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1. 

   Ates Orga on November 2, 2023 at 4:27 pm

   ‘Your life experience is important for anything that you do in life. Music is not only notes. Music is an emotion … if there is no emotion and just notes, then it’s not music’
    
    
   Born in Nal’chik in the northern Caucasus, 10 December 1938, Yuri Hatuyevich Temirknov attended the Music School for Talented Children in Leningrad (violin, viola 1953-57), then the Rimsky-Korsakov Conservatoire (viola, conducting 1957-62; aspirantura 1965), studying with Ilya Musin. Winning the 2nd All-Union Conductors’ Competition at twenty-seven (1966) led to Kondrashin inviting him to tour Europe and the United States with Oistrakh and the Moscow Philharmonic; and to a brief association with the Leningrad Philharmonic (Russia’s oldest orchestra, founded in 1882) as Mravinsky’s assistant (1967). In 1968 he was appointed Principal Conductor of the Leningrad Symphony where he remained until 1976 when he became Music Director of the Kirov Opera and Ballet (staging notably acclaimed productions of Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin, [USSR State Prize 1985] and Queen of Spades). In 1988 he succeeded Mravinsky as Music Director and Principal Conductor of the Leningrad Philharmonic (the Dmitri Dmitrievich Shostakovich St Petersburg Philharmonic since 1991) – ‘the shooting star of the conductors’ Olympus’ finally in charge of the country’s jewel-in-the-crown. This tenure and its civic priorities was combined with a continuing presence in Europe and America – Royal Philharmonic (Principal Conductor 1992-98: he made his London debut with them in 1977); Dresden Philharmonic (Principal Guest 1992-97); Danish National Radio Symphony (Principal Guest 1998 onwards); Baltimore Symphony (Music Director 2000-06); Music Teatro Regio di Parma (Music Director 2010-12). He was Principal Guest Conductor of the Bolshoi Theatre until 2009. A People’s Artist of the USSR (1981) and holder of the Order of Lenin (1983), he received the Russian Federation President’s Prize in 2003, as well as all four degrees of the Federation’s Order of Merit for the Country (1998, 2003, 2008, 2013). In Italy he was created a Commander of the Order of the Star of Italy (2012), subsequently receiving the Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli Prize (2014). In 2015, he was made Honorary Conductor of the Academia Santa Cecilia Choir and Orchestra. That same year Japan awarded him the Order of the Rising Sun.

   ‘Yuri Temirkanov has a reputation as a paragon of Old World virtues. Partly, that’s due to his courtly manner, vigorous work ethic and antipathy for self-promotion. But Temirkanov’s strongest connection to tradition is musical, specifically his favouring warm feeling over cool precision in his interpretations of the standard repertory’ (David Mermelstein, Los Angeles Times, 1 April 2005). Among the most Russianly impassioned of communicators, voluptuously technicolored in his sense of theatre and effect, renowned for the sweep of his melodic arcs and structural landscaping, seeking a ‘Rubenesque’ fullness of controlled tone distinct from percussive aggression (‘when someone builds a house, he doesn’t start building from the roof, he starts with the basement. The foundation for all the strings is in the double-basses. You start there’), Temirkanov stands by the Mravinsky example. ‘When I see young conductors who perform in New York today, in Vienna tomorrow and somewhere in Italy the next day, then I remember him. He worked hard and made everybody else work hard. The musicians probably didn’t enjoy it, but the results spoke for themselves’. Politically shrewd, he recognises his job isn’t about the glamour or adulation audiences perceive come evening, that running an orchestra – taking rehearsals and recording sessions, fund-raising and man-management (‘the work that trade unions do [in the West], I do in St Petersburg. When money is needed, it is I who must ask for it’) – is about practicalities, timetabling, discipline and having a good business brain. ‘It is an illusion that this is an exotic life. Sometimes, I have to get up at 6 in the morning to catch a plane in order to be on time for the next rehearsal in another part of the world. I don’t often have time to get over my jet lag’. That his appearances are highly personalised and charged – visceral events – is not surprising. ‘Every concert is important. The performance is not so much for the public, or the reviewer, but for the orchestra.’ Under the right conditions, he’ll leave players ‘on the edge of their chairs,’ electrifying ‘a sense of adventure. Temirkanov lives for that. Once he feels you’ve got that essence of a piece, he’ll let you go. That’s a great conductor – he conveys the emotional thrust of the piece and then he steps back and lets you run with it. That’s very inspiring’ (James Marvine, Baltimore Symphony).
    
