Patrick Bade
Introduction to Opera, Part 3: Russian Opera

Patrick Bade - Introduction to Opera, Part 3: Russian Opera

- [Lauren] All right, Patrick, I think we can get started.

• Great. Thank you, Lauren. So that’s the exciting and exotic sound of Russian opera. That was the Coronation scene from the greatest Russian opera of all: “Boris Godunov” by Mussorgsky. And that recording is one I would strongly recommend to you. I think it’s one of the greatest complete opera recordings made in the 20th century. It actually wasn’t made in Russia. It was made in Paris just after the Second World War. But using white Russian choirs, you get that very distinctive sound of the Russian choirs. And it was conducted by Issay Dobrowen. And it’s really his great monument. He was a conductor of Russian Jewish origin, who had a distinguished career between the wars, was trapped in Norway by the German invasion. Apparently his life was saved by Fort Bangler, who arranged for him to get out of occupied Norway into Sweden. And he made this great recording with a fabulous cast. Boris Christoff, who’s probably the best, greatest Boris Godunov after Chaliapin, and backed up by other very fine singers. And that was- and he made that at the beginning of the 1950s and then died immediately afterwards. So it’s really, as I said, his monument.

Oh, there you see a picture of the short-lived Mussorgsky. And I think you can imagine, from that image, what the problem was. That he was a hopeless alcoholic and he drank himself to death at the age of 42. But he certainly was an extraordinarily original composer. When you think that music I’ve just played you, that was written in 1869. He was way, way ahead of his time. Now, the very distinctive qualities of Russian opera, I think they have their origin in two particular things. One is in Russian liturgical music, hence the great importance of choral singing in an awful lot of Russian operas. And I’ve mentioned this very, very distinctive sound that Russian choirs have. And the other qualities- source, I think, of special qualities of Russian music is in folk music. The rhythms. The melodic turns of melody and so on, you find in Russian are taken up by the classical composers. But I thought before we listen to any more opera, I want you to hear, well, that was a Russian choir, a white Russian choir. But this is a Soviet choir I’m going to play you now. It was the the great choir of the Soviet Union, in the 1970s, before the collapse of the Soviet Union. And here’s singing an excerpt from Rachmaninoff’s “Vespers”.

So not actually an operatic excerpt, but I want you to listen to the the timbre of the voices of the choir as a whole. But initially you’ve got this- a high lyric tenor, totally distinctive, can only be a Russian tenor. Has this kind of rather reedy, plangent quality to it. And then the voices descend, descend, descend into the depths. And you have these incredible Russian basses. There’s no other country, except maybe a little bit in Scandinavia, Finland, Norway, that produces these these dark, dark, inky, black, deep basses that you find among the Russians. Well, I hope that your sound equipment is better than mine that you could get the resonance of those basses at the bottom. Now, “Boris Godunov” was introduced to the west in 1908. It was actually Diaghilev who brought a Russian company to Paris. And it was presented at the Paris Opera with the great Feodor Chaliapin. And French composers went crazy!

They were just astonished by it. Here was something so fresh, so modern, so new. And the best thing about it, as far as they was concerned, was that it wasn’t German, and it wasn’t Wagner. It gave them an alternative route to modern opera. And the occasion was also a sensational success for Feodor Chaliapin. You can see this is an advertisement for H.M.V and it says “The world’s greatest operatic artist.” That is nothing but the truth. It wasn’t he- I don’t think you could say he had the most beautiful voice, or was even the best singer from a technical point of view. He had some very odd, quirky faults in his singing.

But as a total operatic artist, he was absolutely in a class of his own. And I think I can demonstrate it to you with my next recording. Now when he sang this, of course, the- it was sung in Russian. There would have been very few people in the audience who would’ve understood the text. It’s long before surtitles or subtitles. And the most famous scene is the clock scene. Boris Godunov was the usurper of the Russian throne. And in order to seize the throne, he’d had the true heir, a child, murdered. And he’s just received a description of the murder. And he’s suddenly overcome with guilt. And as the clock strikes, he hallucinates. He thinks he sees the ghost of the murdered child. And Chaliapin’s acting was so vivid, that people in the audience didn’t think he was acting. They, you know, he- they thought that really something absolutely horrific was happening on stage or in the wings. People were standing on their seats, trying to see what it was that Chaliapin was looking at.

