Montreal Symphony cancels a Russian ‘under public pressure’
NewsThe Orchestre symphonique de Montréal has cancelled the Russian pianist Alexander Malofeev for three concerts this week. It followed a request by Montreal’s considerable Ukrainian community to remove the Russian soloist.
It said: ‘The OSM feels that it would be inappropriate to receive Mr. Malofeev this week. We continue, however, to believe in the importance of maintaining relationships with artists of all nationalities who embrace messages of peace and hope. We look forward to welcoming this exceptional artist when the context allows it’.
The conductor Michael Tilson Thomas said: ‘I was very pleased to be working in Montreal for the first time with the extraordinary young pianist Alexander Malofeev. It is regrettable that political situations have made it impossible. I look forward to the possibility of collaborating with him in the near future.’
Not everyone agrees:
Oh, for heaven’s sake. This is a moral disgrace. And the young man (20) has spoken movingly about Putin’s assault. (“The truth is that every Russian will feel guilty for decades …”) Stop this madness, please. Keep moral sense. https://t.co/OISOVOPqjx
— Jay Nordlinger (@jaynordlinger) March 9, 2022
NL- you brilliantly drew the line in the sand a few days ago. This is disgraceful behavior from OSM. and that MTT goes along with it?! I wonder if requiring a denouncing of China’s genocide of the Uyger Muslims will come next for Lang Lang et al. Not holding my breath. WAY too much money involved. This poor kid has nothing to do with Putin’s war.
Yes,the idiocy of this measures is boundless.However,i doubt MTT has much of a say in it.He was hired by the OSM as a guest conductor(only the second time in his long career,i think) .Same as Malofeev…If i were conductor of MTT´s stature,i would have canceled the performance too,though.
Good common sense from Jay Nordlinger, as usual.
Nuts. Caving in to this pressure does not make me proud of the city of my birth.
OSM made a crazy move. what next? they’ve D. Trifonov soon in the calendar, he’s also Russian, he made a declaration similar to the one of Malofeev, is he out too? to play in Montreal, should the artist coming from China made a declaration against their country because of Tibet ? who are we to judge musician’s point of view? please leave politics out from the concert hall
“who are we to judge musician’s point of view?”
Are they gods or something? Of all entitled nonsense I have read on this site, this ranks quite high.
In case it has escaped your attention, Malofeev’s concerts weren’t cancelled because of his views, but because of the “context.”
Just one final question, why do you post under two monikers , “guest “and” Brettermeier”? Wanting to give the impression more than one person shares such crude, uninformed, pretentious drivel? Just BTW, 7 of my orchestra colleagues and I, we fixed up a former rehearsal stage as a shelter for 25-30 refugees over the last 3 days, and picked them up with one of our orchestra buses… Some talk, some do..
I have already told you I post only under the moniker “guest”. You don’t want’t to believe me, that’s your problem. And I have also told you that the difference between the two of us is that my comments are related to the post. I don’t discuss the discussion, nor do I discuss other posters, or attack them. These are trolling tactics. If I ever discussed another poster’s personal circumstances, it was because the poster in question has invited this type of discussion by willingly forwarding personal information about himself. Do you always call comments that don’t agree with you “crude, uninformed, pretentious drivel”? What was “crude, uninformed, pretentious drivel” in my reply to @alexis? The “context” is mentioned in NL’s post, the “pretentiousness” is in my opinion in @alexis’ comment (musicians’ views aren’t exempt of “judgement”, you are one to talk after judging Furtwängler), and I don’t see where the “crudity” could be hidden in my comment. I can see however the hypocrisy in yours, taking me to task for daring to point out musicians aren’t exempt of “judgement”, when you do it yourself. Apparently only musicians _you_ hate by association should be judged, others shouldn’t. Take a look at yourself before pointing your finger at others.
P.S. If you aren’t the guy who wrote the “6 millions” comment in the Furtwängler thread, I apologize. That guy was calling himself “music lover”. There are currently three “guest” posting on SD, one spelled “Guest” (no me), and two spelled “guest”, one of them it’s me, I don’t know the other one but he is a new development, I have seen him the first time in the swiss-take-down-a-tchaikovsky-opera post, and wrote a comment there to let people know there are two posters sharing the same moniker.
