The chronological frame of the RΘ project encompasses the period from the 1730s to 1836: these are conventional dates, chosen to define the chronological scope; they correspond to the official beginning of operatic life in the Russian Empire, up to the first staging of Mikhail Glinka’s A Life for the Tsar, conventionally considered the “first Russian opera” – a date (1836) that still represets a watershed moment in this field for the academic community.
Among the final aims of the project is, rather, the possibility of re-establishing a line of continuity between pre- and post-Glinkian operatic life, a continuity denied by traditional secondary literature. The project, however, avoids any teleological approach, as well as any anachronistic distinction based on national or ethnic criteria: the convention is rather based on the geographic extension of the Russian Empire’s territory, intended in purely historical terms. In fact, it should be clear from the beginning that this project aims at a critical, scientific reconstruction of the operatic life of the country in its multiethnic and multicultural dimension, excluding any rhetoric or celebratory discourse.
The archive will include materials related to the theatrical stagings that took place within the specified borders, with the goal of providing as much information as possible about the Russian Empire’s theatrical activity during the chosen chronological frame. Therefore, the archive will include sources and documents produced not only in Russian but also in other languages (for example, Italian, French, Polish, German, and Ukrainian), which makes it possible to create a systematic picture of the theatrical activity of that context, a long-awaited goal for the academic community.
The archive creation process is structured in several phases, the first of which consists of a survey of operatic titles performed on the theatrical stages of the Russian Empire in the specified period and/or conceived for performance. As to genres, operas are included in their various declinations, subgenres, and definitions, for example, “dramma giocoso”, “opera seria”, “dramma per musica”, “opera comica”, “opera buffa”, “opéra comique”, “Singspiel”, “opera komicheskaya”, “drama” (also “liricheskaya”), “drama na muzïke”, and so on. For now, ballets conceived as separated from operas are excluded from the purpose of the project.
Performances are also collected: every event in this perspective is considered a separate item, related to authors (librettist/s, composer/s, and other figures), place, date and specific location of the staging, related to the source attesting these data.
The next phase consists in a survey of specific materials that witness the production (or the intention to perform) each of these individual titles, in particular:
- Printed and manuscript librettos;
- Manuscript and printed (period) scores;
- Vocal scores (piano reductions);
- Cembalist parts, separate orchestral parts, vocal parts/roles
The collection of stage sets, theatre playbills, advertisements in the periodic press, reviews, chronicles, memoirs, and letters is also planned.
