Dmytro Tkachenko: The Violin Most Closely Approaches the Ideal of Beauty

Somehow we have grown accustomed to the widespread, albeit misleading, concept that we cannot influence the so-called developed world; that everything has long been established and said there; that there is no way to access it with our own ideas, let alone surprise them in any way; that they have experienced everything and have everything, and that we “have what we have.” Yet reality disproves this assumption; it attests to the contrary, proof of which is the first Benjamin Britten International Violin Competition that was recently held in London, one of the world’s acknowledged cultural venues.

Den’ covered this unprecedented event in both Britain and all of Europe. It marked an extremely important development in the cultural life not only of the United Kingdom (which jealously cares for the academic heritage of continental Europe), but also our country. Dmytro Tkachenko, who is the artistic director, initiated this festival. He is from Kyiv, a pupil of Bohdan Kotorovych, and has been living in London for the past several years. Thanks largely to the dedicated efforts of our fellow countryman, the festival attracted the interest of several influential figures in the artistics and political spheres. Suffice it to say that the emir of Qatar and Queen Elizabeth II promoted the competition. Among the festival’s patrons were Yuri Bashmet, Igor Oistrakh, Zubin Mehta, Pierre Boulez, with the winners receiving their awards from The Rt. Hon. Lord Mayor of London. In a word, the Britten competition became a major event in the musical world from the very outset. The fact that Dmytro was not the only Ukrainian participant is even more gratifying. Volodymyr Sirenko, artistic director of the Ukrainian National Academic Symphony Orchestra, was invited to conduct the Royal Philharmonic in the finals, and he coped with the task beautifully, judging by what professionals and the press had to say. The competition program confirmed the successes of our performers. Ksenia Moroz won a special award in the first round, and Maksym Brilinsky (from Lviv, currently studying in Vienna) made it to the finals, placing second and receiving a special prize for the best interpretation of Britten’s music. Thus it came to pass, without much ado — at any rate, in the Ukrainian press — that the school of Ukrainian music once again asserted its status as one of Europe’s best.

Naturally, we could not pass up the opportunity of asking Dmytro Tkachenko a few questions during one of his rare visits to Kyiv.

Dmytro, how did you come to launch such a large-scale project?

Tkachenko: Britain didn’t have a single international violin competition. There are piano competions in Leeds and London, and a vocal competition in Cardiff, but nothing for the violin, viola, and cello. So we tried to bridge this gap. Two years from now they will hold a second violin competition and the very first competitions for the viola and cello.

The very existence of such a gap seems rather strange.

Tkachenko: You’re right, especially considering that Britain is a very important country, and that such competitions exist in France, Germany, even in Ukraine. When I came to London, I had already accumulated a certain amount of experience participating in such competitions, like other young performers of my age; these kinds of competitions are part of the life of practically every contemporary musician. In our profession, you have to compete in at least a few competitions to make a career, and so I had already traveled to other countries. But I was surprised to discover that no such competition existed in the UK.

Meaning you were a trailblazer, in a way?

Tkachenko: Well, we didn’t have to start from scratch. London had already launched the Carl Flesch International Violin Competition, which turned out to be very interesting, but it folded in 1991, owing to a variety of problems, primarily financial ones. Among its founders were Prof. Ifra Niman and Yehudi Menuhin. Be that as it may, the way had been paved. Generally speaking, London is saturated with cultural events; there are several first-class concert halls, such as the Barbican Hall, Royal Festival Hall, or Albert Hall. They have four conservatories of music, rather than the standard one — I mean four elite institutions: the Royal Academy, the Royal College of Music, the Guildhall School of Music & Drama, and Trinity College. In other words, there is a huge megalopolis and constant saturation; so you have prominent performers performing in several concert halls on the same night. Meaning, it’s hard to explain why London hadn’t staged a single violin competition up to now. It was a niche that would be filled, sooner or later. All I can say is that I found the phenomenon hard to understand, let alone explain. Perhaps that very saturation left no room for a violin competition, and that they lacked strength and personalities. Or maybe London has a Darwinian environment — considering its expensive and highly competitive status — in which only the strongest survive.