Too late; cancellation culture has made it WAAAAAY too easy to do. Wash. Rinse. Repeat.
Thank you for your unyielding support for racism and misogyny in all their toxic forms.
Imagine if musicians like Kleiber and Busch who denounced the regime and opted to leave Germany or in the 70’s the Rostropovich’s and Tennstedt’s were treated similarly.
Point is, those musicians publicly denounced the governments for their actions of the time. It took a cancelled concert in Vancouver for him to finally come out and make a statement on Facebook, “The truth is that every Russian will feel guilty for decades because of the terrible and bloody decision that none of us could influence and predict.” He has now done it, however, for the Montreal Symphony, too little too late.
Perhaps giving a 20 year old with no apparent ties to the regime a bit of slack is in order.
Why should he or anyone be forced to make a statement to work? This is so wrong and must stop.
Sorry, but denouncing the war crimes of your patron is a necessary component to bring it to an end forever.
Time for Canadian artists to denounce the runt Trudeau’s authoritarianism in freezing the bank accounts of peaceful protesters.
Haha! You are ridiculous.
But they _denounced_ the regime, this is the difference.
It was the Russians who banned Rostropovich from touring and eventually from appearing much even in Russia. After he left the country with his family he could no longer appear in Russia. He spoke out against the government while he lived in the country and gave a home to Solzhenitsyn when the author had no place to go.
To me his situation was very different than that of musicians today who say what is expected in order to perform a concert with a certain orchestra. Rostropovich was well known for his dissenting opinions. The actions of his government against him were well known to audiences everywhere. He never made a secret of how felt about human rights in Russia.
A lot of innocent people die in war.
So that makes it acceptable? If not what’s your point?
This is war. Deep s..t for everybody. Who cares for music anyway now? Clap, clap, clap, two missiles, one bomb, hundreds of ultimatums, anthems, flags, collateral damage, people killed/lynched/ostracized. Not the happiest times, that s for sure.
It s touching that for some this doesn t mean much: they still plan tours, recording sessions , premieres as they did in the prewar age. Well, something s changed, folks.
And it doesn’t help that the US President doesn’t know what day it is.
In this case, projection does suit you well.
Cadet Bone Spurs left the office 15 months ago,in case you missed it..Putin´s little puppet would have been grilled on the electric chair for treason 70 years ago,like the Rosenbergs.Rightly so.
Welcome back “when the context allows it” – when would Social Justice Warriors online do that?
When fired, it was openly admitted the Russian had done nothing wrong…
Cancel Culture in the West, Putin in the East, must both be very proud of themselves.
Social justice warriors have nothing to do with this, which you would know had you troubled yourself to read the post first.
“Cancel Culture in the West, Putin in the East, must both be very proud of themselves.”
Nice to see you put the cancel culture first, and use it wrongly. Putin the lesser evil? I will tell you an open secret. There was cultural exchange before the war. There will be cultural exchange after the war, but for that the war has to stop first. Malofeev hasn’t done anything wrong, but neither have children half his age dying in Ukraine done anything wrong. He is alive and well, just deprived of a few gigs. I find it fascinating how Russian apologists manage to forget who has started the war, and the fact that people are dying.
How does canceling programs in the West do anything to help children dying in the Ukraine, though? That’s what I don’t follow in all of this.
Mr. Barnard, I regret to inform you I have decided I won’t answer any posts of yours in the future. Your last ad hominem was enough, I have to draw the line somewhere. I write this just to inform you of my decision and ask you not to comment on my posts, if possible. There’s no need for Norman to fear a spat, I had no intention to go down that path then, I have no intention to do so now. No further replies from me in this thread even if Mr. Barnard decides to reply.
This Kraut word salad sounds like Werner Klemperer in Hogan´s Heroes…
Could you kindly stop calling other people “Kraut”? WWII is over.
