The Bolshoi has not arranged them, and did not intend to perform in Poland now. Its opera company made its latest appearance in that country, December 2002, with Modest Mussorgsky's "Khovantchina" and Sergei Prokofieff's "Love for Three Oranges". Both productions aroused public enthusiasm and had an excellent press. As for current so-called "Bolshoi performances", they are entirely on the guilty conscience of tour organizers, said the press service.
True, several Bolshoi soloists are taking part in concerts underway these days, but that is their personal initiative, and they all are on leave from the theatre just now, acknowledged our informants.
The Bolshoi is having problems with its Polish tour, media outlets announced yesterday. People are returning tickets to the box office in protest against their country's contribution to the Allied cause never mentioned throughout Moscow's Red Square V-E anniversary gala of May 9.
Meanwhile, street posters are announcing the renowned Moscow company's sojourn in Poland, and the Warsaw-based www.balszoj.pl website keeps on referring to a Bolshoi tour. The site is using a Bolshoi logotype discarded by now. "We got it from Cezary Szyjko, tour producer," Wiktor Switoniak, tour organizer, of the Podlaski concert agency, said to Novosti.
A Warsaw concert of May 9 was not authorized, and an investigation has been launched by the police, the press service said. The event was nothing to write home about, for that matter-a mere four hundred tickets had been sold for the vast Congress Hall, confessed Mr. Switoniak.
Warsaw performances are an utter failure, what with "inadequate advertising, and ticket sales," Piotr Skulski, prominent Polish manager engaged in ambitious stage projects, said to Novosti.
