In principle, this tendency to educate the audience intellectually and emotionally exists not only in music, but also in the visual arts and literature. Isn't that more of an educational task than an artistic one?
I believe that the future of music lies in an educated audience. And by "educated" I don't mean the amount of information, but the attitude to the music: the way you tune in to what's happening on stage; how well you understand the language of the production and how closely you follow the development of the musical material. The problem is: there is a big gap between the performer's art and the listener's perception. My dream is to close this gap. We were successful in Perm because people there were not bound by established theater traditions and responded easily to new things. But you have to start with the artists themselves. After all, most musicians, and you know this better than I do, have absolutely no idea about theater, cinema, dance. From the orchestra pit in the theater, we can't see who's on stage and what they're doing. Actors and directors, on the other hand, know little about music. You have to make sure that actors and musicians enter into a new relationship, take artistic initiatives together, and engage in experiments together that are as diverse as they are daring.
What kind of audience do you hope to have?
It is something beautiful when people from very different worlds come to the concert hall, for example, to listen to contemporary, academic music by Alexey Retinsky. This is a difficult challenge. Imagine: A person who has nothing to do with science suddenly comes to a symposium on quantum mechanics and sits there for two hours listening. But it's really beautiful. I was once in such a situation myself. Of course, I don't know anything about physics, but I listened very attentively, and strangely enough, I came out of the event a little wiser, even a little enlightened. For I found myself in an energy field with these people who spoke passionately about what they love endlessly. They have dedicated their lives to the subject, they know it down to the smallest detail - and there is an enormous energy in their words. Even an outsider can sense that, even if he can't grasp the essence of their conversations. That enriches a person, broadens his horizons. The same thing happens in church and in the theater. A person comes, listens, does this inner work - and so he improves himself and his life.
In the recent past, you have worked with directors who in some ways break the laws of "proper" directorial theater. Both Peter Sellars and Romeo Castellucci go beyond the canon. Audiences, including even those who know the theater well, are not particularly enthusiastic about these "extensions." In this context, a statement by the director Martin Kušej, who is very critical of the opera business, is revealing: "The only conductor I would like to work with is Teodor Currentzis, because he feels free in the theater and I also want to feel free." What do you say to that?
If you look at the history of theater, basically all the playwrights broke the laws of theater and expanded the framework. Aeschylus was the first, followed by Sophocles and Euripides. They caused very great scandalous destruction. Shakespeare's dramas are canonized today, but in the past people refused to perform them; they tried to restage them. Before any canonization in art, a work inevitably passes through a moment of banishment. And when there is no banishment, no negation, the idea disappears and art dies. The accumulator that drives art is the state of being free to think and free to move forward. As for my understanding of art and my relationship with Sellars, with Castellucci, with whom I've worked recently, and also with Robert Wilson: these people, in my opinion, are very sincere. They don't break laws. They simply want to break away from the conventions of theatrical deception. Because when a singer in an opera portrays certain feelings and sings at the same time, it is an artificial situation. When a person wants to express something important in life, he doesn't sing. If he wants to say something that comes from his heart, he must not be so ridiculous. That is why most opera libretti turn out to be quite comical in their feigned seriousness. And we look funny when we try to dramatize these stories seriously. In psychological theater, this often comes off as false exaggeration and kitsch. Yet the music in many traditional operas is great; it reveals to us the mythological world it expresses. If you tell the story literally, it will touch no one. But if you tell it with riddles, with dots and dashes that follow their own logic, the parable can sparkle in the subconscious and turn into a great flood of information. Directors like Sellars, Castellucci and Wilson are more capable than others of understanding those goals that the composers set for themselves.
Does that mean that those you mentioned hear music better?
I have the impression that they have a deeper understanding of the composer's tasks. They don't try to literally illustrate what's in the score, but they want to reveal the music, its inner dramaturgy. And there are directors who do something quite realistic, like a brisk American soap opera with music - we have long been used to such domestic stories with a well-developed structure. I believe, on the other hand, that it is wiser to dispense with all realistic conventions and speak the language of the subconscious, the language of dreams, fantasies, visions. It is a language we all know; we speak it even if we do not speak it to each other. Our consciousness sees archetypes and prototypes around us, seated like a tattoo in our essence. Art has come to speak to us in this language. Castellucci, for example, is by no means a man who seeks the success of opera productions. He is looking for a way to surprise himself. He is looking for an image that provides a key that opens access to the subconscious. He is not going to a place where everything is clear. He does not want to roll down the roller coaster into the swimming pool, he balances on the edge from which one falls into an abyss if one falls. He presents a tremendous strain on perception, a challenge to our consciousness. Bob Wilson takes the same approach. He said, "It's a great blessing not to disturb the flow of the music"-contrary to many directors who insist on telling us a story that we must watch. And I close my eyes and see my image, which receives the impetus to move through the music.
How about Peter Sellars in this respect?
Sellars carries an effective humanity within himself. He simply wants to illustrate on stage. But he doesn't illustrate the content of the music, but its bio-energy. He wants to share his energy and the emotions he associates with music with other people. For example, he says, meaningfully, "Here, in this joyful movement, I hear an inner pain. And now I express this pain, I open it and give it to you. And you take this pain and put it in your chest. Do you feel this pain? Yes, take that pain and give it to the other person." And you open your feelings and enter Sellar's world along with others. That's how he rehearses. And there are moments in Sellars' rehearsals when everyone suddenly starts to really cry, because in that moment they understand what the music is saying. The singer may not even be aware that this has triggered the movement. It may seem like a random gesture to her or him. But Sellars fills every movement with meaning, and it's important for him to create that energy between the actors. And when they act with symbolic power, there is an emotional flare, a pain that is born. And that pain transfers to the audience. There is trust, the story is very simple and clear. If you don't know Sellars and try to judge him as a director who comes to us with some concept, you will make a negative judgment. But Sellars asks something of us with his message, he connects people who trust him with life. The ancient Greeks did not say "live", but "live well". It is precisely this "living well" that Sellars teaches.