You keep calling anyone who disagrees with you a “Russian apologist”, when they are being nothing of the kind. On the contrary, it’s eminently possible for both of the following to be true:
1) Putin’s war on Ukraine is evil and needs to stop.
2) Disinviting a pianist just because he’s from Russia is unjust, illogical, and won’t change anything about what actually needs to change.
If you can’t figure out how someone could possibly believe both of those things at once, then maybe the problem is you. Or are you trying to argue that disinviting Malofeev will somehow prevent children from dying in Ukraine?
I don’t keep calling people who disagree with me “Russian apologists”, I call only Russian apologists “Russian apologists.”
I agree with your two points, with the exception of the “illogical” in 2)
I would like to ask you whether you have read my comment before replying? Because if you have read it I don’t get it how you came to write your points and the last sentence / question.
I, like you, have written that Putin is evil and the war has to stop for things to go back to normal. I have written that Malofeev hasn’t done anything wrong.
Malofeev wasn’t disinvited just because he is from Russia. Michael Tilson Thomas’ words were: ‘I was very pleased to be working in Montreal for the first time with the extraordinary young pianist Alexander Malofeev. It is regrettable that political situations have made it impossible…etc.’ The current “political situation” is’t synonym with Malofeev being Russian.
To the topic of Russian apologists, my point was that they have a tunnel vision that blots out everything that isn’t Russian, and comment only to complain about real or perceived _wrongs_ done to Russians. My comment was balanced, mentioned both sides, and also compared two wrongs, the wrong of Malofeev being deprived of this Western gig, and the wrong of killing children in the Ukraine. I concluded by implying the latter is the greater wrong. I won’t go as far as to paraphrase you in saying that if you don’t grasp this maybe the problem is you, I will only say that this is my opinion and I stay to it. No, I am not trying to argue that disinviting Malofeev will somehow prevent children from dying in Ukraine. I wish it were true but it isn’t, unfortunately. But are you trying to argue that keeping Malofeev gig in the West will somehow prevent children from dying in the Ukraine? If so I will point to you that:
1) The West has practiced “love” tactics (cultural exchange) for three decades, yet this hasn’t prevented the war
2) A part of the Western population doesn’t suffer of the type of personality disorder that allows one to watch war news containing terrifying footage in the afternoon, and applaud Russian artists in the evening like nothing ever happened, business as usual, particularly Russian artists who incessantly proclaim the “greatness” of Russian culture, when everyone knows how tightly intertwined Russian culture and Russian politics are, and have been, for decades.
The sad thing is that I believe we are all in for a terrible awakening. All these musical concerns seem so insignificant compared to the magnitude of the disaster we’re sitting on. Perhaps ppl should google a little sociologists’ and political scientists’ opinions about what’s been going on with the mental state of the Russian population in the last two decades, and to what point they have arrived now. I don’t know how the West can stop the train wreck that is Putin’s _Russia_. Putin himself is terrible enough, but he isn’t alone. He had worked diligently toward bringing a goodish part of the Russian population to boiling point, while the West was inventing micro-aggression, intimacy coaches, and fretting about the mental state of cats not allowed to cat shows.
Yes, they’ve played the same game sans war machines. And many of us commented on the authoritarian nature of that. Predictably, the Left is now very defensive.
Jesus was a Social Justice Warrior. So was Martin Luther King.
Neither of them popular in their lifetimes, admittedly.
Hysterical, and deeply unfair to Alexander Malofeev (a young and very talentous pianist).
Let’s not melodramatize. It’s just unfair, not deeply unfair. I’d reserve that “deeply” for Ukraine, and the “hysterical” for the one who has started the war. I find it deeply fascinating how Russian apologists manage to forget who has started the war, and the fact that thousands of people are dying. If it goes on like this they’ll manage to persuade themselves they are actually the true victims of this war. Very interesting phenomenon. I wonder if it has a scientific name? I also find it fascinating how they confuse the West with their own backyard. Western gigs aren’t just for the asking of Russian artists because Russia doesn’t belong to any Western Union. Russian gigs may be for the asking of Russian artists, but Western gigs aren’t. The West doesn’t own anything to Russian artists. But oh, the entitlement.
