I thoroughly enjoyed the production of Shchedrin's opera Not Only Love. This is an excellent original work about the people of a modern collective-farm village, with fresh new music and apt intonational characterisation. Over the past twenty years the opera has been staged often, but was not successful. The producers could not find the key to the expression of its subtle and poetic imagery on stage. But now Pokrovsky at the Moscow Kamerny Musical Theatre and Pasynkov in Leningrad are each staging their own versions of the opera, with some success. I find the Leningrad production particularly convincing. In it the lyricism and humour which are so characteristic of Shchedrin's musical style dominate. With the composer's consent, the producer has changed the order of the scenes and compressed the action into one act, making the opera more dramatic and dynamic. The orchestra is well co-ordinated by Dmitryev, who has done so much to raise the musical standard of the theatre...