<>Showtime
Who: Valery Gergiev and the Mariinsky Orchestra
When: Monday, December 17 at 8 p.m.
Where: Roy Thomson Hall, 60 Simcoe St., Toronto
What: Stravinsky’s The Firebird, and The Rite of Spring
Cost: $69.50 - $199.50
Call: 416-872-4255
Oksana looked at me and pressed her forefinger to her lips. The young press attaché then opened the door, and tapped my elbow as if to say let’s enter. Inside, she whispered to the secretary at the large desk near the window. To my left, two ladies sat in stony silence. Russian tradition this silence, I mused as I stood waiting in the holy of holies at the famed Mariinsky Theatre in St. Petersburg this past July 7.
“He comes soon,” whispered Oksana, her fingers questioning me if my mini-tape recorder was at the ready. As promised, he appeared suddenly. He being none other than Valery Gergiev, artistic director of the Mariinsky (Kirov) Theatre. After a brief conversation between the three of us, Gergiev agreed to an interview, though after the première of Canadian choreographer Peter Quanz’s Aria Suspended that afternoon.
A videographer captured the proceedings at the closed dress rehearsal for Quanz’s work: Gergiev rehearsing his Mariinsky Orchestra; Quanz answering Gergiev’s questions on tempo and intensity; the Kirov troupe marking their steps. One half hour later, it was show time. At his curtain call, Quanz was warmly applauded by the knowledgeable Russian balletomanes.
In his office at intermission, Gergiev was buoyant. Within moments, he and the Mariinsky’s new assistant conductor, Gavriel Heine, had decided which one of two Mariinsky vocalists would sing a particular role in Le nozze di Figaro at Heine’s house début later in the month. With the ubiquitous videographer taping his every move, Gergiev announced to all that Quanz’s work reminded him of Balanchine, and then asked everyone in the room for their opinion. As Gergiev took his seat behind his desk, his manager, R. Douglas Sheldon from Columbia Artists Management in New York, reclined facing him. Here, in this narrow office, history hangs heavy in the air as immense pictures of Modest Musorgsky and Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov stare at each other on opposite walls.
“Because the importance of this première is not 1 o’clock today p.m.,” said Gergiev of Quanz’s work. “We have to make sure it stays for hopefully ten years. You talk Balanchine. In our case, in Russia, post war, only (Yuri) Grigorovich managed to create choreography which stayed decades. That’s it. And then there were many gifted choreographers. I am very sympathetic to this young gentleman (Quanz), who, I think is very gifted.”
I, however, was interested in Gergiev and his orchestra, and the reason they tour. “Of course, touring is always important for Russian orchestras for Western money,” admitted Gergiev in broken but reasonably well pronounced English. “But today you can stay in Russia and maybe find much better supported project financially than, for example, something you do outside of Russia. Basically, you loose money but the opportunity to tour is simply to come to meet audiences, colleagues…You bring your own message or a little part of your own history.”
This Monday, Gergiev and his Mariinsky Orchestra bring a bit of history to Toronto’s Roy Thomson Hall. They’re slated to perform two ballet scores by Stravinsky, The Firebird, and The Rite of Spring, works long considered part of the symphonic repertoire. “Coming to Toronto for example, which by the way, we always enjoy doing, we also understand that it’s not just about us, this hundred people, but also about physically what we represent, a major opera house with a tradition, orchestrally, opera, ballet, and most important, composers,” said Gergiev. “Class. Success. Glory. Impressions. You see the world. That’s very important for musicians. It’s not money.”
The Mariinsky Orchestra has between 200 and 250 musicians on its roster. From that number, Gergiev said that, “There will be always 130 to 140 players who play with me more regularly.” Those players will rotate in and out accordingly. “Rotation is big,” stressed Gergiev. “I will never bring to Toronto so unexperienced musicians who will for the first time see in Toronto, on stage in front of the public, something like Le sacre (The Rite of Spring). That basically doesn’t happen here.”
“When Mariinsky goes up, and it’s prepared, and rehearsed, and balanced, then it can be really frighteningly good orchestra,” claimed Gergiev. “It happens sometimes quite regularly.” After having heard them many times on their home turf during the White Nights Festival in 2006 and 2007, I can concur with Gergiev’s assessment. However, their playing standard fluctuates according to who’s on the podium. When it’s Gergiev conducting, say, Benvenuto Cellini in the Mariinsky’s new concert hall, the results are exhilarating. When it’s some domestic conductor in the pit conducting, say, Romeo and Juliet, the results can be, well, the pits.
As for the Mariinsky’s new $39 million concert hall, it was erected in less than fifteen months. Over $20 million came from private purses, thanks in large part to Gergiev’s fundraising efforts. The hall’s acoustics are very ‘wet’ due to acoustical engineer Yasuhisa Toyota using much Canadian maple. “Canadian cedar,” said Gergiev correcting me, adding that, “Maybe this is the secret of its sound.”
