By Olga Fyodorova
The year 1931. The artistic cafeteria at the Bolshoi…
“Hi! Mind if I join in?”
“Of course not! Go ahead...”
“I hear you’ve got a new conductor here, right?
“Yeah, this guy’s from the Caucasus. The name’s, er, Melik-Pashayev…
Yes, Alexander Melik-Pashayev...”
“They say he is very young…”
“He’s 26…”
“Wow! I bet he’s the youngest conductor the Bolshoi has ever had! I guess
he’s just another whiz kid or something like that…”
“Exactly. They say he already played the piano when he was only three…
He has an amazing ear for music and wonderful memory… At 16 signed up as
a solo performer with the Tbilisi opera theater…”
“Really? One of the best company around?”
“Yeah… He spent several years working there and then decided to move on
and become a conductor. Went to Leningrad, entered the conservatory there
and finished it in just two years instead of five. And now they invited
him to the Bolshoi.”
“I don’t think he will start conducting any time soon though… He needs
some time to look around and get the hang of the scores…”
“No sir, he’s conducting Aida just three days from now! They are already
there rehearsing it, can’t you hear?”
“Okay, let’s take a look what’s going on…”
“Gee, the orchestra sounds pretty good!”
“See, the conductor doesn’t stop the orchestra over trifles, not telling
them to play faster, slower or louder…”
“It’s all in his hands, look how expressive they are!”
“Hush! I can’t hear anything!”
Melik-Pashayev’s debut was a resounding success and Aida forever remained
his best-loved opera he conducted during his 25th and 30th stage anniversary
concerts.
With a baton in hand, Alexander Melik-Pashayev was the epitome of elegance,
inspiration and poetic imagination. His interpretations were exquisite
and impeccable with the conductor paying much attention to detail while
keeping intact the composition’s musical fabric and soul…
His rehearsals were equally inspired and fascinating. “I never come to
a rehearsal without a clear vision of our operatic characters after many
days and nights of working with the score,” Melik-Pashayev admitted. “When
the inanimate notational symbols slowly come to life and the music starts
growing deep down inside me…”
Knowing each score literally by heart, he demanded the same exactness from
his musicians, resulting in glitchless and absolutely perfect productions.
His each premiere was a sensation and Beethoven’s opera Fidelio was one
such major attention grabber. Melik-Pasheyev was very actively involved
in the opera’s translation into Russian making sure that Beethoven’s music
did not suffer even a tiny bit…
He was equally exacting about the stage presentation discussing with Boris
Pokrovsky each and every episode proving once again how much Fidelio meant
to him. He once admitted that no other composition had ever moved him so
much as Fidelio had…
The premiere was a thunderous success and when, six months later, the outstanding
German conductor Herman Abernoth came to Moscow and was offered to conduct
something, he opted for Fidelio.
“It was an absolutely unforgettable experience!” raved the German, “Each
measure shines with exquisite mastery and Melik-Pashayev really does justice
to Beethoven’s unique style…”
At the Bolshoi Theater Alexander Melik-Pashayev was an undisputable authority
trusted for his impeccable taste and huge experience…
When the Iron Curtain went up a little during the late-1950s, Melik-Pashayev
started going abroad, first performing in Poland, Hungary and Czechoslovakia
and them moving further afield conducting at the Grand Opera in Paris and
the famous Covent Garden in London. However, despite the rave response
he enjoyed abroad, Melik-Pashayev’s forays to the West were rare and far
in between preventing this larger-than-life talent from ranking with the
very best conductors around…
Figures tell precious little when you are talking about musicians of Melik-Pashayev’s
caliber. And still, it’s well worth mentioning that he spent a record 33
years conducting the Bolshoi orchestra, including ten years as their chief
conductor. He conducted more than 2,000 operas and ballets and steered
the Bolshoi orchestra through 30 operatic premieres.
There was one more record he broke, though, the record of human affection.
Melik-Pashayev was everyone’s darling, from the divas to the ushers, which
is something that is very hard to find in the artistic community!
The bureaucrats handling cultural matters just couldn’t care less about
this wholesale adoration though and in June 1964 Culture Minister Yekaterina
Fursteva relieved Melik-Pasheayev from his position as the chief
conductor of the Bolshoi’s orchestra…
Visibly unfazed by his demotion, the maestro said that was something he
had long been going to ask for, just to be a regular conductor and work
like everyone else. Walking up to the Bolshoi’s billboard to check out
his future dates a few days after this dismissal, however, he was surprised
to see that a young conductor had been named to do them for him…
It was a terrible shock… How come they never warned him? Why? How could
they do that?! He had a heart attack that night and, several days later,
Alexander Melik-Pashayev was gone… He was only 58…
The Culture Ministry decided to organize a civil funeral in grand style
right at the Bolshoi Theater. The colleagues were already preparing heartfelt
speeches but Melik-Pashayev’s wife said no thanks. Thousands of grieving
people filed past the coffin holding the body of a great musician whose
noble spirit will forever grace the theater he loved so much…
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