Azernews.Az

By Sabina Idayatova

The premiere of the musical comedy Arshin Mal Alan (The Cloth Peddler) was held at the Ankara State Opera and Ballet Theatre on its 100th anniversary on October 27.

The operetta, written by great Azerbaijani composer Uzeyir Hajibeyli, was played to a full house on the stage of the Ankara State Museum of Paintings and Sculptures.

Ankara State Museum is an art center where the most outstanding works of the artists who played an important role in the development of Turkish Painting and Sculpture Arts are displayed.

The premiere which was prepared and staged by the honored Azerbaijani artist Hafiz Guliyev brought together the representatives of the Turkish society, Azerbaijani diplomats, and Azerbaijanis living in Ankara.

Azerbaijani ambassador to Turkey Faig Bagirov also attended the event.

Azerbaijani national dances prepared by the famous Turkish choreographer Deniz Chig have been met with great interest from the audience.

For about two hours, the audience thoroughly enjoyed the operetta's comic and romantic story of love which was full of songs and humor, and the performance received a standing ovation.

"Arshin Mal Alan" is the third and last operetta of Uzeyir Hajibeyli, the author of the first Oriental opera, and was composed and staged in 1913 in Baku.

The operetta which is close to the comic opera genre and has an amusing love story is one of the most well-known and dearly-loved stories among Azerbaijanis.

It is also attracting a broad audience worldwide, being successfully performed in over 60 countries of the world, including Austria, France, China, Greece, India, Russia, and Turkey.

On September 7, it won the hearts of about 3,000 Los Angeles theater lovers at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion. The American opera singers sang in original Azerbaijani with projected English translations, and spoke in English.

It was also successfully staged in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, having been translated into the Uzbek language.

The plot is centered on a young man named Asker who wants to see and choose his bride himself before marriage. But doing so was difficult at that time, because women were traditionally kept at home and were heavily covered in hijabs when they went outside.

Asker's friend Suleyman suggests that he dress up as a fabric peddler and go around the houses selling fabrics and meeting women.

Asker falls in love with Gulchohra and asks Gulchohra's father, the wealthy Sultan bey, for her hand in marriage. Sultan bey agrees, but Gulchohra objects, because she is in love with the peddler. Eventually, she realizes that the rich businessman Asker is actually her beloved peddler and they get married.