So, here the text- here’s the text you can- I’m going to show you very briefly before I play you the scene. Then you see as the- you’ll- this will be…of course this is in Russian. You’ll have no trouble in guessing the moment that he sees the ghost of the child. It’s so, it’s half-sung, half-spoken. And then he chokes with horror and emotion, and he collapses. I’m always amazed that anybody could, could do that in a studio in front of a microphone. It’s so incredibly real, his acting. Now, “Boris Godunov” exists in several different versions. It became known to the world in a version, which had been quite extensively edited and improved in verges for commerce by Rimsky-Korsakov. And that’s the version you’ve just- the two excerpts I’ve just played were in that version. But there have been many other versions produced. When it was first put on in 1869, people said to Mussorgsky, “look, this opera will never carry- catch on. It’s too grim. It’s too dark. You have to add something to add a bit of contrast.” So he added the so-called “Polish scene,” where you have an extended love duet. Otherwise, there’s no love interest in the opera apart from this, and hardly any women. But there’s this very beautiful duet between the Polish Princess and the false Dimitri, a young man who pretends to be the murdered child.

And, so this… In the last time I saw “Boris Godunov” actually, at Covent Garden, they cut this scene. They went back to the original intentions of Mussorgsky. And I must say I felt really cheated because this is just such gorgeous music. You just don’t want to be without it. And this shows another aspect of Russian music, a particular type of extended melody. We know that other nations can produce good tunes. Italians, of course. French, we’ve already heard. Russian melodies, they just, they seem to be so long-breath. They seem- think of, you know, Rachmaninoff’s melodies. Think of the opening melody of the famous Rachmaninoff Second Piano Concerto. It goes on. It’s just one melody, but it just goes on and on and on for ages over pages. So I’m going to play you this duet where it’s also got a very beautiful extended melody with two very fine singers: Eugenia Zareska and, I think this is the first commercial recording, certainly in any complete opera set, of Nicolai Gedda right at the very beginning of his career when his voice was at its freshest. As elsewhere, ‘cause opera was an import, ultimately from Italy. Opera was brought to Russia in the 18th century, and specifically, of course, to St. Petersburg. And, as in Italy at the beginning, it was a court entertainment.

Catherine the great was a great fan of opera. And opera was not performed in Russian. It was initially performed in Italian. And a whole series of Italian and occasionally French composers were imported. This is Galuppi on the left, Paisiello on the right. Cimarosa on the left, and Boieldieu on the right. These were all composers in the second half of the 18th, and into the early 19th, century who were brought to the Russian court. A most distinguished Italian composer of all to arrive in Russia was in 1862 when Verdi, suitably dressed, as you can see on the left-hand side. If you go to Verdi’s house, by the way, at Sant'Agata, near to Parma, you can actually see the carriage in which he travelled all the way across Europe from Italy to St. Petersburg in as much comfort as was possible in those days. And he was paid huge sum of money, huge sum of money to write “The force of Destiny,” “La Forza del Destino,” which had a tremendous impact on really galvanised Russian opera. Partly because Russian composers resented the amount of money that Verdi had earned. And they felt that they must establish a more authentically Russian version of opera. But also “La Forza del Destino” is this huge epic opera with very complicated plots and subplots, a very kind of sprawling epic.

And this certainly had its impact on Russian composers. Not least, I think on Mussorgsky’s “Boris Godunov.” Wonderful, lavish, elaborate sets. This is for, this is “La Forza del Destino” in Russia. The two key figures in founding a national school of Russian opera were the composer Glinka and the poet Pushkin. Glinka here on the left, Pushkin on the right. It’s amazing how many operas in the 19th century through into the 20th century have their origin in poems, or short stories, or novellas by Pushkin. Now Glinka went to Italy. And his composing style, I suppose, was initially formed in Italy. He wrote two masterpieces, which are very core to the the Russian repertoire: “A life of the Czar” in 1836 and “Ruslan and Lyudmila” in 1842. And these really, these two operas at first “Life of Czar” is a kind of historical epic opera, not so different from the kind of grand operas that were being put on in Paris by Mabet, Alavin and so on. Whereas “Ruslan and Lyudmila” is based on a legendary folkloric story.

