Elena Cheremnykh. Conductor from San Francisco

Conductor from San Francisco
Elena Cheremnykh

Publication date: November 22, 2000

Michael Tilson Thomas is a descendant of Ukrainian immigrants, a third-generation musician, and a trained pianist. He is currently the artistic director and chief conductor of the San Francisco Symphony. He is also known as the founder of the New World Symphony, an orchestra for gifted graduates of American conservatories. In 1994, he was named conductor of the year in America. In 1995 he became an exclusive musician for BMG Classics. After he recorded seven discs with Stravinsky's music and organized the Strawinsky-fest the year before last, it is generally accepted that the conductor significantly adjusted the position of Russian music of the 20th century on the world market. Five-time Grammy nominee Michael Tilson Thomas has won the award twice for his recordings of music by Stravinsky and Prokofiev. He performed in Moscow for the first time.

For a man who heard Stravinsky live at the age of ten, played the piano for him at eighteen, and then for a long time took advantage of the opportunity to personally attend Stravinsky’s orchestral rehearsals, Michael Tilson Thomas is very well preserved. Compared to Stravinsky's "silent shadow" - conductor and chronicler Robert Craft - Michael Tilson Thomas is probably too practical and an adventurer. Having retrained from pianists to conductors, he played not only real American (Charles Ives, George Gershwin) and European (Beethoven, Mahler) music, but also the music of Stockhausen (sarcastically compared by the master to blowing soap bubbles), John Cage ( who “works under the motto “do it yourself”) and others who were ironically rejected by the main modernist of the twentieth century, Igor Stravinsky, for participating in the “conspiracy of soundlessness.”

In the eventful and yet clearly two-sided biography of the émigré composer, perhaps only one gap is noticeable today: Stravinsky’s Russianness. Perhaps it is this mysterious category that explains the interest of Michael Tilson Thomas in the proposal received from the leadership of the RNO. The three numbers of the program, in addition to making extraordinary demands on the condition of the Russian team, are also intriguing due to their non-competition context. None of these works, except for “The Rite of Spring” performed by the Mariinsky Orchestra with Valery Gergiev, can be found in the memory of the Great Hall of the Conservatory.

Alas, in the first part, on the music of the ballet "Apollo Musagete", the orchestra's string group rather sluggishly developed a "neoclassical" line, completely not feeling in Stravinsky's music the spirit of the customer - Balanchine - a consumer of typical contrasts and a wizard of tempo plasticity. "Symphony in Three Movements" (perhaps thanks to the infusion of wind and brass sections) sounded much better. The timbres in it have already gotten used to each other. It almost turned out to be an “over-beat” rhythm. However, the puffs from carefully calculated pauses made the impression not as favorable as it could have been.

But in “The Rite of Spring” (after intermission) the orchestra brilliantly passed the Strawinsky-test. I would like to review this in the spirit of Stravinsky himself, who at one time compared three recordings - Karajan, Boulez, Craft. For example, write: “The bassoon plays well, rather hoarsely, but is too busy counting (“Kiss the Ground”).” Or: “Double basses on the downbeat sound lighter than Gergiev’s, but this deprives the music of its glaringly bold color (“Spring Round Dances”).” And for the finale, the main thing: “(“Great Sacred Dance”) The tempo is a little slow at the beginning, but does not deprive the music of tension. A very correct short pause before the last flute passage. The ending is excellent.” The ending was truly excellent, so it was played as an encore.