Did they pick up on your idea quickly?

Tkachenko: It happened so quickly, so easily, that I’m still wondering about my good luck. The bottom line must have been the fact that I was Ifra Niman’s pupil. Now Prof. Niman cuts a spectacular figure in the history of violin music; his name is mentioned in a number of music history textbooks. His parents came from Ukraine, by the way, from the small town of Holovanivsk near Uman. He studied under Jacques Thibaud, Carl Flesch, and Max Rostal, three brilliant violinists of the twentieth century. He was a friend of Isaac Stern and Yehudi Menuhin; he sat on juries of the most prestigious music competitions and was a co- founder and artistic director of the Carl Flesch competition; and he was the life and soul of the London International String Quartet Competition. In a word, he was riding on the crest of a wave with all those creative trends and contacts.

So how did he feel about your idea?

Tkachenko: His reaction was very favorable. By this time we were on very good terms and were touring together; he would be on a jury and I would be competing as his pupil. He also found it paradoxical that London did not have any string competition. So, he supported my concept in every way; we would discuss who could take an interest in the project. Of course, we would start with the VIPs, people that could really help us, among them Ida Handel (another pupil of Carl Flesch, currently the head of the Britten jury), Igor Oistrakh, and Michael Berkley, a modern British composer — and Britten’s godson, by the way — who contributed the compulsory composition for the first Flesch competition in London, and then for our violin competition. Ironically, Britten wrote the first composition for Leeds and Berkley wrote one for Flesch, and then for our Britten project. So these VIPs helped our competition receive support at the first and most difficult stage. Regrettably, Niman passed away last January. We owe him so much! It so happens that every festival held in Britain has turned out to be a very prestigious international event, like the piano contest in Leeds, the string quartet, or the Flesch one in London. The Britten competition appears to be guided by similar ambitions.

About the Britten competition: how well did it work out, in your opinion?

Tkachenko: According to the critics and us, musicians, the competition featured many top performances. The organizers set themselves very exacting tasks.

What about specific details? Anything that made it stand out among other similar music forums?

Tkachenko: We believe that in a way we succeeded in creating a revolutionary event. Consider the finals. Ours proved to be the only competition starring two of the world’s best orchestras and three outstanding conductors. Each finalist performed at the Barbican Hall for three days, together with the Royal Philharmonic and London Symphony Orchestra, and three conductors. This year the conductors included the Ukrainian Volodymyr Sirenko, the Venezuelan Jan Wagner, and the Briton Andrew Davis. Once again, ours is the only competition that can afford such a luxury. Besides, we were able to carry out another of Niman’s revolutionary ideas — the compulsory composition contributed by Michael Bradley, which was distributed to the performers forty-eight hours before the performance. I believe this is unprecedented. On top of it, our competition program was a most sophisticated one, challenging the Queen Elizabeth competition in Brussels.

Meaning you made the young contestants face a very complex challenge?

Tkachenko: Precisely.

And what was the reward for this marathon?

Tkachenko: I believe our prize is among the most tangible pecuniary awards for violin competitions, nearly ,000, in addition to the gold medal and concert and recording contracts. I’ve never researched this subject, but from what I know, no other competition matches this one. The ones in Leeds and Brussels offered considerably smaller awards at first and had smaller capacities by far. You can look up the list of our sponsors, too.

Would you let us in on your secret? How did you manage to get the legendary French composer Pierre Boulez to be one of your patrons?

Tkachenko: I competed in Lucerne last year and he was a key figure there, conducting several concerts. He was present during my performance and I took advantage of this. I knew from the press that Boulez wasn’t a fan of Britten’s music, that he cared little for music that he found even a little tonal. But I was surprised to hear him say, after I presented my ideas for this project, that he did not consider himself a competition buff, yet at the same time, dialectically speaking, he believed that young musicians did need this kind of competition, that it was something they actually can’t do without. I also think that Boulez said as much in his old age, compared to his revolutionary self thirty years ago. Anyway, he showed a remarkably friendly attitude toward our contest, and it’s safe to assume that his support, as well as his name, played an important role.

Indeed, the list of names you’ve mentioned is very impressive.

