Thursday, August 20, 2015

Gantvarg Michael: I do not play by their rules – Fontanka

For the former head of the St. Petersburg Conservatory, violinist and conductor Mikhail Gantvarg, apparently, will remain in the recent history of music as the first rector of the university in the 21st century, who left without scandals, criminal cases and courts for reinstatement. About how and why he was fired, he told the “Fontanka”.

  The chair of the rector of the St. Petersburg Conservatory, more can be said, has not cooled down after Michael Gantvarg and the Ministry of Culture has already nominate Acting .: cellist Alexei Vasiliev. In high school, he was surprisingly modest for the ascent to the principalship position of assistant professor, but in the past was a student of Sergei Roldugina – the current director of the St. Petersburg House of Music, godfather eldest daughter of President Putin. The noble name of Sergei looked Roldugina alongside other signatories of the open letter “of culture in connection with the situation at the St. Petersburg State Conservatory named after Rimsky-Korsakov” at the Ministry of Culture. Cultural workers demanded “overcome the crisis” at the Conservatory. Later, on the site there was a refutation of the House of Music: Sergei Roldugin, it turns out, “it is not and was not signed open letters about the situation in the St. Petersburg Conservatory.” His name from the letter removed.

  in high school Gantvarg considered everyone’s favorite. So 4 years ago, after a series of scandals involving the dismissal of rectors, its shape is called the most optimal, it calmed all the warring clans, and 4, the Conservatory has lived quietly. Rumor has it that one of the true reasons for his dismissal – repair of the Conservatory, in which to master a total of 2.6 billion rubles. Obstinate Gantvarg, taking work as if clinging to each piece of paper and do not want to sign the ceremony.

  – Michael Hanonovich what you call formal reasons, to resign?

 - That’s what I said to the Minister of Medina. By the way, he did not even know that I was called back from holiday to do that I had to stop concerts in California to come. Specific reason I did not call. The minister said only Ivliev (his deputy) all the time saying something about some shortcomings in my work. I replied that it is natural defects can be for everyone. Medina said, “I think I have them even more than you.” Nevertheless, he said, the decision is made. And asked me to write a statement on their own.

  – And you have written?

 - No.

  – Why?

 - When I was called to California from the ministry and asked to interrupt his vacation, I once suggested that if you call to dismiss, let me send you a fax application. I said no, no, you are, but it is necessary to come. Now I’m glad I did not got excited and did not send them a statement. To elect me to the staff of the Conservatory, from the collective complaints addressed to me was not my door was always open to everyone – from student to professor and People’s Artist. If I wrote a letter, I would be very embarrassing to them. They want the ministry – let them fired. I believe that all these 4 years at the Conservatory was calm, normal, working environment. I have not given “shoot” Conservatory, when the idea of ​​unification with the Mariinsky Theatre. When I passed the 150-year anniversary, we were able to relocate while repairs to the street Glinka, without interrupting the educational process … So, I say thank you. I just wish the Conservatives. Again she falls into a turbulent state.

  – You did not say, and we have named two possible reasons why you are debarred. The first – the Conservatives was accredited as an institution because it has no electronic library.

 - It’s just nonsense. Those digital libraries, which we offered to connect does not have even one-thousandth of the materials that are in the St. Petersburg Conservatory. Maybe they are good for historical or mathematical faculties. But the musical materials in them … I do not want to offend anyone, but even for the rural school is bednovato. Nevertheless, we were offered 4 e-mail addresses to which it was necessary to connect 150 thousand rubles a year.

  – A deal so only some 150 thousand a year …

 - Of course, I initially did not want to. I saw this absolutely blatant corruption. But the order came from the Ministry – and we signed contracts. So the question is removed.

  – is clear. But there is another reason, which they say out loud: you have not spent at the university optimization, you duplicate positions in the departments and so on.

 - Optimization unfortunately goes. Maybe not in those volumes, which the ministry wants. I was asked to dismiss completely priceless professors. In the name of some kind of optimization. I was deprived of the grant makes up most of my salary, I was once or twice a year depremirovali, they were such hints. However, this optimization, we had to spend. It was, for example, two at the Conservatory Orchestra: For the opera studio and symphony conducting. Socrates joined – made one. There were two choir – made one. It does not benefit the educational process, but I was forced to carry out and fulfill these requirements. So the real causes must be sought, apparently in something else.

  – And what is the?

 - Unfortunately, I can not name them. But they cry. Apparently, someone took the place …

  – And let me try to guess the reason?

 - Well, let’s.

  – They say that you – a man difficile. For example, the Conservatory is a repair and you refuse to sign the acts of the acceptance of work, any work you do not like …

 - It is absolutely workflow. Naturally, I have not played for some regulations, which do not want to even talk. I just tried to protect the interests of the Conservatory. To our staff live in normal human conditions. For example, the minister told me to carry Conservatory Theater Square at the Glinka 2. I said, no, you need at least a month. But we moved because worked like lunatics. As the war was evacuated. We had to carry, for example, 400 piano. Fortunately, God was for us: the weather was good. We are 4 shifts transporting tools, they immediately set up – and the next day began the lesson. That is, the learning process, we did not stop for a second.

  – That you tell – and I understand that you behaved with the Ministry of very Shrew, for any reason, resisted.

 - I can not say – the Shrew. But, apparently, need more accommodating candidacy.

  – You said that you did not give to spend association with the Mariinsky Theatre. So maybe, just fire you need to spend it?

 - I do not think. We Valery Gergiev in normal relations, we have long been familiar, and quite close. The idea is, in fact, was, I do not know who it belonged to, maybe not him. I think that after our meeting, after speaking on the subject, he realized that this idea is not viable.

  – What are you told him to convince?

 - I told him: Valerie, you know, the learning process – it is quite unnecessary extra burden on the theater. And without the Mariinsky Theatre 90 percent staffed by our singers, our musicians. So it’s “Association”, and so there is a perfectly normal character. Since our frames are at the Mariinsky Theatre, and not only there, it means that we are preparing them good.

  – I can be wrong, but you seem to have in the modern history of the Conservatory perhaps the first rector, who is leaving without scandal and without a criminal case. Or, perhaps, too early to rejoice?

 - No, I hope, no criminal cases and can not be. And they understand that perfectly. Otherwise, why they tried to persuade me: Michael Hanonovich better you sign the statement, and then we’ll start checking … I say, for God’s sake. I’m from the Conservatory did not take anything. True, no one has given it to do. Maybe it just did not suit the ministry? But I do not insist on this. I have, in the end, the contract ended next year, and I’m still going to go away.

  – And you will not resist to sue for reinstatement on the grounds that you were laid off during the holidays? ..

  - I?! Yes, what you say, never in my life! I did not know anything when flying from California. But the land is rife with rumors. I’m just afraid that because of the new appointment of the Academic Council of the Conservatory will again gather to say that they do not care that they had not talked that appoint someone without talking to them … I told the minister that if he needed to calm the Conservatory, the solution had to take a more balanced and calm. And certainly not when the rector on vacation. And now it turns out that again in the first musical institution of the country is totally unacceptable spat.

  – you are in no way accused Conservatory quietly lived for 4 years. But at least some formal grounds for the dismissal call you? What will write something?

 - I did not say that. But in my contract it says that the ministry has the right to terminate the contract without giving any reason. So it gives me great pleasure to pour back into our family the Conservatory, I continue to teach, I remain a professor. Hopefully, the new rector had not been fired. You know, I will be even a little calmer. And during these 4 years I have not a single quiet day was not.

 Interviewed by Irina Tumakova “to Fontanka.ru”

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