No, the entitlement is from Western people who think they have moral grounds to cancel Russians in difficult positions.
In my opinion, if a Russian performing artist comes out loud and clear to the press and on social media that they unequivocally deplore the atrocities committed in the Ukraine under Putin’s leadership and completely condemn his actions, I have no problem with them performing at this time. If they don’t, cancel them.
What about Chinese artists, or are they exempt? And how about Americans after all the bloodshed they’ve caused over the years? Who are you to dictate how an innocent musician is to behave?
Why, is there a war going on with China? I must have missed it.
“Who are you to dictate how an innocent musician is to behave?” But you are allowed to dictate organizers whom they should put on stage? Oh, the entitlement. No one “dictates” Malofeev anything. This rhetoric is on par with Netrebko whining she was “forced to denounce her homeland ” Spare us.
Your comment makes no sense. As for China, if you think there’s no problem there, then…
“Your comment makes no sense”.
Read again. Can’t be so difficult, it’s plain English.
It´s absolutely lousy ,German school english.
You are completely ignoring the consequences for them and their families if they live in Russia and speak out against the war. 15 years in jail. I bet you wouldn’t be risking that for the sake of a concert.
But no one is forcing Malofeev to anything. If he fears consequences he should keep his mouth shut.
Truly fascinating how the Russian apologists continue confuse the West with their own backyard. Western gigs aren’t just for the asking of Russian artists because Russia doesn’t belong to any Western Union. Russian gigs may be for the asking of Russian artists, but Western gigs aren’t. The West doesn’t own anything to Russian artists. Want a gig abroad? Then abide to the rules abroad, wherever this “abroad” may be, and whatever the rules may be. Case closed. Stop this entitlement.
Why are you all clamoring for Western gigs anyway? Not enough gigs at home? What’s going on?
Your talking to much. Under several monikers…
I have never used any other moniker on this site. As to talking too much, better have a look in the mirror at yourself before looking at others.
The difference between the two of us is that my comments are related to the post. I don’t discuss the discussion, nor do I discuss other posters, or attack them. These are trolling tactics. If I ever discussed another poster’s personal circumstances, it was because the poster in question has invited this type of discussion by willingly forwarding personal information about himself.
Brettermeier and Guest are the same person.Same word salad,miserable english ,same clumsy expressions….How stupid do you think we are? You demand the courage to speak up against a dictator in a totalitarian state,and hide your drivelling comments behind fake accounts? True to form,yes!
Well, if you ask me directly, you’ll get a direct answer. Yes, I believe _you_ are stupid. Don’t know about that “we”, unless you fancy yourself royalty. “Guest” and “guest” aren’t the same poster. There are also two different posters who comment both using the moniker “guest” (spelled lowcase). I am one of the two “guest” posters. I don’t know who the other is. I know of his existence because he has posted in the swiss-take-down-a-tchaikovsky-opera comment section in a thread where I was already. I don’t know whether “Guest” and “Bretermeier” are the same poster, nor do I care. Not everybody shares your hobby, or has time to waste online. Some people have real lives.
I never _demanded_ from anyone the courage to speak up against a dictator.
I am done with you. I don’t owe you anything and I have already extended you the courtesy of writing three replies to your nonsense posts. @music lover, why are you here? Are you here because you are a music lover, are you here to comment on NL’s posts, are you here because you like to have interesting conversations with other people, are you here because you have an ax to grind, are you here to stalk me? If it’s the last two, let me tell you it reveals more about you than you realize, and nothing about me. Get lost, and don’t forget to take your paranoia and your insults with you.
You denounce all who come from a specific country? And had nothing to do with war? He shouldnt have to make any statement to work. I assume you work for the MET. Did you make a public statement while Jimmy was there before Gelb finally took action? Bet you still had a job. Yeah. Maybe look in a mirror before judging all based on their affiliation.
Over 46,000 civilians were killed during the war in Afghanistan, including the US military dropped 211 shells on the only trauma hospital in north-eastern Afghanistan. The fact there were no consequences then for US / UK but there are now for Russians is pure Western hypocrisy and nothing else.
