The Russian-American pianist has pulled out of the Proms owing to what the BBC call ‘a processing delay with his visa’.
He was supposed to be playing the new Mason Bates concerto on July 30. Since no-one else knows the work, the BBC has replaced it with Korngold’s violin concerto, with Vadim Gluzman as soloist.
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What a shame! I had booked tickets for that concert.
You can’t call it pulling out, when the country doesn’t give him a visa. He is pushed out in fact.
Small minded bigots, those Brits not giving him a visa.
@Tamino – grow up and stop trolling. And in any case, people in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones.
He and his agent would have known a year ago or more that he was booked to come to London, not just find out last month, so had more than enough time to have secured a visa like anyone else in the queue coming to Britain or the UK, or just London.
How would you know they have applied only a month ago? That‘s very unlikely. Don‘t spread lies.
No, he is canceled because he is Russian traveling with a Russian passport.
Isn’t DT a US citizen? Married to an American.
His wife is from Dominican Republic
But domiciled in the US and a citizen of same?
@Tamino, how would you know he is “canceled [sic] because he is Russian traveling with a Russian passport”? That’s very unlikely. Don’t spread lies.
How would I know. Well, he has no problem playing anywhere else. Somehow only in Britain they do lately not manage to process his visa in time. A bit strange, don‘t you think?
Thank God for that. Changing to a familiar work.
Ew no, one of the big draws of the Proms is exciting new works. If these become absent from the festival, there goes all the younger generations’ interest and within 20 years, no more Proms.
Trifonov is becoming fatally unreliable. This is the fourth concert he’s cancelled in the UK since March this year (ie. all of them).
Back in March the visa was also given as the reason. If we even believe it this time it suggests carelessness at best or incompetence at worst.
Have you tried applying for a British visa once?
You make several assumptions about what’s going on—interesting that you first put the blame on him. Why?
As I mentioned all his scheduled apprearances in the UK this year have been cancelled. The first time and this time, the visa was given as the reason. At the very least it suggests lessons have not been learnt.
Obviously if the visa excuse is true maybe it’s his management or agent at fault, or maybe even the BBC if they did not supply supporting documents in time. On the other hand maybe he just changed his mind.
Either way he’s become more unreliable than any other artist, with the possible exception of Jonas Kaufmann.
Visa+Russian= Rejection by UK
This is your brain on Brexit and Russophobia. If the UK is going to limit visas to innocent Russians based off its political stance, it will need to develop a music education system that can compete with Russia’s.
You really think one of the world’s top pianists learned and passed up on premiering a piece by a famous composer at one of the world’s most prestigious music festivals because he’s careless? How do you think visa applications work?
The reason given the first time was delay in visa processing (ie. the applicant had not applied in time) but if the visa has been denied then it should be made clear but the explantions are always vague.
All I know is that he has cancelled 4 times this year alone for a variety of reasons, which suggests something else is going on and that excuses are interchangable.
His Barbican concert in June was also cancelled due supposedly to illness. Something is going on here….
Yes, that’s about it. More to it than just a visa delay.
Totally correct, he had a big concert with the LPO and this lame excuse was given. I commented very much the same as you and got pelters. Don’t book him over here. It’s as simple as that
I’m just wondering, have you ever tried to get a UK working visa having Russian passport and being abroad? It can take months and no one cares it’s a famous pianist. And those people in bbc usually have no idea how long it takes and send all the documents too late. I was getting some visas for competitions and masterclasses before the war staying in Russia and sometimes it took months (even before the pandemic and before the war). And no one from the management took that into account. I was always getting everything last minute though being super responsible and not that insanely busy as Trifonov is. Keep in mind he’s traveling and having concerts all that time while he’s supposed to keep his passport at the UK embassy. That means he has to have the second passport to get that visa. And it takes another 3-4 months (and efforts, and money) to get the second passport being abroad. You also have to be being super mindful sharing visas between your passports. He’s obviously supposed to have a US visa and work permit, a EU visa and work permit and probably Korean, Japanese etc ones.
So you’re obviously one of those privileged people who had never dealt with all these visa requirements and you dare share your priceless opinion on this matter. You know what? You’d better shut up. Since we’re blaming people for the things their governments made, you guys made brexit yourselves, so don’t complain artists aren’t prioritising you to the rest of the world
As you make so clear, this is not an unknown problem. I get that everyone wishes that things were different but you say it yourself:
“those people in bbc usually have no idea how long it takes and send all the documents too late”
“no one from the management took that into account”
This is my point and that’s called incompetence.
Please don’t make assumptions about me, you know nothing about me.
In the past I have had two passports for this very reason and secondly if I’d done my job this badly I’d have been fired.
Maybe all this is just an excuse for an artist who is overcomitted and changed his mind. Who knows?
He needs new management- one that can get his visas done on time.
Interesting how many people/avatars post on this site in an attempt to discredit Trifonov and his management, when in fact British officials are cancelling him by making his Visa applications Kafkaesque…
You can hear the boring Mason Bates here
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lex6nhW3etA
Sounds like John Adams, but with less notes.
Fewer…
Bingo!!
The man has no problem playing anywhere else in Europe.
What could the problem be I wonder…….
British bigots in public office?
Having you got something more pressing to be getting on with; a couple of shirts to iron?
What about you? Are you wrinkle free?
No, but perfect in every other way. Thanks for asking.
Don’t know anything about the Civil Service, do you?
Speaking as a travelling musician who has had to buy many visas for Europe (post-Brexit), has asked about British visas for European/Russian musicians coming to perform in the UK together, and who has (pre-war) had to buy visas to perform in Russia, I can confirm that this is nonsense. Yes, there is a long wait, yes there is a lot of red tape for all of us – Brits, Russians, Europeans – to work anywhere. The vast majority of us can plan in advance and secure our visas without problem. For someone like Trifonov who has been booked long in advance and whose management knows to purchase visas – well this sounds more like an excuse than anything else I’m afraid to say… to confirm, no bitterness towards Trifonov, I’m just calling a spade a spade.
Good to hear from someone with experience of these issues..
There was no problem for Trifonov or France to come to Paris to play at the 14th of July concert. That was 6 days ago.
Russians don’t usually need a work visa to play concerts in France.
Others had said it but this is an awful cock up by the agents of Trifonov, who had not only sufficient time to apply for visa by the standard route but even enough time to go through backchannels.
It is very irregular for an agency to let blame be put on them if this isn’t the case, so they are either going well above their duties to protect his reputation or there are some serious issues at Opus 3 artists!
The Boris Proms. Brits only.
Luckily it‘s not British composers only!
The Korngold VC would be very enjoyable as substitute. I only watched a documentary on EWK yesterday and didn’t realize he was a prodigious talent. When he composed film music in the USA his critics complained, “he was a genius and now he’s merely talented” – a completely false proposition.
It’s about time they changed the name! No serious musician wants to play at a “prom” — it’s so “high schoolish”!
Well, do I smell something fishy?! Someone at the Home Office happened to be delaying his visa application!
I wonder could it be the job done by the very top guy at the HO? A certain racist of coulour, female non-English civil servant?!
Very dissaponted. I was looking forward to this concert. As I know you can get UK visa within 24 hours.
Ridiculous. This concerto was first performed 18 months ago in January 2022. How many professional pianists are there? They would have plenty on time to learn it. But just happy to keep taking the public’s money for playing the same old stuff we’ve all heard 100 times before. It’s a wonderful new work and nobody apart from Trifinov can be bother to learn it. Disgraceful.