How Valery Gergiev will combine the positions of general director of the Bolshoi and Mariinsky theaters

There has been a change of power at the Bolshoi Theater. At a meeting of the Bolshoi team, employees were introduced to the new general director, who became Valery Gergiev. The creation of some kind of updated “directorate of imperial theaters” or the merger of the Bolshoi Theater with the Mariinsky in some form, however, did not happen: both theaters will continue to exist independently (at least in the legal sense), and Valery Gergiev will combine two separate leadership positions. Comments Sergei Khodnev.

Approximately seventy people gathered in the main foyer of the History Stage. Sitting at the table in front of them on the presidium were Minister of Culture Olga Lyubimova, Deputy Prime Minister Tatyana Golikova, Valery Gergiev and Vladimir Urin. Mrs. Golikova, representing the government, spoke first, saying that Vladimir Urin “wrote a statement of his own free will” and that the vacancy, according to the order signed by the Prime Minister, would be filled by the head of the Mariinsky Theater. And in a sad and excited tone, she thanked the outgoing director for ten years of work and for the performances, “which entered the golden fund of Russian culture” (the audience responded with applause).

Olga Lyubimova, briefly noting the “great joint experience” of the Ministry of Culture and both theaters, energetically assured that the department will support the Bolshoi “in this light moment of turbulence.” After which the floor passed to Valery Gergiev.

What the maestro’s speech was least like was a pre-rehearsed “speech from the throne” with a ready-made program of action. The conductor mistakenly called Galina Sergeevna Ulanova “Galina Semyonovna”, said that the Bolshoi Theater was run by “statesmen”, but spoke extremely generally about the future of the Bolshoi: “After some time we will be able to get to know each other better… to feel what is expected of us as in Moscow and throughout the country.” He promised to preserve the well-being of the entire theater team (“We must do everything so that people do not feel undervalued”), expressing the hope that the government and specifically the Ministry of Culture will provide the Bolshoi with the support necessary for this. He made it somewhat vaguely clear that the life of the Bolshoi would be subject to “general principles,” which those present knew from the way the Mariinsky Theater lives. He suggested that both theaters could exchange productions and tours.

By and large, that’s all.

The only truly concrete intention announced by Valery Gergiev is a course to expand extra-budgetary funding, again, of both theaters by expanding their “group of friends” (that is, boards of trustees).

This, according to the maestro, will happen “in the very near future.”

As an observer, it must be noted that the new general director of the Bolshoi Theater was burdened by the founder with a burden of such weight and volume that no other theater director in the recent history of Russian culture has received it.

At the Mariinsky Theater (staff – about 4 thousand people) Valery Gergiev is simultaneously director, artistic director and chief conductor. By the standards of both global and domestic practice, such a combination of leadership functions in one person is already an exception. In St. Petersburg, the theater owns three stages at once: historical, new (“Mariinsky-2”) and a concert hall on Dekabristov Street, which also regularly hosts not only concerts, but also opera performances.

In 2016, Valery Gergiev received the Primorsky Opera and Ballet Theater (Vladivostok), which became the Primorsky Stage of the Mariinsky Theater. In 2017 – the Vladikavkaz Opera and Ballet Theater of the Republic of North Ossetia – Alania, which became a branch of the Mariinsky Theater. Another branch of the Mariinsky Theater is being created in Kemerovo as part of a new cultural cluster. In addition to this construction, the prospect of reconstructing the historic Mariinsky building, the condition of which has been considered alarming for many years, looms on the horizon. Finally, Maestro Gergiev is also the chairman of the All-Russian Choral Society – and according to papers, this is a large organization with branches in all regions of the Russian Federation.

Now to all this is added the Bolshoi Theater (with a comparable staff of 3.4 thousand people), which has two main stages on Theater Square – Historical and New. Plus the Chamber Stage, the former Chamber Theater of Boris Pokrovsky on Nikolskaya Street, but this is a burden: one of the tasks undertaken by Vladimir Urin was to create, instead of a cramped theater on Nikolskaya, a new Chamber Stage on the site of the “Slavic Bazaar” that burned down a long time ago. The project has even already been agreed upon, however, what will happen to it now is still unclear. Plus a branch of the Bolshoi Theater, which is being built in Kaliningrad.

In total, Valery Gergiev gets as many as six capital stages and four regional branches, existing or planned (to these, obviously, we must add the opera and ballet theater that is being built in Sevastopol: the creation of a “cultural cluster” there, as in the case of Vladivostok, Kaliningrad and Kemerovo , is also an initiative of maestro Gergiev).

He certainly was and remains a musician of incredible endurance. The ability of a conductor to hold a record number of concerts or performances in the most limited period of time was amazing even twenty years ago, but there is still gunpowder in the flasks. In June of this year, for example, the already 70-year-old Valery Gergiev conducted a performance of Rimsky-Korsakov’s “The Tale of the Invisible City of Kitezh” (this is a huge and incredibly difficult opera in terms of performance) – and during a prolonged break he moved to another stage, so that no matter how no matter what happens, conduct Bartok’s ballet “The Marvelous Mandarin”, which is also very difficult, albeit a one-act one (see. “Kommersant” from June 29).

But in an administrative sense, this is a lot even for him. Especially if, as the Mariinsky Theater press service told news agencies, he plans to stand at the conductor’s stand in St. Petersburg three to five times a week. Controlling the document flow of the two main state theaters alone is a puzzling task, since the Bolshoi has not yet been promised any executive director with the right to sign. And creative issues—they, one must assume, will even more so be resolved spontaneously and suddenly.

Sergey Khodnev