Yuri Ivanovich Simonov (Yuri Simonov) |

Yuri Simonov

Yuri Simonov was born in 1941 in Saratov into a family of opera singers. For the first time he stood on the conductor’s podium at the age of less than 12, performing with the orchestra of the Saratov Republican Music School, where he studied violin, Mozart’s symphony in G minor. In 1956 he entered a special ten-year school at the Leningrad State Conservatory, and then to the conservatory, from which he graduated in viola class with Y. Kramarov (1965) and conducting with N. Rabinovich (1969). While still a student, Simonov became a laureate of the 2nd All-Union Conducting Competition in Moscow (1966), after which he was invited to the Kislovodsk Philharmonic for the position of Principal Conductor.

In 1968, Yu. Simonov became the first Soviet conductor to win an international competition. It happened in Rome at the 27th Conducting Competition organized by the National Academy of Santa Cecilia. In those days, the newspaper “Messagero” wrote: “The absolute winner of the competition was the Soviet XNUMX-year-old conductor Yuri Simonov. This is a great talent, full of inspiration and charm. His qualities, which the public found exceptional – and so was the opinion of the jury – lie in the extraordinary ability to get in touch with the public, in the inner musicality, in the power of the impact of his gesture. Let us pay tribute to this young man, who will certainly become a champion and defender of great music.” E.A. Mravinsky immediately took him as an assistant in his orchestra and invited him on tour with the Honored Collective of the Republic of the Academic Symphony Orchestra of the Leningrad Philharmonic in Siberia. Since then (for more than forty years) Simonov’s creative contacts with the illustrious team have not stopped. In addition to regular performances at the Great Hall of the St. Petersburg Philharmonic, the conductor has taken part in the orchestra’s foreign tours of Great Britain, Austria, Germany, Switzerland, France, Holland, Spain, Italy and the Czech Republic.

In January 1969, Yu. Simonov made his debut at the Bolshoi Theater with the opera Aida by Verdi, and from February of the following year, after his triumphant performance on tour of the theater in Paris, he was appointed Chief Conductor of the Bolshoi Theater of the USSR and held this post for 15 and a half years is a record term for this position. The years of work of the maestro became one of the brilliant and significant periods in the history of the theater. Under his direction, the premieres of outstanding works of world classics took place: Glinka’s Ruslan and Lyudmila, Rimsky-Korsakov’s The Maid of Pskov, Mozart’s So Do Everyone, Bizet’s Carmen, Duke Bluebeard’s Castle and Bartok’s The Wood Prince, ballets The Golden Age by Shostakovich and Anna Karenina by Shchedrin. And staged in 1979, Wagner’s opera The Rhine Gold marked the return of the composer’s work to the theater stage after an absence of almost forty years.

And yet, the most important contribution to the history of the Bolshoi Theater should be considered the painstaking and truly selfless work of Y. Simonov with the constantly renewing theater teams (opera troupe and orchestra) to overhaul and maintain the highest musical level of performances of the so-called “Golden Fund”. These are: “Boris Godunov” and “Khovanshchina” by Mussorgsky, “Prince Igor” by Borodin, “The Queen of Spades” by Tchaikovsky, “Sadko” and “The Tsar’s Bride” by Rimsky-Korsakov, “The Wedding of Figaro” by Mozart, “Don Carlos” by Verdi, “Petrushka ” and Stravinsky’s The Firebird and others … The conductor’s many hours of daily work in the classroom, regularly carried out with the newly organized probationary vocal group in those years, became a solid foundation for the further professional growth of young artists after the maestro finished his creative activity in the theater in 1985. It is impressive not only the scale of what Yuri Simonov did in the theater, but also the fact that in one season he became the conductor in the theater about 80 times, and at the same time, at least 10 titles on the theater poster per season were under his direct artistic direction!

In the late 70s, Y. Simonov organized the Chamber Orchestra from young enthusiasts of the theater orchestra, which successfully toured the country and abroad, performing with I. Arkhipova, E. Obraztsova, T. Milashkina, Y. Mazurok, V. Malchenko, M. Petukhov, T. Dokshitser and other outstanding artists of that time.

In the 80s and 90s, Simonov staged a number of opera productions in major theaters around the world. In 1982 he made his debut with Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin at London’s Covent Garden, and four years later he staged Verdi’s La Traviata there. It was followed by other Verdi operas: “Aida” in Birmingham, “Don Carlos” in Los Angeles and Hamburg, “Force of Destiny” in Marseille, “That’s what everyone does” by Mozart in Genoa, “Salome” by R. Strauss in Florence, ” Khovanshchina” by Mussorgsky in San Francisco, “Eugene Onegin” in Dallas, “The Queen of Spades” in Prague, Budapest and Paris (Opera Bastille), Wagner’s operas in Budapest.

In 1982, the maestro was invited to conduct a series of concerts by the London Symphony Orchestra (LSO), with which he subsequently collaborated on numerous occasions. He has also performed with symphony orchestras in Europe, the USA, Canada and Japan. Participated in major international festivals: Edinburgh and Salisbury in the UK, Tanglewood in the USA, the Mahler and Shostakovich festivals in Paris, Prague Spring, Prague Autumn, Budapest Spring and others.

From 1985 to 1989, he led the State Small Symphony Orchestra (GMSO USSR), which he created, performing a lot with him in the cities of the former USSR and abroad (Italy, East Germany, Hungary, Poland).

In the early 1990s, Simonov was Principal Guest Conductor of the Philharmonic Orchestra in Buenos Aires (Argentina), and from 1994 to 2002 he was Musical Director of the Belgian National Orchestra in Brussels (ONB).

