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(RIA Novosti) - St. Petersburg's famous Mariinsky Theater will host a star-studded festival lasting over two months before closing for an overhaul.
This year sees the fourteenth running of the Stars of the White Nights Festival, a showcase event for the theater better known outside Russia by its Soviet-era name - the Kirov.
"The festival will be the Mariinsky's last large-scale event before the historic theater building closes down for refurbishment," organizers said.
The theater will use the two and a half month long marathon, which starts May 10, to pay tribute to 20th-century composer Dmitry Shostakovich on the centenary of his birth.
All of Shostakovich's 15 symphonies will be performed during the festival, as well as two operas (Katerina Izmailova, The Nose), two ballets (The Golden Age, The Overcoat) and a musical comedy (Moscow. Cheryomushky).
Pyotr Tchaikovsky is another famous Russian to figure prominently at this year's festival, which features all of his ballets and four operas. Operatic highlights include the Mariinsky's acclaimed productions of "Eugene Onegin," "The Queen of Spades," "Mazepa" and "The Sorceress."
The festival will also offer a selection of Italian operas, including Giuseppe Verdi's Nabucco, Falstaff, Don Carlos and La Forza del Destino, and Ruggero Leoncavallo's I Pagliacci.
The 250th anniversary of Mozart's birth will be marked by performances of his opera Cosi Fan Tutte and his Requiem.
This festival's extensive ballet program will offer a journey through the history of ballet at the Mariinsky, from the classical works of Marius Petipa all the way to experimental choreography of recent years. The Stars of the White Nights - named after and timed to coincide with a period when St. Petersburg enjoys up to 20 hours of daylight a day - is traditionally an occasion for foreign stars to perform at the Mariinsky. This year's guests include the London Symphony Orchestra, Italian conductor Ricardo Muti and American soprano Renee Fleming.
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