VYACHESLAV GANELIN  "THE DEVIL'S BRIDGE"
Music from the Motion Picture Soundtrack
C&P 33 Records , Vilnius , Lithuania  33CD002
Order and purchase online -   http://litus.gemm.com


"THE DEVIL'S BRIDGE":YESTERDAY AND FOREVER"
"The Devil's Bridge" was written and staged in 1972-1973 in Lithuania as the
first rock opera.
Of course, it was impossible to name it like this at that time. Anyway, the
composer and jazz performer Vyacheslav Ganelin, the poet Sigitas Geda and
the film director Arunas Zebriunas were already famous in those days.
Singers were invited from the "street"-hippies and young bohemians youths
from night clubs and restaurants. In that sense "The Devil's Bridge" became
a sort of underground poem, too.
The plot and motif were borrowed from the best Lithuanian novel "The
Windmill of Baltaragis", writen by Kazys Boruta. Some parts came from The
Old Testament, Lithuanian myths, incantations and witchcrafts, also from
folklore magic and alchemy.
The plot is a Faustian and folkloric one. How much does happiness cost?
Where does a bargain with the devil lead to?
Pincius, a little devil, falls into a lake after angels' riot in heaven.
Here he is cougth by a man named Baltaragis who puts Pinciukas to work at
his windmill. Other characters: Baltaragis's wife Marcele, daughter Jurga
and her groom Girdvainis with his dappled horses, fastest in the region -
all stay around. What fate awaits them? Which aspects of their everyday life
are tragic and which are comic? Anyway: how much does it cost to sell one's
soul? People try to solve this in every single inch on Earth.
Folklore, witchcraft, magic, things that are human and those that are
"devilish" are brikly intertwined here. Renaissance of musicals has
flourished in Lithuania for almost three decades now. We were eager to do
something similar to "Jesus Christ Superstar", "Hair" or "Cats". We tried to
do it in our own country and in our own way.
Sigitas Geda.
October 2000, Vilnius