False equivalency with the war in Afghanistan, the war with Ukraine is of a different kind. Killing _innocent civilians_ is despicable indifferent of the kind of war.
So what are you actually arguing? That two wrongs make a right? That the West should look at Putin transforming Ukraine in a pile of rubble, and applaud his efforts toward topping the 46,000 figure? Uh, don’t think so. You may call the sanctions hypocrisy, others call them common sense because Putin won’t stop at Ukraine, never mind what he says, there’s no end to the man’s deceitfulness.
Ukro-fashism in action
Shame!!!!!!
shameful behavior from the orchestra board, the orchestra and Tilson Thomas. And now what? Where is the young pianist? Where does he go having already deplored the invasion? utterly craven.
I won’t rest until all American artists who have not publicly denounced Biden’s savage and illegal bombing of Syria are barred from all the world’s concert stages. Nor will I rest until all British artists are barred from performing unless they denounce the UK’s heinous use of chemical weapons in WW1. Nor will I rest until all Canadians are cancelled for the horrific treatment of indigenous persons. Nor will I rest until the evil French repent for their war crimes in Algeria. And I will especially never stop denouncing 100% of all Russians (and japs), dead or alive. We are and have been in a War (since forever, times have changed) and it must end!
People LOVED the war in Iraq at first. The US also created a failed state in Libya. Let’s score though everyone’s history and cancel everyone who supported those wars.
This is quite an agenda, but wrong address here for at least half of the items on your list. This isn’t the website of a concert organizer. To bar artists from performing you must address yourself to institutions, because they have the last word.
It’s “Indigenous” now. And no, you’re never gonna rest.
Cancel cancel cancel! Find an excuse to cancel everyone!
Almost all French love foi gras (and we all know how that’s made!). Love a goose today and denounce all French performing artists! 🙂
Interesting how quickly any cause becomes twisted by mob rule these days.
The irony is you arrive straight back at the authoritarian injustice you were running from.
Bravo JN. I agree with every word. This is a very sorry state of affairs and a complete overreaction, in my humble opinion. Alexander Malofeev is such a hugely talented pianist and, judging by the times I’ve heard him speak on YouTube, for instance, a beautiful human being. I am a big fan and I think it will have taken him a lot of courage to speak out in this way and he deserves to be listened to and not treated so appalingly.
Have the people who forced this ridiculous action not seen the television footage of the young people of Russia being arrested for protesting against this war?This deranged mad man does not speak for all of the Russian people and when a young artist makes a stand in this way, he should be supported not condemned. It’s like blaming Dmitri Shostakovich – and his colleagues of the time – for the barbarisms of Stalin.
Shame on the MSO.
If I could speak directly to Alexander, I would thank him for his stance and the courage he has shown as well as his wonderful playing.
I just hope he will be safe, along with his family. He is in my thoughts.
Interesting how one identifies mob rule as the reason a concert / performance was cancelled somewhere, but is blind to the online mob rule unfolding in this comment section.
I don’t know about that authoritarian injustice weighting down the West in general and Montreal in particular, but I know that an artist who tries to give a concert to a public who isn’t the mood for him, isn’t a good idea, as many artists of the past can testify. An artist isn’t entitled to give concerts everywhere he fancies, but the public is entitled to boo and throw rotten tomatoes, if they choose so. The public pays for the privilege. The artist takes the money and the public’s approval or censure, depending on many circumstances. This is the division of labor in showbiz. It was always like this and it will be always like this, in the 18th century as in the 21st century.
This artist has expressed his views against Putin’s war on Ukraine very eloquently. The MSO maybe acting in caution against reprisals from the mindless for merely hosting a Russian artist.
I was fine with blackballing Gergiev and Matsuev in the West, as they have long stood up for and with Putin. As well as with Toronto cancelled Valentina Lisitsa a couple years back. But young Mr. Malofeev has no such history and has pretty clearly disassociated himself from the Russian attack. I wish the OSM had made that distinction in responding to the understandable concerns of the Ukrainian community in Montreal.
