ATHENS, Greece — For guests to Athens, the traditional Odeon of Herod Atticus is the must-see theater on the foot of the Acropolis. Artists revere it for the majestic stage the place legends have carried out. And for the Greek capital’s residents it’s the touchstone of their summer time cultural calendar.
The Odeon of Herod Atticus just lately opened the seventieth season of the annual Athens Epidaurus Festival, a cherished annual custom for a lot of Greeks. However this version marks the final earlier than the theater that’s greater than 18 centuries previous shuts down for upkeep and restoration work that’s anticipated to final a minimum of three years.
Whereas theater and dance grace its stage, music is its cornerstone. Famend artists who’ve carried out right here embody Luciano Pavarotti, Frank Sinatra, Coldplay, and Greece’s personal Maria Callas.
Its closure might be a profound loss for spectators who’ve lengthy loved first-class performances beneath the celebs in one of many world’s most iconic open-air theaters.
“When (folks) consider the Athens cultural scene, everybody thinks of the pageant and Herodion,” stated Katerina Evangelatos, the pageant’s creative director since 2019, calling the theater by its generally used Greek identify. “It has grow to be a synonym of the pageant. It’s the coronary heart of the pageant.”
When the Greek Nationwide Opera opened this season’s pageant with Giacomo Puccini’s opera Turandot, it erected non permanent buildings behind the Roman-era odeon’s arched partitions to develop out there house for performers’ dressing rooms. The everlasting underground amenities weren’t sufficient.
The manufacturing additionally wanted more room contained in the venue to accommodate the size of the manufacturing.
To fulfill the opera’s scenic and casting calls for, a crew constructed a picket, balcony-like platform to partially lengthen over the orchestra pit.
This adaption allowed house for the massive solid and complicated staging, together with the emblematic scene wherein the emperor, Turandot’s aged father, is ceremonially rolled out in his towering throne to look at suitors try to resolve his daughter’s riddles — on the danger of execution. The scene requires important simultaneous on-stage presence by a number of performers.
Giorgos Koumendakis, the Greek Nationwide Opera’s creative director, describes the Herod Atticus Odeon as “a strained, fatigued house” which nonetheless instructions widespread veneration.
“People who find themselves aware, cultivated, educated — who perceive what this house is, its historic significance, the significance of the pageant, and the historical past of the Greek Nationwide Opera — respect it deeply and enter it nearly reverently,” stated Koumendakis. “It’s like getting into a temple — a temple of artwork — and it really has an affect. I can see it from the singers and the orchestra, too. Once they come right here, they genuinely wish to give their all.”
Throughout earlier restoration and conservation initiatives, the Herod Atticus Odeon had surfaces cleaned, cracks full of grout and new seating put in. This time, the scope of the work will rely upon findings from the research nonetheless underway.
Tradition Minister Lina Mendoni stated that though the venue’s time limit is for certain, on the finish of summer time, its reopening isn’t.
“It will rely upon the issues that the research will reveal,” she stated in an interview to Greek radio station Skai final month. “What is for certain is that a minimum of three years might be wanted.”
The closure of the Herod Atticus means the Athens Epidaurus Pageant might want to contemplate options for the subsequent few years. Evangelatos mirrored on the pageant’s 70 years, noting that it started throughout Greece’s turbulent postwar years of political division and financial hardship.
“It’s a miracle of survival and creative legacy,” she stated.
On the pageant’s opening evening, the backstage space was abuzz with remaining preparations, with wigs styled, masks adjusted and costumes touched up.
Soprano Lise Lindstrom, who starred as Turandot, took within the gravity of the setting.
“It’s a fully magical ambiance right here. To have the ability to stand on the stage and look instantly up and see the Acropolis is just a little bit mind-blowing, I’ve to confess,” she stated. “After which additionally to look out and see all of the folks sitting there and simply being so absorbed into the efficiency. It’s very, very highly effective and magical.”
All eyes had been on Lindstrom as she took middle stage beneath the celebs — marking the beginning of a remaining season earlier than an extended intermission.