Transformative Music Director Departs COT with Shostakovich’s The Nose • December 2023
Chicago, Illinois
Photo by E. Jason Wambsgans / Chicago Tribune
After seven years as Chicago Opera Theater’s Music Director, Lidiya Yankovskaya departs on a high note with the first Chicago performances of Shostakovich’s The Nose, in a new production by Francesca Zambello. A number of outlets have written about her tenure at COT, the astonishing 25 works she brought to Chicago for the first time, her championing of contemporary and Slavic repertoire, and her drive to perform at the highest artistic level.
Chicago Tribune: Transformative music director departs COT
The Reklama Cover Story: ‘These days I live by my nose’
Musical America: The Nose is COT Music Director’s Last Hurrah
Critical Acclaim
Lidiya leads a rehearsal of The Nose
Photo by Justin Thompson
“In her final appearance as COT music director, Lidiya Yankovskaya led a fizzing performance of Shostakovich’s irreverent score, drawing full-tilt playing from the hard-working orchestra. The conductor communicated the score’s musical audacity and pushed the piercing dynamic extremes.”
–Chicago Classical Review
“Yankovskaya and Zambello are the two women who are on the nose with this opera. They realized both the blistering music of the score and the zany story of a man chasing his own nose in a thoroughly entertaining way. Shostakovich’s score bursts with exuberance and audacity, and Yankovskaya’s leadership in the pit yields splendid results. There are madcap riots of atonal chaos, instrumental sneezes, belches and farts, lots of rude musical gestures from the trombone, as well as sections of pathos and melodrama. The Intermezzo for Percussion was wildly satisfying.”
–Hyde Park Herald
“Wonderfully absurd and wildly zany…plus a superb orchestra led by Yankovskaya in her final performances as COT’s excellent music director.”
–WTTW
“Of course, the main story surrounding the production is that this is the last Chicago Opera Theater production performed under the baton of beloved Music Director Lidiya Yankovskaya. During her years in the position, she has earned accolades for her artistry and leadership, successfully shepherding the organization through lock-down and programming seasons that typify COT’s artistic vision of opera as a living artform. It’s no exaggeration to say that her departure marks the end of an era for the company. For the opera-going public in Chicago, that sea change is perhaps the biggest reason for making it a point to see The Nose.”
–Chicagoland Music Theater
“A subversive and hilarious opera that was a thrill to watch…Yankovskaya previously detailed how Shostakovich wrote every shriek, grunt, and even flatulence into the music. She has a masterful command of scores with different structures and instrumentation and has a devotion to music in Slavic languages.”
–Third Coast Review
“A conductor very much on the way up, Yankovskaya will be missed. The Russian-American was very much at home in Shostakovich’s score, adroitly capturing both its idiomatic flavor and its harder edges, propelling the action forward and holding all the varied, sometimes competing forces together. The Nose is an important work that one could easily have imagined the Lyric Opera of Chicago debuting locally. But much as it did in 2019 with Jake Heggie’s Moby-Dick, Chicago Opera Theater grabbed the opportunity for this [Chicago] premiere and deserves kudos for both its initiative and this first-rate result.”
–Chicago Sun-Times
“Challenges don't seem to intimidate Lidiya Yankovskaya. The orchestra under her meticulous direction was merrily raucous. Typical of Yankovskaya's seven years as COT music director, the principal singers were superb. Her international career has been taking off, and her tenure has been impressive. She has commissioned new operas and presented several world premieres. The orchestra has never sounded better, both technically well-honed and deeply expressive. That Yankovskaya scheduled The Nose for her finale as COT music director is wholly appropriate. COT has become an operatic incubator for Chicago, a place to hear excellently produced new works and more obscure pieces worthy of attention. The Nose is a youthful celebration for a 50th-anniversary season.”
–Musical America