This is insane and comparable with the insanities of the Russian regime. Did the pianist kill Ukrainians? Did he disrupt Europe? Did he make dirty deals with Mr Xi? Shame on them….!
Pathetic. Censorship pure and simple.
Very few Russians have got political and moral awareness. It is very hard for them to admit that not only the Putin regime , but also the whole system of imperialist patriotic ”ideals” they have been indoctrinated with since childhood is murderous. They need to repent themselves publicly as Germans and Japanese did at the end of WWII. It is not sure that the world will understand , but it is good for their conscience ( collective and individual conscience – and the young pianist seems to have understood this.)
OSM, with a principal conductor fresh off the Venezuelan, Putin-allied, Chavista regime-funded El Sistema conveyor belt, is cancelling a 20yr-old Russian with zero ties to Putin except his passport? Just shows how this world has lost all ability to join the dots, and reacts only according to the prevailing winds of virtue.
I would suggest that you be more cautious with your words. This decision had NOTHING to do with our music director designate. I can’t get into details, but he was not a part of the decision. I agree with you, but no to take it any further than the administrative decision that was made.
OSM is full of and is patronized by morally grandstanding racist, elitist idiots. The very existence of OSM trades on the notion that Montreal is a cultivated outpost of civilization that has a symphony orchestra that it is important to support. The OSM does not support “classical music”: it is a performance of a performance.
This is going too far. I feel very sad for this young pianist at the start of his career to be treated this way. It is getting out of hand. I heard on the news here tonight too, that the Welsh National Orchestra is not going to play any Tchaikovsky this season. Barking mad I think. Showing timidity and stupidity.o
You’ve got to TRY and understand that Putin doesn’t care a damn about this, or his own people.
Welcome to the age of idiocy.
Do these cancelled artists receive their contracted fees without having to play? If not, there is legal work being done, I would imagine.
For me, this one is pretty clear. I am a regular concert goer and in different times I would have bought a ticket to hear Alexander Malofeev perform. He is clearly a great talent. But the world is different now and it would be disingenuous to pretend that there hasn’t been a paradigm shift. We’re just coming out of a two-year pandemic. Many of us have experienced loss. Some of us feel vulnerable and raw. Putin’s bloody decision, which is still playing out before our eyes (just today, the bombing of a maternity hospital in Mariupol), affects everything. The notion that we should witness the horrific images coming out of Ukraine every day and act as though it’s business as usual when it comes to the arts just feels wrong. It’s lovely to think that culture is so elevated, so lofty that it somehow hovers above the fray. For me, it doesn’t. Not at this time. We cannot ignore the unprecedented global effort underway right now, on so many different fronts (business, technology, sports), to send a message back to Russia that we are outraged by the actions of its government.
I have no quarrel with Malofeev and I feel for him as an individual. But at this moment in time I want the message to go back to the Russian government and its people that we will reject their exports—including their brightest stars—unless they end this invasion. I don’t want to pay to hear a Moscow-based pianist who pays taxes in his home country. Right back to the Russian government funding these atrocities. Count me out.
*Of course, the ‘deranged mad man’ I’m talking about is Vladimir Putin and not Alexander Malofeev.
This is an absolute disgrace. The world has gone f***ing mad.
The lad is a musical genius.
What else does one expect from the Canada of Trudeau.
There are 3 categories. Those who support Putin eg Gergiev who should be punished and ostracised, those who say nothing and should be prepared to be vilified (circumstances like family in Russia can be difficult for them) and those who condemn and oppose. This person has condemned Russia. Don’t cancel because a person is Russian – otherwise you treat Navalny and arrested demonstrators in Moscow as you would and should Gergiev.
You don’t mention whether Mr. Malofeey has condemned the Russian invasion of Ukraine. That is an important omission.
Yes, climate. You cannot have a concert if the audience is hostile and throws dead cats and things. Remember how Gieseking was thrown out of NY. (It appears that his pro-Nazi statements were made to arch rival Rubinstein in an unwitnessed conversation but don’t let us get petty.) As for the young man, he is still going me, me, my music, my art, my nationality, while bombs are falling on maternity wards.