Bomb report turned to be false

A report on a bomb planted in St Petersburg's Mikhailovsky theater that caused postponement of the opening night of a rarely performed French opera Thursday has proved to be false, press officials at the St Petersburg and Leningrad Region Interior Department said after the demolition experts had ended their search in the theater's building.
The Mikhailovsky Theater director, Vladimir Kekhman said an unknown man who presented himself as a members of a radical nationalistic grouping called the management at 17:25 and made a warning that bombs had been planted inside the building that it the explosion would occur shortly before the performance.
The theater had to postpone the premiere to Friday with Kekhman saying all the tickets sold for Thursday would be valid on the rescheduled day unless the spectators returned them to the ticket offices.
The premiere of La Juive /The Hebrew Woman/, which the French classical composer Jacques-Francois-Fromental-Elie Halevy /b. 1799, d. 1862/ composed on the basis of a plot by Eugene Scribe, is timed for the opening of the Year of France in Russia.
The party of Rachel is to be performed by Maria Jose Siri, an operatic star from Uruguay.
Engaged in other parts are the Italian singers Valter Borin and Gian Luca Pasolini. Harry Peeters of the Netherlands performed the part of Cardinal de Brogni.
The Mikhailovsky Theater promotion describes La Juive as “a masterpiece of grand style of the early 19th century” where “visual effects prevailed over the musical and dramatic logic.”

19.02.10