The Czech Philharmonic will begin its touring schedule for its 131st season with four concerts in Stockholm and Helsinki. Under the baton of Chief Conductor and Music Director Semyon Bychkov, the orchestra will be joined by violinist Karen Gomyo and pianist Yunchan Lim. Audiences can look forward to Shostakovich’s Violin Concerto No. 1 in A minor, Dvořák’s Symphony No. 7, Ravel’s Piano Concerto in G major, and Smetana’s Má vlast.
What almost immediately sticks out, when you study the orchestra members, is that they are predominantly Czech. This has its advantages, particukarly when you play the Eastern Eurpean repertoire There is without a doubt a sameness in the way many orchestras sound, which is due to the fact that many young musicians no longer study in the country they were born. Then there is the fact that music from other cultures is readily available and young people can easily pick up incluences from anywhere in the world and imitate them. According to Bychkov the Czech Philharmonic has managed to retain their own, unique sound.
“ Juat like the Vienna Philharmonic, the Concertgebouw Orchestra, the Cleveland Orchestra, Dresdner Staatskapelle and the Gewandhaus Orchestra in Leipzig.”
Bychkov has conducted all those orchestras and clearly thinks that the Czech Philharmonic is as good as any of the afore mentioned.
I am curious to know if he can describe their “unmistakeable individuality’
“They are Czech. They are special. It is difficult to describe sound, but one could say that it is a particularly warm sound. It is a sort of a hugging sound which comes from their musical tradition. When you think of the music that came from their culture: Smetana, Dvorak, Mahler was born there and then later on Janacek, Martinu, and others. You will associate the sound of the orchestra with that kind of music. Bohemia, which means soft grained. Gentle, sensitive and because they are all coming from the same culture, the same tradition, from the same way of being educated, there is a unity about the way they will phrase music, they will articulate it, they will speak its language. That makes them distinct. “
“The orchestra has traditionally been all Czech, simply because of life itself. When you think that until 1918 the country has always been dominated by those that are bigger and stronger. For example Austrian Empire. 1918 they became independent. It only lasted 20 years before the Nzis came. Then controlled by Nazis until end of WWII they were dominated by Nazi Germany. The war ended. Who replaced the domination? The Soviet Union replaced domination. So they were in fact most of the time behind the Iron Curtain.
What could they do if not continue their existence with the musicians born in their own country ?”
Born in St Petersburg in 1952, he emigrated to the United States in 1975 and has lived in Europe since the mid-1980’s. Singled out for an extraordinarily privileged musical education from the age of 5, Bychkov studied piano before winning his place at the Glinka Choir School where, aged 13, he received his first lesson in conducting
“I was given extraordinary opportunity and chances as a student from the beginning. In 1960, I am seven years old passing the tests to enter Glinka Choir school in Leningrad. There were 500 boys my age auditioning, that came from all over the country, not just Leningrad. Only 20 were accepted. Ten years later only 13 of us graduated. The others didn’t make it. Then it is time to enter the conservatory. I wanted to enter the conducting class of Ilyan Musin. There were 78 candidates in the first round. Then the rounds go on from dictation, ear training to other subjects. First round of conducting, conducting two pianists.
The next round you walk into a room and the whole faculty of professors is assembled there. On a big table there are lots of scores that are open anywhere, in the middle, at the end, not in the beginning naturally, that you are supposed to identify. You can be asked all kinds of questions, that relate to the piece itself, or it relates to the composer or to anything else. Then comes the final round of conducting an orchestra. You have to pass all those rounds to get to conducting the orchestra. 78 were in the first round, 18 remained for the final round conducting an orchestra. At the end of that only one could be accepted. Because only one has graduated the year before. It was only based on, whatever ministry it was based on, education or culture, I don\t know what.
If one has graduated, only one person could be accepted. That person was me, at the age of 17. Never happened in the history of conducting department of conservatory. That was a privilege. Later on I won Rachmaninnoff conducting competition in 1973. That was a privilege. As a result I was invited to make my debut with Leningrad Phil.
It was there and then that the trouble started. I was deemed to be politically unreliable. That is a quote. That made the government tell Leningrad Phil Society that this concert should not take place. And it didn’t. One week prior to that the concert was cancelled.”
The authorities attacked him viciously in a publication and that was when he knew there was no future for him in the Soviet Union. He started learning English, and when he applied to emigrate the International Jewish Agency for Refugees supported him. In 1974 he was flown to Vienna where he came into contact with a wide network of refugee musicians. He brought nothing with him, just some scores and $100 in his pocket. was in the middle of the Cold War.
After Vienna, he spent were six months in Rome, where he lived in a tiny room outside the city.
MORE TOMORROW 25 AUGUST.
