CAIRO – 11 September 2017: September 11 marks the day Igor Stravinsky’s Opera “The Rake’s Progress” was first performed in Venice in 1951.
Divided into three acts and an epilogue, the Opera tells the dramatic tale of Tom, who is supposed to marry Anne Trulove but refuses to make an honest living. After Tom encounters a strange man named Nick Shadow, they strike a deal to allow Tom to collect the fortune of his dead uncle. The deal leads Tom down a spiral of immoral actions, including marrying a bearded woman behind Anne’s back.
It is revealed by the end of the Opera that Nick Shadow was the Devil and Tom had sold his soul to him. Finally, he is left as a madman in an asylum. The moral of the story is that the Devil can always find work for idle hands.
Stravinsky got the idea for the Opera and the title from a series of paintings by artist William Hogarth. “The Rake’s Progress” received critical acclaim and became Stravinsky’s best known piece of work.
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