interested in the throne. She spurs his ambition, and they agree to march on Moscow.

Act IV

Scene 1: The Duma (Parliament) in the Kremlin. The boyars are meeting, debating how to stop the Pretender. Shuisky arrives and describes Boris's madness, how he was talking to a ghost and shouting, "Away, child!" Just as he speaks, Boris himself stumbles in, wild-eyed, and cries the same words. He sits, and Pimen, the old monk, is brought in. He tells a story of a blind shepherd who was cured by praying at the tomb of the murdered Tsarevich Dmitri. This final, supernatural proof of the boy's sainthood shatters Boris. He collapses. Knowing he is dying, he calls for his son, Feodor. He sings his farewell and death aria, warning his son to beware the boyars and to rule justly. As an offstage chorus prays, Boris dies. Scene 2: A clearing in the Kromy Forest. (The revised ending of the opera). A mob of peasants has captured a boyar and is torturing him. The Holy Fool (Simpleton) is mocked by children. The Pretender Dmitri arrives with his army. He rallies the people, proclaiming he is their true Tsar. The crowd, in a frenzy, follows him toward Moscow. The stage empties, leaving only the Holy Fool. Alone in the snow, he sings the opera's final, devastating lament for the future of Russia: "Flow, flow, bitter tears...".