Tkachenko: Another patron was the noted conductor Zubin Mehta. Every American housewife probably knows his name. The list also includes Yuri Bashmet, and we hope that he will be in charge of the viola competition scheduled for 2006. We’re negotiating Rostropovich’s participation in the cello jury. Boulez has promised to write a compulsory composition for the next competition. The only patron who has nothing to do with music is the Lord Mayor of London. The funny thing is that at first we placed his name at the end of the patron list, but were then told this was wrong, for he represented the capital city of the United Kingdom, so his name is now at the top of the list.

Right. The powers that be, noblesse oblige. Do you feel proud of having made this truly unprecedented project a reality?

Tkachenko: I can’t say that I do — you see, I am a violinist, a performer. Concert performances are my life, as well as promoting certain values that I have as a creative personality. What I have feared most over the past couple of years is the prospect of turning into yet another administrator, but I do hope that I have succeeded in avoiding this sad fate. In this sense I am a very happy man.

Many people think that Britain is not a music-minded country. What do you think?

Tkachenko: I think this assumption wrong. I would even say that music, listening to it and playing it, has become a national trait. Most families seem to have an instrument, and it’s common practice for an engineer or serviceman to play the violin at home, accompanied by his wife on the piano. And if they put on a good performance, they celebrate it with brandy in the cozy quiet of the early evening. Britain loves amateur music and maintains it at a significantly high level. Incidentally, this produces very good audiences; they are real concert devotees. It’s true that we have small audiences in the finals of international music competition, even during the Lysenko competition, since most people prefer to attend gala concerts. In contrast, much to our surprise, the Britten competition played to full houses. I think this is a special British social trait. They love music and there are many amateurs playing various instruments rather well. I was the only professional musician on our organizing committee, but all the rest played some sort of instrument at their respective amateur levels. I’ve never seen anything like this in Ukraine. There, anyone playing the violin is supposed to be a pro. You don’t see an engineer playing the violin after coming home from work, instead of watching TV or playing ball in the yard.

Why the violin? What makes this instrument so special?

Tkachenko: The violin is generally believed to have a nearly human expressiveness. This instrument is so vocal and, like the viola and cello, it can produce sounds most closely resembling the human voice. This assumption is true. Unlike the grand piano, the violin can hold sound much longer. One of our patrons, the pianist Alfred Brendel, believes that he can work the crescendo, meaning a continuous build-up of sound, between one and the next notes. He can actually do this — I mean he actually looks it, making the audience believe it — but this is the way with all pianists; it’s the way they are able to convince the audience rather than actually do it, for the piano cannot do it, being a percussion instrument in essence. Now the violin can do it, really. It allows you to hold the sound, alter it, because you can work the bow to produce lots of nuances, the way the human voice can.

Was this why people used to believe that fiddlers had something to do with evil spirits, that they could even communicate with them?

Tkachenko: Yes, perhaps because a skilled violinist could truly enchant them with his music. An excellent pianist can do this with a superb interpretation, conveying his own message. The violin can make you cry, for that is how it is designed. Playing the piano, you have to send your message, make the audience accept it; every note must correlate with the next. Well, I don’t know how to explain the specifics of the violin so that everyone will understand them. The violin must be closer to our soul. And its range is gorgeous. The cello is also very much like the human voice, akin to the tenor. The violin is more on the soprano side, it’s truly feminine, and this is an inherent trait. Since a woman’s beauty is considered ideal, at least within the aesthetic domain (which appears to be predominant in our culture), I dare say that the violin most closely approaches the ideal of beauty.

One more question: does a man with a tight schedule like you have the time to indulge in any hobbies?

Tkachenko: Yes. Arranging competitions. I had other hobbies as a kid, of course, mainly studying languages. I’d learned a lot and then forgot about as much. I still study languages, and I am strongly attracted by exotic subjects. I know my limitations, yet I keep studying Arabic, Chinese, Japanese, and even Lithuanian. My studies largely depend on my concert tours. I learn quickly, sometimes the hours I spend on board a jet with language textbooks are enough to help me communicate after landing, but then I forget almost as quickly.