When it comes to money, Gergiev doesn’t count in kopecks, but in millions of euros or dollars. Gergiev mentioned that the Mariinsky will receive approximately €300 million from the Russian government for a new opera house, plus an additional €100 million to upgrade the historic 1860 house. And what’s more, he said that the Mariinsky recently spent about US $15 million on an HD (High Definition) truck which will be used to record productions for broadcast and DVD. “Mariinsky has more powerful budget than recording companies…We don’t want to depend even on the very powerful companies,” said Gergiev. “We don’t want to feel that someone should decide if this Sleeping Beauty or this Pique Dame or this Elektra will be shown ever or never shown. I want to make this decision not alone, but basically, I want to make this decision. That’s why we cooperate with four or five most important Western partners..."
Over five years ago, philanthropist Alberto Vilar pledged, according to one report, $20 million dollars for the Mariinsky. “He wanted to do it. He never did it,” said Gergiev. “I was never myself nervous about the New York Stock Exchange or London Stock Exchange. He was the one who had to worry more. Stock went down and obviously it was not possible for him to keep his word. But I’m grateful for what he did. He supported with $1 million the War and Peace production. He supported the creation of Academy Young Singers (which is under the artistic directorship of Gergiev’s sister, Larisa). He supported new production of Lohengrin. Altogether made $2 million dollars. Maybe $14 was announced (as a pledge). Now we have raised more than that.”
One thing Gergiev can’t count is the number of times he conducts annually at the Mariinsky. “Maybe 150 (times), maybe 130. It’s a lot,” was his answer. However, the Mariinsky’s web site gives a completely different tally. During the 2006-07 season, it listed Gergiev as conducting 15 performances, plus an additional 15 during the White Nights Festival. Indeed, after our interview was over, he was to have traveled to Ivangorod’s medieval fortress to conduct the Mariinsky troupe in Tchaikovsky’s Mazepa. Gergiev never made the trip. Telltale signs that Gergiev, the dynamo who once conducted a concert in Amsterdam and New York on the same day, may be slowing down? Maybe. But he’s also the principal conductor of the London Symphony Orchestra, and regularly conducts the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra. He steps down from the Rotterdam Philharmonic next August, making way for his successor, Canadian conductor Yannick Nézet-Séguin.
I asked Gergiev of his late teacher, the renowned Ilya Musin who passed away in 1999 at the age of 95 (or 96 according to the Julian calendar). “He (Musin) would still be alive but one of his pupils let him down,” said Gergiev. “And another one, how to say…It was a very unfortunate combination of Musin being away, and there was a little thing here, going, some organization for young conductors selecting, and without Musin, they selected some of his pupils and others were not selected. But it was his (Musin’s) own pupil who, what Musin felt, insulted him, without talking to him, without consulting, asking his opinion. They kick out someone, they let another one go. Then he felt he was let down. I was the last person on earth to talk to him, at least I talked to him in this very emotion he had. And I was so worried but it was just too late, because he died next day. I was after performance here, I told to him, ‘Please calm down. We will solve everything. I promise. We cancel all these results. We’ll start again. Just calm down.’ I never heard him talk like this. But just his heart was… No one knows this story. I never tell this story, in full.”
What’s very important in Gergiev’s life now is his family: his wife and two sons, and his mother. “I do not have to leave Moscow, St. Petersburg at all for the rest of my days,” said Gergiev. “I will be the richest conductor in the world for sure. Why all these pop-rock stars come to Russia every week? (Elton John played an outdoor concert on Palace Square adjacent the Hermitage the previous night.) They are paid twice the way they are paid in America. Which I think is stupid. But this is what it is.”
Classical Calendar
Today at 1 p.m., the Metropolitan Opera opens its season of live worldwide HD transmissions with Anna Netrebko in Gounod’s Roméo et Juliette at SilverCity, 771 Golf Links Rd., Ancaster. Tickets: $19.95, child/senior $16.95. Call 905-304-5888.
Tonight at 7 p.m., the Hamilton Children’s Choir presents its annual Holiday Concert at Centenary United, 24 Main St. W. Tickets: $20, senior $15, student $10. Call 905-527-1618.
At 7:30 p.m., Boris Brott leads the NAO, the Arcady Choir, and soloists in Handel’s Messiah at Christ’s Church Cathedral, 252 James St. N. Repeated tomorrow at 7:30 p.m. in St. Christopher’s Anglican, 662 Guelph Line, Burlington, and Monday at 7:30 p.m. in West Highland Baptist Church, 1605 Garth St. Tickets: $25, senior $20, student $10. Call 905-525-7664.
Tomorrow at 7 p.m., Too Good to Miss presents Kenny & Marvin Munshaw in Christmas Cheer at Marshall Memorial United Church, 20 Gilbert Ave., Ancaster. Tickets: $17, student $13, child $8. Call 1-877-304-5929.
Next Friday at 8 p.m., the Canadian Orpheus Male Choir presents its 20th annual Christmas Concert in Hamilton Place with guests the Hamilton Children’s Choir and the Hamilton Philharmonic Youth Orchestra. Tickets: $15 adults, children under 12 $10, groups of 15 or more $13 per person. Call 905-523-7377 or 905-527-7666.
