Conductor Gergiev does not distance himself from Putin despite Mayor Sala’s autocracy. He also skips conducting the Vienna Philharmonic at Carnegy Hall
EGLE SANTOLINI
MILAN
During the night the war arrived and changed everything, even for La Scala, even with the breezy torpedoing of one of the most acclaimed conductors in circulation. The evening before the attack, Wednesday, the triumphal event was celebrated before the Queen of Spades by Tchaikovsky, leading the orchestra the great Russian conductor Valery Gergiev, charismatic head of the Mariinsky in St. Petersburg and personal friend of Vladimir Putin. Nine minutes of applause at the end canceled out an isolated attempt at protest, just as Gergiev arrived on the podium, made up of a “buu” and a “go away!” »From the gallery. But yesterday morning, an upset geopolitical scenario, instead of the isolated loggionist, Mayor Beppe Sala, who is president of the board of directors of La Scala, decided to intervene: «The teacher has repeatedly declared his closeness to Putin – he says -. With the superintendent of the theater we are asking him to take a precise position against the invasion. If he didn’t, we would be forced to give up the collaboration. These situations make it necessary to intervene ».
A letter, signed only by the superintendent Dominique Meyer but agreed with the mayor, is immediately delivered to Gergiev. It contains the request for a conciliatory stance aimed at a peaceful solution to the conflict: a soft formula, which does not include the word “invasion”, and which should allow the teacher an honorable exit from a very delicate situation. Despite the pressure of the theater and the city administration, the conductor has not distanced himself from Putin, on the contrary he has his esteem and solidarity. it is therefore very likely that the theater will replace it in a very short time.
Gergiev was expected already tonight for three concerts with the Wiener Philarmoniker at Carnegie Hall in New York. In the evening, the news of the cancellation of the dates arrived: to replace him will be Yannick Nézet-Séguin. Perhaps his decision was affected by the fact that a protest was being prepared for him in New York, as in 2013 before a Onegin at the Met and then precisely for a concert at Carnegie Hall, when Russia passed a law against so-called “homosexual propaganda”? In the event that he also distances himself from Piermarini, the solution is ready: the brilliant Timur Zangiev, 27, who directed the Milanese rehearsals.
Born in Moscow in 1953, pupil and artistic heir of the venerable Jurij Temirkanov who has frequented since San was called Leningrad and Mariinsky Kirov, Gergiev, a true wand shaman capable of attracting the attention of orchestras and the public, knows Putin since he was Deputy Mayor of St. Petersburg and was awarded the title of Hero of Labor of the Russian Federation. Putin has never lacked his support, for example with the disputed “concert for the liberation of Palmyra”, or calling Pussy Riot “only interested in money” while one of them was on a hunger strike in a camp. Dear. He has always declared that “music is the only thing that matters” and that he has never discriminated “except on the basis of talent”. But is it permissible, in his case, to discriminate and release an artist from office only on the basis of proximity to a political leader, however detestable? The debate is open. –
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