English Summary
The Hopes, Passions and Dreams of Teodor Curentzis
Few things are permanent in Perm, it would seem; gone is Marat Gelman’s provocative street art, gone are the rest of the city’s cultural trailblazers that Snob wrote so enthusiastically about seven years ago. Yet Curentzis has remained – alone, and despite continually receiving offers from the world’s best theatres.
It took some struggle before fellow classical musicians started taking him seriously. There was just something too flashy about the way he’d push his hair back and flail his arms while conducting; he was just too conventionally handsome for a genius – and perhaps too loquacious and in-your-face in his interviews. He called von Karajan “a hollow figure,” and Pavarotti “jacuzzi music”. Nowadays, he rails against the internet.
“The web is full of both glossy façades and the most unsightly things. Even the beautiful things that end up there are sometimes sloppily made. It’s a technology our world is not yet ready for.”
Detractors say he’s deliberately avoiding capital cities; before Perm, there was Novosibirsk. Insecurity perhaps? “I spent my childhood in Athens, and then lived mostly in Moscow and St Petersburg. If anything, I’m the opposite of ‘provincial’. It’s just that I’m not interested in established musical institutions that are all about preserving their standards and traditions. Distinguished musicians seek to join my orchestra and choir here in Perm, and are prepared to sometimes rehearse for twelve to fifteen hours a day. All those Moscow critics should take a walk down the Garden Ring and look at the playbills for all those rubbish concerts before they try and claim to understand music better than we the ‘provincials’ who’ve been invited to play Mahler in Salzburg next summer.”