Dmitri Jurowski: “The leitmotif will be love”
On 30 December, a concert of classical operetta will be presented as part of the Mikhailovsky Theatre’s Hermitage Evenings. Soloists from the theatre’s opera company will perform some of the best vocal pieces from this popular genre, accompanied by a piano and a string duet. Maestro Dmitri Jurowski will be returning to the stage as cellist after a long absence.
“The composers whose works will be heard at the concert on 30 December — Lehár, Kálmán, Strauss, and Offenbach — determined the fate of operetta as a genre. I think hearing all these composers in a single concert will be of great interest to the audience”, said Dmitri Jurowski. "People will be able to discern those musical aspects all these masters had in common, and at the same time, detect the very clear differences in their compositions. Many duets will be included in the programme; some very poignant, even exaggeratedly so at times. There will be a large selection of excerpts from Die Fledermaus, for instance. Love will be the evening’s leitmotif — love spoken and unspoken, requited and unrequited. It is a theme that is relevant to all, particularly in the run-up to the New Year when everyone wishes for their dreams to come true. The theme of love cannot help but appear in dreams.
The accompaniment will be provided by a piano and two string instruments — a violin and a cello. The use of strings in combination with the piano is in the tradition of salon music. Concerts like this are sort of nostalgic for me — I miss them a lot. I am now known chiefly as a conductor — after all, it has been 14 years since I gave up playing the cello. For the first five of those years I did not even touch the instrument — I could not play because of arthritis in both hands. The disease turned out to be congenital and incurable, so I had to forget about a career as a professional cellist, and that is actually why I began conducting. But medicine has done its part, and now I am able to play the cello again, if only occasionally. Of course it is nothing like it was before, but now I regard the instrument more reverently since it is no longer my profession but a hobby, a passion.
Being a conductor is a strange occupation — you don’t produce a sound, you don’t sing or play. You only create the atmosphere in which others do so. That’s why direct contact with sound is very important to me. Of course that can be achieved at the piano too, but if you have ever had a stringed instrument in your hands, you will always have a special relationship with it — it is like your first love. As a cellist, there is a great deal that links me to operetta. There was a time when I often played this repertoire in concerts just like this one. For me, the return to it feels nostalgic. And the fact that it will be with people whom I know professionally from the Mikhailovsky Theatre is especially encouraging, as there are uniquely heartfelt personal connections here. In a sense, this will provide me with the support I need. I am never nervous before going on stage as a conductor these days, but taking up an instrument I have not played for so many years will definitely be a bit emotional. And during the New Year performances, emotions are the main thing."
