From April 16 to May 7, the 61st Art Festival «In Tchaikovsky’s Motherland» will be held in Udmurtia. The festival is supported by the Ministry of Culture of the Russian Federation and the Government of Udmurtia, Executive Director of the festival – Director of the Udmurtia State Philharmonic Society Alexey Fomin.

The festival opened in Votkinsk with a concert of the State Chamber Orchestra «Moscow Virtuosi» conducted by Vladimir Spivakov. On 17 April, the maestro and his orchestra reopened the festival in Izhevsk in a festive atmosphere. It is noteworthy that the musicians were hosted by the hall of the former «Izhmash» House, which for many years was the «residence» of the festival, a favourite and memorable place for many lovers of academic music. The Russian Drama Theatre of Udmurtia is now located here.

This year the festival also received support from the Head of the Udmurt Republic. Alexander Brechalov ended his brief congratulatory speech with words of gratitude to the musicians and personally to Vladimir Theodorovich Spivakov, whom he called an example of his attitude to his profession, his country and his attitude to people.

The concert programme included works by Mozart, Boccherini and Haydn, including the famous Farewell Symphony, where the maestro himself takes the violin in his hands. The masterfully constructed dramaturgy of the performance gave the audience two hours (a whole eternity by current standards) of solitude with music that is soothing and harmonious. At the end (before the encore exits) there was a serenade by Haydn – a tender (pizzicato performed) declaration of love for the musicians themselves – Music.

The grateful audience, having arranged from the very beginning a five-minute (or even more) ovation for «Virtuosos…» and the young soloist Alexandra Stychkina (a scholarship holder and permanent participant of concerts by the Vladimir Spivakov Foundation), who performed Mozart’s Piano Concerto No 9 in E flat major, does not seem to have sat down since then. Everything was inspired – the brilliant performance of the musicians, the mastery and the stage charm of the maestro. Children who listened to – and saw – the concert «from the other side» were luckier than others: young musicians from Udmurtia – participants in master classes from Denis Matsuev’s mentors of the «New Names» foundation named after I.N. Voronova, a permanent partner of the festival, were located deep in the stage…

Despite the lengthy (five or six encore releases) concert ended by the flying «Libertango» Piazzola, Vladimir Teodorovich, standing with a bouquet of roses in front of a diverse audience (children, parents, journalists), answered all (all!) questions in good faith. He shared his joy – as an opera conductor he recorded «Eugene Onegin» together with the National Philharmonic Orchestra of Russia, which he heads. According to the maestro, this opera is his first strong musical impression, he heard it at the age of 12. He promised to come to us with this very orchestra…

Having said at the beginning of the concert that the main quality of a person is love for people, the maestro, with these roses in his hands, without rushing, singing topics, discussing with a journalist the subtleties of Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninoff’s author’s scores, still emitting «concert» elastic waves of energy, he created the very atmosphere of genuine interest and affection for people. The very shell in which only life is possible…