   Economical, minimalistic, YT, short and wiry, relies on subtle hands, graphically expressive body language, the occasionally sung, nicotined baritone phrase, to mould lines, sculpt sound, and individualise players. Not on words or digressions. ‘A baton is not necessary. For me, to conduct without a baton is more natural. When I was young, I thought that a baton was a part of the conducting profession. It turned out to be not so important. What is important is the result, whether achieved with a baton or without’ (Baltimore Sun, 30 October 2000). ‘He can literally create magic with 100 different voices […] Maestro Temirkanov is so soft-spoken and so focused, you can literally hear a pin drop during rehearsals. If you’re watching from the auditorium, it doesn’t look as though he’s doing anything very much, but if you sat in the orchestra with us, you’d see the conversation we have and the way he brings his tradition and experience to every player. What’s really amazing – for someone who says almost nothing – is the autonomy he gives us as musicians. We have a lot of freedom. He allows us to play the way we hear the music, and to bring our own backgrounds to it. Just by the way his eyes change, he gives us an extraordinary amount of encouragement’ (John Locke, Baltimore Symphony). ‘The most challenging aspect,’ Temirkanov believes, ‘is to find the best artistic and human contact with the orchestra one is working with. And to maintain this relationship and to inspire the musicians to give you their best. The most rewarding aspect is when you achieve this and know that musicians feel you have a right to stand in front of them.’
    
   Temirkanov, gentleman-prince, shines in the Russian/Soviet mainstream. Inevitably. But it’s not his only forte. Collectors of the old Melodiya catalogue will recall an early Haydn/van Swieten outing. Symphonic Beethoven, Brahms, Mahler, Mozart, Sibelius and Richard Strauss feature regularly in his programming. French music similarly, as well as the occasional central/eastern European and British foray. Ives even. In the opera house he’s been associated with Verdi and Gershwin. Orff and Respighi come naturally. Youngest conductor of the Gosconcert Five (Mravinsky, Kondrashin, Svetlanov and Rozhdestvensky being the others), he was a man, contrasting many of his compatriots, who was allowed relative licence by the authorities between the 60s and 80s. ‘I can’t say that the Communists actually spoiled my life or career. But of course there were many musicians, instrumentalists, and singers who were really great but are absolutely unknown in the West because they never had a chance. I was lucky to be born a little bit later than the worst times. At this time, it was already possible to perform abroad. Even for me, however, it was limited. But now, I’m free and am able to go anywhere I desire and to stay abroad as long as I wish. I can now earn money, fortunately, without having to give most of it to the government in Russia. Before, one could only be abroad for three months at a time. Then, it was the Soviet government who dictated where I went and what I performed’ (Baltimore Sun).
    
    
   ‘If I feel on stage that something came out well, then of course I can’t help being in a good mood. That’s what we musicians live for. It’s our destiny, but we can’t plan it. You listen to a CD and you always hear the same thing. In a live performance, every concert is different, but each one of them must be a joy. If we’re doing our job, the audience should come away with the impression that the music was born in that moment – and not in the hours of rehearsal’

   AO, Brilliant Classics 2007 updated

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   At the Annecy Classic Festival, 2013: Scheherazade
   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vdnUBQT5Bqw

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   At the Royal Festival Hall, 2017 https://www.classicalsource.com/concert/philharmonia-orchestra-yuri-temirkanov-marriage-of-figaro-overture-rimsky-korsakovs-scheherazade-eliso-virsaladze-plays-mozart-k467/

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