Meeting Benches World art in all forms
Teodor Currentzis, the master of time
If you wanted to get to know the international music scene, it would be appropriate to start with the evidence of the fact that there are artists, genres and festivals that make music a shareable language. So, you should ask yourself if you are interested in any artists, a particular genre, or what are the most famous music festivals. If you have some decisions, we want to remind you of some emerging artists to focus your attention on. Ranging from pop to electronic, from hip hop to rock, from songwriting to alternative music, musical genres can be appreciated live at special festivals, such as Rock en Seine https://www.rockenseine.com/en/, which takes place in Paris in the Saint Cloud Park and hosts emerging artists and realities. The Awakenings https://www.awakenings.com/en/about/, on the other hand, a festival dedicated to electronic music and offering DJ sets and live performances, is held in Amsterdam. If you want to try this kind of experience combining it with a spring trip, choose Barcelona Primavera Sound https://www.primaverasound.com/en/barcelona, a festival held in Barcelona and Porto.
As for the originality of the personal approach to music, there is an American heavy metal band, Bad Wolves, who paid homage to Dolores O’Riordan of the Cranberries with a cover of Zombie. A British pop singer, however, Anne-Marie, who has just released her debut album Speak Your Mind, gained notoriety after collaborating with Clean Bandit and Ed Sheeran. We have chosen to delve into a third musical story for you, that of Teodor Currentzis http://www.teodor-currentzis.com/, a Greek conductor who leads the newly formed Orchestra Utopia http://www.teodor-currentzis.com/index.php/utopia-orchestra/, composed of musicians from thirty countries. Published by him on the Sony Classical record label, works by Mozart, Beethoven and Stravinsky have received numerous international music awards. Artist in residence at the Salzburg Festival, The RUHR Triennale Festival and the Lucerne and Aix-en-Provence festivals, as artist in residence at the Wien Konzerthaus https://www.viennaclassic.com/en/concerts/all-concerts/concerts-overview.html, held concerts with the Vienna Symphony Orchestra. As a conductor and musical director, he has worked with the Opéra de Paris, the Teatro Real and the Bolshoi Theatre. In 1994 he entered the State Conservatory of St. Petersburg to study with professor Ilya Musin, but it was in his homeland, Greece, that Teodor Currentzis began studying music. During world tours, together with his ensembles he performs in prestigious venues such as the Vienna Konzerthaus, the Philharmonie de Paris and La Scala.
Born in Athens in 1972, Greek conductor, musician and actor Teodor Currentzis began taking piano lessons at the age of four. At the age of twelve, he entered the violin department of the National Conservatory of Athens, later deepening his composition studies with professors Hadjinikos and Shreck. With the support of a scholarship, he studied conducting at the St. Petersburg State Conservatory. In 2009, he starred in a film based on the biography of physicist Lev Landau. Director of the Novosibirsk Opera and Ballet Theater until 2010, he then became musical director of the Perm Opera and Ballet Theater. Starting from the 2018-2019 season he became chief conductor of the SWR Symphonieorchester https://www.swr.de/swr2/musik-klassik/symphonieorchester/index.html. In ancient Greece, Chronos indicated the passing of minutes; Kairos, on the other hand, is the quality of the flow of time. We must memorize this background to better understand a controversial conductor. Abandoning the traditional front position and wearing lace-up boots, skinny jeans and a t-shirt on stage, the eccentric Teodor Currentzis conducted from within the orchestra. Between long silences and expertly calculated words, inflexible and elegant, proposing new solutions and maintaining consolidated approaches to music, he was able to create a cloud of mystery around himself. However, since 2022 he has chosen to wear black suits with white shirts, dress shoes and a more diligent haircut. The Novosibirsk Opera and Ballet Theatre https://novat.ru/en/, where it seems that an elusive protector supports the artists, saw the debut of this conductor’s career in 2004. To those who ask him if he feels Greek or Russian, he replies that he is Greek by language.
With the aim of performing baroque music and operas and giving new impulses to contemporary music, it was precisely in Siberia that, in order to make music with like-minded musicians who did not look at the clock during rehearsals, Teodor Currentzis created a community of orchestral players – the MusicAeterna choir and orchestra – where to study and investigate innovative scores. During the recording of a musical trilogy, he isolated eight bars of the Nozze di Figaro https://www.bilibili.com/video/BV1RB4y1f7pc/?t=8&spm_id_from=333.1350.jump_directly, a comic opera by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, a story of love, jealousy, deception and reconciliation, set in a Spanish villa in the 18th century, and worked on it for four hours. One evening later, when the rehearsals for Idomeneo had lasted almost until midnight, he boldly questioned the choir and orchestra: “Can you imagine Leonardo da Vinci saying he could make a certain machine in seven hours?”
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