So those are the two main types of Russian opera for the rest of the 19th century. And so his style is sort of a sort a bel canto style, but he is ratifying it. He’s studying folk music, peasant music, and he’s adopting the rhythms of folk music. And many of the melodic turns as well. Here is the overture to “Ruslan and Lyudmila” where you’re- you- if you got your dancing boots on, you may want to do a little jig to this. The most prolific, and in many ways, most influential Russian opera composer of the 19th century is Rimsky-Korsakov. He wrote 15 operas all together. But his influence and his importance goes really beyond his own operas. He was a a kind of father figure and a mentor to many other composers. He’s been reproached for interfering with the masterpieces of Mussorgsky. But we might not even have them without him. Certainly Rimsky was the person who enabled Mussorgsky’s operas to reach the world. He had the rather uncomfortable experience of sharing an apartment with Mussorgsky. That cannot have been a bundle of laughs that they shared the piano. They had to alternate on using the piano for their composing. Now Rimsky’s operas, again, all fall into one of these two categories. They’re either legendary, fantasy folkloric, or they’re epics from Russian history.

And his first great success was “The Maid of Pskov,” who’s later retitled “Ivan the terrible.” Really repackaged as a star vehicle for Chaliapin. But so he wrote this at exactly the time that Mussorgsky was writing “Boris Godunov.” And you can hear many similarities between the two in the use of chorus and in the importance of course of bells. Very, very important in Russian culture. So this is a short excerpt from “The maid of the Pskov” by Rimsky-Korsakov. I, personally, find his folkloric, fantasy operas more appealing. Actually, he’s a wonderful composer and I think he’s, these days, very underrated outside of Russia. Not as performed as much as he should be. But the, for me, the loveliest of all is “The Snow Maiden.” And it’s based on old Russian legends, and Snow Maiden is the daughter of the Frost King and the Spring Fairy. And it’s a kind of a sprawling opera. The heroine wanders through it searching for love and being rebuffed until finally, in the last scene, she really finds love. But it’s fatal for her because she’s the daughter of the Frost King and, when she finds love, she melts! And this is from the final scene of the opera where she has found love and she- we can hear her melting. Beautifully sung, I think, in this recording by the Latvian Jewish Soprano Inese Galante.

Sadly, we really only caught the end of her career in the West. She was sort of leading- the leading soprano in Latvia before the Iron Curtain came down. And she only moved to the West in the 1990s towards the end of her career. Now, Russia is a nation that straddles Europe and Asia. And this is a very important factor, of course, in Russian culture. And it’s very important in Russian opera. There are- strongly orientalist elements in quite a lot of Russian opera. And so the opera that deals with this most directly is Borodin’s “Prince Igor.” Here is Borodin on the left. He was a very busy man. He was a chemist and a doctor and could only compose in his spare time. And he worked on “Prince Igor” over 30 years. And even while he was writing it, bits of it were performed during his lifetime. And he he enlisted the help of fellow composers, Glazunov and Rimsky-Korsakov, to help him with the orchestration of certain parts. In fact, it was left unfinished when he died at age 53, apparently of overwork, in 1887. And the wonderful overture, glorious piece of music, was actually reconstructed from- he’d never written it down. He performed it quite often on the piano for his fellow composers.

And it was Glazunov who reconstructed it from memory. But, so it’s an opera where the outer acts take part in Christian Russia. And the inner Act is the act of the Asian Tribesman: the Polovtsy. And I can’t help feeling that, actually, his sympathies lie with the Asian Russians 'cause he certainly gives them the best tunes. And I’m sure you’ll recognise this and probably be able to sing along with it. Now that’s quite an old recording. I chose it, specifically, to demonstrate the very distinctive qualities of Russian voices and the sound of Russian orchestra. Actually, I think still to this day, Russian orchestras sound quite different from orchestras in Western Europe. Now, this is Tchaikovsky with three people who, I suppose, were the most important in his life. There he is with the nephew who he was certainly in love with and they possibly had a sexual relationship. There’s a lot of speculation. The bottom picture is of his wife. He had this short-lived, very, very disastrous marriage. I think before he really admitted to himself that he was homosexual. The other very important relationship in his life was a relationship by correspondence with his Patroness. A wealthy Patroness. The fortune came from the construction of the Russian railway system. And here you see her, she’s just left of centre, rather beautiful woman actually. Madame von Meck.

