Edgar Ottovich Tons (Tones, Edgar) |

Tones, Edgar

People’s Artist of the Latvian SSR (1962), State Prize of the Latvian SSR (1965). Significant successes achieved in recent years by the Academic Opera and Ballet Theater of the Latvian SSR are rightly associated with the name of Tons. Thanks to his energy and determination, this theater has pleased music lovers with many interesting performances.

Tons was born in Leningrad. However, as a musician, he was formed in Latvia. In the capital of the republic, he graduated from the conservatory in the double bass class, played in various orchestras under the direction of G. Abendroth, E. Kleiber, L. Blech. Having accumulated experience, in 1945 he again entered the Latvian Conservatory and five years later completed his education as a symphony conductor under the guidance of professors P. Barison and L. Wigner. Already in the years of teaching, Tons began practical conducting activities. First, he worked at the Riga Musical Comedy Theater, where he led The Violet of Montmartre, Pericola, The Wedding at Malinovka, and then at the Opera and Ballet Theater as L. Wigner’s assistant in the performances Faust, Kashchei the Immortal, Iolanta”, “Don Pasquale”, “Youth”, “The Scarlet Flower”.

After a competition for young conductors organized in Moscow (Bolshoi Theater, 1950), Tons was sent for an internship at the Opera and Ballet Theater named after S. M. Kirov. Here B. Khaikin became its leader. In Leningrad, Tons conducted Boris Godunov, The Maid of Pskov, Eugene Onegin, The Queen of Spades, The Taras Family, and staged his first independent production, the opera Dubrovsky.

Having gone through an excellent school, Tons in 1953 took the post of chief conductor of the Opera and Ballet Theater of the Latvian SSR. Infecting the artists with his enthusiasm, he sought to renew the repertoire. This is how performances of opera works that have not been shown in the Soviet Union for a long time, as well as samples of modern music appear on the Riga stage: Wagner’s Tannhäuser and Valkyrie, R. Strauss’ Salome, S. Prokofiev’s War and Peace, Peter Grimes » B. Britten. One of the first in our days to address the conductor to “Katerina Izmailova” by D. Shostakovich. At the same time, many operas and ballets by Russian classics were conducted by Tons. The musician’s repertoire included about forty major stage works. He was also an excellent interpreter of the works of Latvian composers (Banyuta by A. Kalnyn, Fire and Night by J. Medyn, Towards the New Shore, Green Mill, Beggar’s Opera by M. Zarin). Tons did not break the ties he had established with the Kirov Theatre. In 1956 he staged the opera f. Erkel “Laszlo Hunyadi”.

No less intense was the activity of Tons, a symphony conductor. At one time (1963-1966) he combined theater work with the duties of the head of the Latvian Radio and Television Orchestra. And on the concert stage, he was attracted primarily by large-scale dramatic canvases. Among them are Handel’s Messiah, Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, Berlioz’s Damnation of Faust, Verdi’s Requiem, Stravinsky’s Oedipus Rex, Prokofiev’s Ivan the Terrible, M. Zarin’s Mahogany. On the creative account of Tons there are also the first performances of many works by composers of the republic – M. Zarin, Y. Ivanov, R. Greenblat, G. Raman and others.

Tons constantly performed with concerts in Moscow, Leningrad and other cities of the country. In 1966 he toured Poland with programs from works by Tchaikovsky and Shostakovich.

The work of Tons was fruitful as the head of the symphony conducting class at the Latvian Conservatory (1958-1963).

Lit .: E. Ioffe. Edgar Tons. “SM”, 1965, No. 7.

L. Grigoriev, J. Platek