POP/ROCK - July 11, 1988

West Germans got a taste of glasnost rock over the weekend--the Soviet Union’s first rock opera. “Yunona and Avos”--which blends breakdancing with ballet, folklore, sex and religion--closed a four-night stand in Munich on Saturday. The rock opera, performed by Moscow’s Lenin Komsomol Theatre in Russian and Spanish, is a parable of modern politics and a tribute to new artistic freedoms set in San Francisco in the early 19th Century, when California was still under Spanish rule. The central character is a Russian merchant who wants to build links with the United States. “This kind of thing was very difficult to put on in the past, in the old days,” said director Mark Zakharov. “Now we can say just about what we like, where we like -- well, most of the time.”