A Season Rich With Russian Arts

“Moscow on the Hudson,” indeed. This spring, the arts world at large has been enjoying a Russian moment – one that’s likely to flourish all year long. On Saturday, Symphony Space presents its 37th Wall to Wall, a daylong exploration of Igor Stravinsky, and Baruch College has launched a Russian Festival that runs until May. The Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by Valery Gergiev, will present Dmitri Shostakovich’s symphonies at Avery Fisher Hall in April, and the Emerson String Quartet will perform his string quartets, as well.The Metropolitan Opera is in on it, too, with its staging of Tchaikovsky’s opera “Mazeppa” this month.The Russophilia is due in large part to the centenary of Shostakovich (1906-1975), which will mean a year full of events and Russian music. But there also have been recent performances by Russians of Russian creations: the Kirov Orchestra performed music by Shostakovich (surprise) within days of the Tchaikovsky Ballet and Orchestra (formerly the Perm Ballet) dancing “Sleeping Beauty.” In the middle of all this, Russian painter Edward Bekkerman is launching a major show of new work this week at TAMA Gallery in TriBeCa (through May 13). Can this all be due one composer, whose birthday won’t even come around until September?According to Russian music expert and Princeton University professor Simon Morrison, the appeal is, in fact, typically at a constant simmer. “One simple reason is that Russian music from both the 19th and 20th centuries has maintained broad listener appeal,” he said. “Even in the grimmest of times, Russian music was oriented around the sentiments of the listener.”A centennial year does bring that sustained interest into focus, but more directly, the Russian government has renewed interest in promoting its music and art. “In recent years, certainly after the collapse of the Soviet system, Russian culture and Russian music received a lot of vital infusion in Moscow and St. Petersburg,” Mr. Morrison said. “In the last six years, with the Russian economy on the rise, there’s been money lavished on music. It goes on tour and is used in film.”Whatever the reason for the increased Russian presence on these shores, there’s a lot to see and hear right now. Symphony Space’s artistic director, Isaiah Sheffer, has had a longstanding desire to devote the annual Wall to Wall event to Stravinsky. But for years, that effort was stymied by the complexity of most of Stravinsky’s work. “It’s not as easy as getting musicians to sit down and read through Haydn or Mozart,” Mr. Sheffer said. “You have to find people who are familiar with his repertoire across the sixdecade span of his career.”Symphony Space divided Saturday’s event into four three-hour programs, each of which deals with one era of his work.The first program is what Mr. Sheffer describes as the “most Russian one,” focusing on the composer’s work from 1902-18, a period that includes his “Pastorale,””The Mushrooms Go to War,” and “Petrouchka.”The following quarters explore Stravinsky’s musical work in France and America, and the final session explores his theatrical work. The day concludes with a staged reading of Stravinsky’s “Story of a Soldier: A Fable of Salvation and Damnation,” with Leonard Nimoy as the Devil.The Russian Festival at Baruch College, now through April 29, was partly an attempt to connect with the school’s large population of Russian students, as well as a desire to commemorate Shostakovich, according to Baruch’s director of theater arts, Cathleen Eads.”I think the centennial for Shostakovich has sparked a Russia resurgence,” Ms. Eads said. “It just gives people a great excuse to bring out that great Russian music – it’s so moving and stirring. The centennial reminds us of the treasure trove of great art that comes out of that country.”Baruch’s festival features a series of films with soundtracks composed by Shostakovich and performances of his string quartets. It extends to readings of Russian poetry, two Chekhov plays, and a panel discussion with experts on Russian art and music. There also will be an exhibit of post-Soviet art through April 26 at the Baruch Performing Arts Center.The Emerson String Quartet’s decision to perform Shostakovich’s work was similarly inspired by the composer’s birthday. The quartet also has a long-standing dedication to the composer, and particularly to the string quartets, Emerson violinist Philip Setzer, said. “The string quartets are his most personal and perhaps most completely honest music, coming under much less direct scrutiny than his symphonies, concertos, and operas. They are like personal letters written to supportive, loving, and sympathetic friends,” Mr. Setzer said. Emerson performs all 15 of Shostakovich’s quartets in a series of five concerts of three quartets each, April 27 to May 14 at Alice Tully Hall.The Russian-born painter, Mr. Bekkerman, is perhaps a fortunate beneficiary of the broader trend. He painted his abstract pieces in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks of September 11. “Everybody was trying to express something black, horrible. I was thinking about how I could give them light and beauty,” Mr. Bekkerman said. The artist emigrated from the former Soviet Union in 1975 at the age of 15.Trained as a Bolshoi Ballet dancer in his native country, Mr. Bekkerman worked with George Balanchine at the School of American Ballet upon moving to New York. He left the profession after injuries and took up painting. Today his work is in the permanent collection of the State Russian Museum in St. Petersburg.Perhaps the Russian moment is merely a fleeting fancy, and will soon come to be replaced by interest in another land. But Mr. Morrison, for one, doesn’t think so: “It’s definitely a growth industry.”

A Season Rich With Russian Arts

A Season Rich With Russian Arts

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