In 2001 Y. Simonov founded the Liszt-Wagner Orchestra in Budapest.

For more than thirty years he has been a permanent guest conductor of the Hungarian National Opera House, where during the years of cooperation he has staged almost all of Wagner’s operas, including the tetralogy Der Ring des Nibelungen.

In addition to opera performances and concerts with all Budapest orchestras, from 1994 to 2008 the maestro conducted international summer Master Courses (Budapest and Miskolc), which were attended by more than a hundred young conductors from thirty countries of the world. Hungarian television made three films about Y. Simonov.

The conductor combines active creative activity with teaching: from 1978 to 1991 Simonov taught an opera and symphony conducting class at the Moscow Conservatory. Since 1985 he has been a professor. Since 2006 he has been teaching at the St. Petersburg Conservatory. Conducts master classes in Russia and abroad: in London, Tel Aviv, Alma-Ata, Riga.

Among his students (in alphabetical order): M. Adamovich, M. Arkadiev, T. Bogani, E. Boyko, D. Botinis (senior), D. Botinis (junior), Y. Botnari, D. Brett, V Weiss, N. Vaytsis, A. Veismanis, M. Vengerov, A. Vikulov, S. Vlasov, Yu. , Kim E.-S., L. Kovacs, J. Kovacs, J.-P. Kuusela, A. Lavreniuk, Lee I.-Ch., D. Loos, A. Lysenko, V. Mendoza, G. Meneschi, M. Metelska, V. Moiseev, V. Nebolsin, A. Oselkov, A. Ramos, G Rinkevicius, A. Rybin, P. Salnikov, E. Samoilov, M. Sakhiti, A. Sidnev, V. Simkin, D. Sitkovetsky, Ya. Skibinsky, P. Sorokin, F. Stade, I. Sukachev, G. Terteryan , M. Turgumbaev, L. Harrell, T. Khitrova, G. Horvath, V. Sharchevich, N. Shne, N. Shpak, V. Schesyuk, D. Yablonsky.

The maestro was a member of the jury of conducting competitions in Florence, Tokyo, and Budapest. In December 2011, he will head the jury in the specialty “Opera and Symphony Conducting” at the XNUMXst All-Russian Music Competition in Moscow.

Currently Yu. Simonov is working on a textbook on conducting.

Since 1998 Yuri Simonov has been Artistic Director and Principal Conductor of the Academic Symphony Orchestra of the Moscow Philharmonic. Under his leadership, the orchestra in a short time revived the glory of one of the best orchestras in Russia. During performances with this group, special qualities characteristic of the maestro are manifested: a conductor’s plasticity, rare in terms of expressiveness, the ability to establish trusting contact with the audience, and bright theatrical thinking. Over the years of his work with the team, about two hundred programs have been prepared, numerous tours have taken place in Russia, the USA, Great Britain, Germany, Spain, Korea, Japan and other countries. The enthusiastic foreign press noted that “Simonov extracts from his orchestra a range of feelings bordering on genius” (Financial Times), called the maestro “a frantic inspirer of his musicians” (Time).

The subscription cycle “2008 Years Together” was dedicated to the anniversary of Y. Simonov’s work with the Moscow Philharmonic Orchestra (season 2009-10).

In the rating of the national all-Russian newspaper “Musical Review” for 2010, Yuri Simonov and the Moscow Philharmonic Academic Symphony Orchestra won in the “Conductor and Orchestra” nomination.

The main event of 2011 was the celebration of the 70th anniversary of the maestro. It was marked by New Year’s concerts in China, two festive programs in Moscow and concerts in Orenburg in March, a tour of Spain and Germany in April. In May, tours took place in Ukraine, Moldova and Romania. In addition, within the framework of the philharmonic program “Tales with an Orchestra”, Y. Simonov held a personal subscription of three literary and musical compositions composed by him: “Sleeping Beauty”, “Cinderella” and “Aladdin’s Magic Lamp”.

In the 2011-2012 season, anniversary tours will continue in the UK and South Korea. In addition, on September 15, another anniversary concert will take place – now the Moscow Philharmonic Orchestra itself, which is 60 years old, will be honored. In this anniversary season, outstanding soloists will perform with the orchestra and Maestro Simonov: pianists B. Berezovsky, N. Lugansky, D. Matsuev, V. Ovchinnikov; violinists M. Vengerov and N. Borisoglebsky; cellist S. Roldugin.

The conductor’s repertoire includes works of all eras and styles, from the Viennese classics to our contemporaries. For several seasons in a row, suites composed by Y. Simonov from the music of ballets by Tchaikovsky, Glazunov, Prokofiev and Khachaturian have been very popular with listeners.

The discography of Y. Simonov is represented by recordings at Melodiya, EMI, Collins Classics, Cypres, Hungaroton, Le Chant du Monde, Pannon Classic, Sonora, Tring International, as well as videos of his performances at the Bolshoi Theater (American firm Kultur).

Yuri Simonov – People’s Artist of the USSR (1981), holder of the Order of Honor of the Russian Federation (2001), winner of the Moscow Mayor’s Prize in literature and art for 2008, “Conductor of the Year” according to the rating of the Musical Review newspaper (season 2005-2006). He was also awarded the “Officer’s Cross” of the Republic of Hungary, the “Order of the Commander” of Romania and the “Order of Cultural Merit” of the Polish Republic. In March 2011, maestro Yuri Simonov was awarded the Order of Merit for the Fatherland, IV degree.

Source: Moscow Philharmonic website