EVENINGS OF CLASSICAL MUSIC
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PROGRAMME FOR 24 SEPTEMBER 2003
JENUFA
Opera in Three Acts by Leos Janácek (1854-1928)
Libretto:  By the composer, founded on a story by Gabriela Preissová.
First Performance:  21 January 1904, Brno

CAST
Jenufa                                                     -   Roberta Alexander
Kostelcnicka Buryjovka          -   Anja Silja
Laca Klemen                                   -   Philip Langridge
Steva Buryja                                   -   Mark Baker
Grandmother Buriya                -   Menai Davies
Foreman at the mill                     -   Robert Poulton
The Mayor                                          -   Gordon Sandison
The Mayor's Wife                       -   Linda Ormiston
Karolka                                                   -   Alison Hagley
Barena                                                    -   Sarah Pring
Jano                                                            -   Lynne Davies
A Maid                                                    -   Helen Cannell
Aunt                                                            -   Deirdre Crowley

The Glyndebourne Chorus & The London Philharmonic
Conductor   -   Andrew Davis

Recorded at Glyndebourne (1989)
Directed by Nikolaus Lehnhoff
Sung in Czech with English sub-titles
Synopsis

The story is set in a Moravian village at the beginning of the 20th century.

Act One
          Jenufa is the stepdaughter of the Kostelnicka Buryja and in love with her son Steva, whose child she is carrying.  Laca, Steva's good-natured half-brother, is passionately fond of Jenufa, but she rejects him.
          Steva returns to the family home from the recruiting office, happy and drunk.  He has not been accepted for conscription and so Jenufa, overjoyed at this news, begs her beloved now to organise their wedding as soon as possible.  In his high spirits, he gives his promise.  The Kostelnicka, however, is appalled at the drunken disorderliness of her son and insists that he must wait a year before marrying Jenufa.  Steva staggers off.
          Dismayed, Jenufa is forced to fend off Laca's renewed advances.  In a fit of jealous rage he slashes her cheek with a knife and makes good his escape.

Act Two
          Five months later, Jenufa has given birth to her child.  For fear of the shame it might bring upon the family, the Kostelnicka keeps both mother and baby hidden at home.  When her son Steva refuses to marry the now disfigured stepdaughter, she chases him out of the house.  The Kostelnicka tells Laca of Jenufa's fate, but reveals to him only that the baby died during labour.
          With the mother asleep, she then takes the baby and drowns it in the ice-covered village pond.  The Kostelnicka convinces Jenufa that her baby died whilst she had been delirious with fever.  Lacking any longer a will of her own, Jenufa accepts Laca's proposal of marriage.

Act Three
          Two months later, preparations are underway for the wedding at the Kostelnicka's cottage.  Steva, who in the meantime has married Karolka, the Judge's daughter, has also been invited.
          Suddenly, the shepherd boy Jano brings the news that a child's body has been found under the melting ice.  Jenufa immediately recognises it from its cloting as her own and the villagers accuse her of murder.  Laca intervenes to protect Jenufa, but it is the Kostelnicka who saves her stepdaughter by confessing to her crime.  She agrees to testify in court to Jenufa's innocence.
          Jenufa, now recognising Laca's good nature, is finally able to find security in the honesty of his love for her.
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