She had a very good arrangement. I think every woman should think about this. She had an elderly, doddery rich husband you can see just to her right. And she had a hunky, smouldering young lover who was her secretary in commerce who you see in the centre of this picture. And for, but for her intellectual and, really to some extent, her emotional life, that was her correspondence with Tchaikovsky. They only saw each other twice very briefly. They passed each other in the street without actually talking to one another. So Tchaikovsky wrote 10 operas. Most of them, again, the standard either historical epic or folkloric fantastic. But I think it’s very significant that the two of the ten operas, which were successful, and have established themselves in the repertoire, are of quite a different kind. I don’t think he was really suited to writing historical epics. And they’re both operas that are- in a way, they’re more like verismo. They deal with real people and real emotional situations. And both operas are derived from works by Pushkin. And they are “Eugene Onegin,” sort of famous, autobiographical work by Pushkin, and “Pique Dame The Queen of Spades.” So I’ve chosen an excerpt from each. And, first of all, we’re going hear “Lensky’s Aria” from “Eugene Onegin.”

And this, he has two beautiful arias, actually, in the opera. And this is written for a Russian lyric tenor. And this is a very special type of singer. You still, there’s still a few around. It’s a very distinctive type of voice. A bit like, say, the French soprano voice. It may or may not be to your taste. As I said, a very plangent, a very kind of reedy sound. Here are three very famous Russian lyric tenors. The one on, in fact… I’m just trying to remember what their names are now. But the one I’m going to play you is the one on the right-hand side. And that’s Ivan Kozlovsky. A week or so ago, somebody said to me, could I name my favourite tenor? And I said Taubira. But a close second might be Kozlovsky. And I’ll be interested to know what you think of him. It’s not a voice that’s to everybody’s taste. But I adore him. I worship him. And a few years ago, I met an ex-monk, a Russian ex-monk who told me as a boy chorister he’d sung in a performance with Kozlovsky. Kozlovsky apparently, at the end of the performance, was so delighted with this boy’s soprano that he kissed him on the cheek.

So I immediately said to this elderly man, “please kiss me on the cheek!” 'Cause I want to be two kisses from Kozlovsky. And he did. And it was only afterwards I thought, “oh dear, now I think I’m three kisses from Stalin” because Kozlovsky was Stalin’s favourite singer. And this is “Pique Dame,” the other opera that does gets done quite a lot, also based on Pushkin. And I think, actually, for- this is my preferred Tchaikovsky opera. And I like it 'cause it’s got this frenzied, crazy, crazed atmosphere. I mean, everybody in it, really, belongs in a lunatic asylum, both the hero and the heroine. He really is a nutcase who’s totally, he’s got two obsessions. He’s obsessed by this young, aristocratic girl who he sees in the distance and he stalks her. If she had any sense whatsoever, she should call for the men in white, but she doesn’t. She’s very fascinated by him and she falls in love with him. And his other obsession is winning at gambling. And he believes that her grandmother has a magic formula for this. So he stalks as well. So this is towards the end of the first act where a storm blows up. And both- he sees the girl with her grandmother, and both his crazy obsessions kick in. The Soviet period produced two very great Russian composers: Prokofiev and Shostakovich.

And both had ambitions to be opera composers. Shostakovitch’s were unfortunately blighted by a disastrous reaction to his opera “Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk.” This was in 1934. And, initially, it was a tremendous success. The public absolutely loved it! And over the next two years, it had literally hundreds of performances. It was as popular as a popular musical. Until one day, Stalin went to see it. And Stalin, like Hitler, was a man of delicate sensibilities and was easily shocked. And he was terribly shocked by the action of Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk. It tells a story of a woman who’s unhappily married to an older man who doesn’t love her. And she has an abusive father-in-law, and she murders them both. And she takes a hunky, young peasant lover. And, let me see, have I got…yes. So the scene that really shocked Stalin is the one I’m going to play you of the brutal- of her brutal seduction by the hunky peasant. He makes a pass at her. She doesn’t really put up much resistance. It’s a sort of “no, no, don’t, don’t, don’t stop,” kind of thing. And their lovemaking, it’s extremely short. I haven’t timed it, but I don’t think it’s… I think their sex lasts about three minutes. And together with, well, I think the tyees I give you the last time, is quite an explicit musical evocation of the Sex Act.

