Posts Tagged ‘Vladimir Putin’

MPhil Bosses Want Continuity

Wednesday, January 31st, 2018

By ANDREW POWELL Published: January 31, 2018 MUNICH — Contrary to a London blog report yesterday, nothing has been “locked down” with regard to a contract extension for Valery Gergiev at the Munich Philharmonic, though things are indeed moving in that direction, for practical more than artistic reasons. What has happened is that Hans-Georg Küppers, […]

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Earful of Joy for Trump

Friday, June 23rd, 2017

By ANDREW POWELL Published: June 23, 2017 MUNICH — Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, complete, is slated for President Trump’s second orchestra concert on the job, to take place, like the first, in Europe, specifically at Hamburg’s new Elbphilharmonie. Details of the July 7 event, part of the 12th G20 Summit, were announced Wednesday by a spokesman […]

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Gergiev, Munich’s Mistake

Wednesday, April 9th, 2014

By ANDREW POWELL Published: April 9, 2014 MUNICH — Not a week goes by here now without media mention of Valery Gergiev. The musical friend of Vladimir Putin and, more to the point, high-profile employee-to-be of the City of Munich inspires comment even in modest suburban newspapers. Many want his alarmingly long contract (2015–20) shredded. […]

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Stravinsky On Autopilot

Thursday, March 27th, 2014

By ANDREW POWELL Published: March 27, 2014 MUNICH — In eight days in May 2004, as a kind of audition for the post of principal conductor, Valery Gergiev drove the London Symphony Orchestra brilliantly, if roughly, through recorded concerts of all of Prokofiev’s symphonies. Acclaim ensued, he got the job, and two years later the […]

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To Russia with Love

Tuesday, October 8th, 2013

By Rebecca Schmid Vladimir Putin has given the western world much reason for protest over the past year. There is the law banning homosexual “propaganda.” Two members of Pussy Riot still sit behind bars. According to some residents (and ex-residents) of the former Soviet Union, Russia is reverting to a full-blown totalitarian dictatorship. The businessman […]

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Bieito Hijacks Boris

Thursday, February 21st, 2013

By ANDREW POWELL Published: February 21, 2013 MUNICH — As dramaturgy, Calixto Bieito’s new staging here of Mussorgsky’s seven‑scene 1869 Boris Godunov (heard and seen yesterday, Feb. 20) runs into trouble almost immediately. Set in present‑day Russia — identifiable by the up‑to‑date, thug‑police gear and the wall map in Boris’s Terem (Scene V) — it […]

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