Premium
"A Christmas story and other stories of Queen Maria of Romania" concert-show, with live music and video projections, will be presented, for the first time, at Arthub, on Thursday from 19:00, according to the organiser's Facebook page.
The cast includes Irina-Margareta Nistor - reading, mezzo-soprano Claudia Codreanu - reading, Inna Oncescu - piano, Octavian Paun - reading, Radu Radescu - concept, visuals, percussion, sound illustration, reading. The original music is signed by Felicia Donceanu, and the compositions by Paul Constantinescu, told Agerpres.
"The Stories of Queen Maria" collage show starts from the selection of some of the most beautiful writings for children of Queen Maria of Romania, the first of them being a Christmas story, completed with passages from "Daily Notes," from the desire to pay tribute to her devotion and love for her children, on the centenary anniversary of the coronation in Alba Iulia of King Ferdinand and Queen Maria (1922). The show tells, in words, music and images, the story of the six offspring of Queen Maria through the stories for children that the sovereign wrote urged by her older daughters, Princesses Elisabeta and Maria, illustrated sonically, but also visually, through original graphics of the volume of stories and through vintage photos of the royal family, restored and digitally colored by ColoRostariu, the presentation reads.
The book "The Stories of Queen Maria of Romania" was printed for the first time in 1921, in two volumes, by Cartea Romaneasca publishing house, and republished in 2011, by Curtea Veche Publishing. Two of these delightful and meaningful stories, "Ciobanul si Domnita" (The Shepherd and the Lady) and "Baba Alba" (Old Alba), inspired composer Felicia Donceanu (1931-2022) to write, especially for the show, four songs based on verses extracted from these stories, performed by Claudia Codreanu and Inna Oncescu. The show is accompanied by two other songs for children, composed by Paul Constantinescu (1909-1963), flanking the entire narrative, which towards the end reunites all the participants, along with "the voice of films," Irina-Margareta Nistor, the organisers say.
"Memories about the infancy of the Queen's children mix bittersweetly with fragments of her memoirs about her own childhood spent in England, with recollections of the royal Christmas celebrations, with painful testimonies during the war and with her emotional philosophical and spiritual meditations, a proposal for a show that we hope will bring together young and old lovers of fairy tales, royal history and music," the organisers also inform.
