Felicia Filip - Glinka: RUSLAN & LUDMILA, I am sad (Ludmila's cavatina), 1989 High D

THES SONGBIRD: Felicia Filip is from Romania, born in 1959. After a start on the piano, she studied voice in Bucharest and joined the opera company there. Her international debut was in Basel in 1991. She has sung Violetta often, including at Covent Garden (1994) and the Vienna State Opera (1993 - 97). She was Gilda in Barcelona, Queen of the Night in Toronto, Elvira and Leila in Toulon, and Adele in Frankfurt and Liege. In 2014, she became the director of the Comic Opera for Children in Bucharest. THE MUSIC: Mikhail Glinka composed "Ruslan and Ludmila" (Руслан и Людмила) between 1837 and 1842, based on a poem by Puskin. The work premiered in Saint Petersburg in 1842 (the same year as Donizetti's "Linda di Chamonix" and Verdi's "Nabucco"). It became a mainstay of the repertoire after its premiere in Moscow in 1846 (with over 700 performances there). The story of chivalry centers around the abduction of Ludmila on her wedding night by an evil sorcerer, and her subsequent rescue. Ludmila's opening aria is a long and florid cavatina -- Filip interpolates a sustained High D to the end of the aria.