And, of course, there’s another very notorious one in “Der Rosenkavalier” right at the beginning before the curtain rises. You know everything that’s happening behind the curtain. And here we, we really know what kind of lovemaking this is. It’s real wham bang thank you ma'am brutal sex. And we even get the sort of post-coital aftermath. And I can only describe what the trombones in this passage as being detumescent trombones. You’ll see what I mean when you hear it. Well anyway, Stalin was horrified, and that really well, pretty well put an end to Shostakovitch’s career as an opera composer. Prokofiev also, in this time, in the 30s, 'cause he was outside of Russia, he was also interested in very sexually explicit plots. And “The Fiery Angel” was magnificent opera, but almost un-performable at the time because of all of the action. It ends with a black magic orgy in a convent. And this on the right hand side is the amazing Kirov production, which was brought to Covent Garden, which was completely eye-popping, jaw-dropping stuff. But I’m not going to play that to you.

I’m going to finish with his final operatic masterpiece, “War and Peace.” He wrote this after he went back to, strangely, went back to Russia in 1936 just as things were really getting bad under Stalin. And he wrote “War and Peace” between 1941 and 1951. And it was meant to be a great, patriotic, epic opera. And it obviously is as much about the great patriotic war of Second World War as it is about the Napoleonic Wars. And it ends with a great hymn of praise to the leader of the Russian people who saves them from a foreign invader. And although it’s about Field Marshall Kutuzov who, together with the Russian winter, defeated Napoleon, it’s very clear that, actually, it’s a homage to Stalin. Right. Well, I’ve run out of time. So, I’m going to go into the Q and A and see what’s coming up.

Q&A and Comments:

Somebody would like me to- I have done a talk on Rodan. I think I did a talk on Rodan last year. I’m very happy to do another. But we’ll have to see if we can fit it in.

Yes, somebody guessed it was unbelievable low basses. You know, the last time I heard “Vespers” in London, it was with a London choir, and they actually had to import two Russian basses to reinforce the bottom line 'cause they just couldn’t find any basses in Britain with that kind of resonance sound right down at the bottom.

Q: Are the Russian tones set at a slightly higher pitch compared to Western music with similar keys?

A: I’m not sure about that. I’d have to find that out for you.

Q: Is a “Boris Godunov”- Is a “Boris Godunov” as the director is Tarkovsky?

A: Not sure what Judith’s asking me there.

From Dory: not a question, but a comment about conductor Dobrowen. In 1935, her father, who, of course, was the the leader of the Palestine orchestra, her father was attending a rehearsal in Vienna at the State opera, being conducted by Dobrowen, and Huberman playing solo. At a break at the rehearsal, Huberman told Dobrowen that what the Germans were doing in Germany was terrible. They were sending people to concentration camps. Obviously Huberman was raising the alarm and alerting the need to get out. But I’m afraid Dobrowen clearly didn’t pay enough attention to him, as he very nearly suffered a terrible fate himself.

Chaliapin- No, he’s not in blackface. No, no, no, he’s not in blackface.

Would I rank Kipnis up there with Chaliapin? He’s very, I- Kipnis is a singer I absolutely worship. And in some ways I think it’s a more beautiful voice and more beautiful singing. But I don’t find Kipnis’ Boris as powerful or convincing as Chaliapin. I mean, there are a couple of recordings of live performances with Kipnis. I don’t know whether you have discussed or intended to discuss or talk about a Eugene Onegin. Uh… Yeah. Right. Yes, I know. Isn’t it terrible? I mean, it was such a dreary production at Royal Opera House. It almost put me off the opera. The other thing about “Boris Godunov” is you just need a supremely great singing actor, and they’re very few and far between.

Q: Why did the other composers write other versions of “Boris”?

A: Well, he left it in a bit of a mess. And, initially, it was felt that his orchestration was amateurish. And Rimsky- Korsakov polished it up, made it a bit smoother and lusher. And there’s a version, there’s a version that was re-orchestrated by Shostakovich. There are certainly three or four different- and there are even if you are just going on what he wrote. He, himself, made additions and changes. So they’re all, it’s one of those operas where it’s real, it’s quite problematic, which version to use. Comment on Russian history around the time Mussorgsky wrote- oh dear, that’s another lecture.

