The inventiveness and courage of Long Beach Opera keeps impressing. The company's next double-bill, on May 4 and 10, provides two original takes on Stravinsky’s neoclassical theater piece L’Histoire du Soldat. The 1918 score was set to Ferdinand Ramuz’s version of a Russian folktale about a soldier in pursuit of a princess and a treasure, who is conned by the Devil.
In An American Soldier’s Tale, author and pacifist Kurt Vonnegut reimagines the Russian folktale into the vexing World War II true story of Private Eddie Slovik. In 1945, Slovik became the first American soldier executed for desertion since the Civil War.
Wynton Marsalis’ companion piece, A Fiddler’s Tale, reinterprets Stravinsky’s score through the lens of American jazz and spins The Soldier’s Tale into a Faustian yarn about a young, upstart musician who strikes up a deal with record producer Bubba Z. Beals and bites off more than she can chew.