And it’s probably a Trudy lecture, I think. Two factors that characterise- what the, this liturgical music, that was the most important musical tradition in Russia, was the church. The Russian Orthodox Church. But also, as I said, the inflexions, the melodic inflexions, and rhythms of folk music. Those are the two things.

Yes, “Ruslan and Lyudmila” is a wonderful… it’s wonderful… I can’t remember who recorded it, which recording I used. It certainly wasn’t Bernstein.

My voice? I hope I’m not talking at the same time as the music.

Q: How did the Latvian Jewish singer survive World War Two?

A: Well, she would, I don’t know. Well, she would’ve been, I don’t think she would’ve been born. It would be how her parents survived the war. I suppose there were, everywhere, there were Jews who were hidden and who survived. Her name is Inese Galante. And she did a wonderful recital at Wigmore Hall in 1999 that I shall never forget. And it’s actually, you can get that on CD. Somebody’s saying Inese Galante is a cousin, but two or three generations of your husband, Barry, whose father immigrated from Latvia to South Africa. There’s the answer to some previous question. She now lives in Russia but, for a time, lived in Israel.

Why do we say- Because I don’t, I’m not a Russian speaker. So, you know, it depends.

Oye-gan, Ew-jen, Eugene. I’m afraid I don’t make much attempt to get the Russian pronunciation correct.

Please name the two second acts of Tchaikovsky- Oh that’s “Pique Dame”. Well, it’s either, it’s either known as “Pique Dame” or it’s known as “The Queen of Spades.” All right.

Stalin hit a sensitive and shocked by these scenes and they killed- Yeah, I know. That was my point, actually. It’s amazing, isn’t it, to think that they- No, Hitler was unbelievably shocked by a scene in an opera by Hindermann that showed a nude soprano singing an aria in the bath. And that was enough to offend Hitler’s sensibilities.

This is interesting from Robin Woodard- Woodard: “though he was Stalin’s court singer, Kozłowski hated being told what to sing when and what not to sing. So, he had to find clever ways to refuse Stalin’s orders.” I don’t know a lot about Kozłowski’s personal life. I’d like to find out more. There is, there is a wonderful complete Rigoletto in Russia and the most beautiful complete in Russian with Kozłowski which I recommend to you.

This is Judith saying when she was in St. Petersburg with an opera tour, one of the operas was the story of “The Czar Sultan.” Yes. That’s Rimsky-Korsakov, which is a children’s story.

Yeah, that’s that. As I said, I think I prefer his folkloric side to his epic historic side.

I think this is Margaret saying that Shostakovich borrowed some of Stravinsky’s rhythmic techniques for the sex scene. Yes. That’s, that is very probable. They all borrow- well ‘cause Shostakovich shamelessly borrowed from Ravel’s “Boléro” for the Leningrad symphony.

What about Borodin’s- What about it? “Prince Igor.” I did talk about it. Maybe you missed that bit. Latvian soprano- All these things are in the list that you get sent. So you should have that. Her name is Inese Galante.

Yes. Robin, that is so extraordinary, isn’t it? That Prokofiev and Stalin died on the same day. And the Polovtsian dance music has been used for all sorts of things, of course. Such a good tune.

I forget somebody saying that she finds English tenors that- I wouldn’t say English tenors have a very particular sound. I certainly don’t hear a similarity between Peter Pears and Kozłowski. Or any Russian tenor, actually. That is a distinctive English sound, which you may or may not like. I don’t like it very much.

You think that Kutuzov’s song in “War and Peace” is best opera aria composed since Puccini. War and Peace is fantastic work. Yeah. Right.

I think, is that it? Kip- what about Kipnis? Oh, Kipnis. God, I’d like to do a whole talk on Kipnis. As I said, he’s really one of my, one of my heroes. Marvellous, marvellous singer. But he was really, I’d say Kipnis, oddly enough, although he was Ukrainian, his great importance was really in German opera. He’s the greatest base on record. And, of course, a wonderful Leporello, too, in “Don Giovanni.”

And that seems to be it! So, thank you all very much! And I’m going to have to see if I could maybe squeeze in some, some Kipnis… Some…Any excuse. I love to play Kipnis. So maybe I’ll find a way to put him in next week or so. Thank you, everybody!

• [Lauren] Thank you so much, Patrick. And thank you, everyone, for joining us. Bye.