Return of the Genius

He steps onto the stage like a pallbearer at a funeral, but plays the piano with the enthusiasm of a child fiddling with his favourite toy. While conducting, his movements are sometimes of the slightest kind yet he has the capacity to bring both the orchestra and audience into a state of ecstasy. He is both secretive and informal at the same time, clinically intellectual and grandly melodramatic, a charming clown and intolerable philosopher, chain-smoking devil and vodka-swilling god. He is the essence of a Dostoyevski hero: Prince Myshkin, Stavrogin and Raskolnikov all rolled into one. In a nutshell, Mikhail Pletnev is a paradox.

He graduated from the Moscow Conservatory as the student of Lev Vlasenko. At the age of 21 he snatched the Gold Medal of the International Tchaikovsky Competition in the piano category. In 1979 he debuted – to considerable acclaim – in the United States, but then history intervened. In the wake of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan he was permitted to play only in Eastern bloc countries for many years. During the 1980s he signed a recording contract with Virgin and gradually his name came to be mentioned alongside the greatest performers. 1988 was a turning point: he played at the Washington conference of the superpowers, nurtured a friendship with Gorbachev, and this opened the way to permission to form the Russian National Orchestra in 1990, the first non-state-sponsored Russian symphonic orchestra since 1917.

In the meantime he remained fully active as a pianist; he has been a recording artist with Deutsche Grammophon since 1996 and his releases have swept the board. In partnership with Martha Argerich they recorded his own transcription for two pianos of Prokofiev's Cinderella suite (the record went on to win a Grammy prize in 2005). He is reckoned to be one of the most important interpreters of Prokofiev, Rachmaninoff, Scriabin and Tchaikovsky, although when on one occasion he was termed a Russian specialist, he responded by saying, "Russian music is enormously varied. For instance, Scriabin wrote Russian music. Tchaikovsky too. But Scriabin hated Tchaikovsky. Then again, we have Mussorgsky, whose music is similarly Russian. But Tchaikovsky couldn't bear Mussorgsky." So he does not believe in national styles and schools of composers. Instead, he believes in personalities. That from the amalgamation of composer and performer personality it is possible to create an explosive compound.

In late 2006 he renounced the piano, and for many years – aside from a few restricted concert performances – he only appeared in public as a conductor. However, last December he made a comeback as pianist, and his genius continues to divide public opinion. In the course of the past few years he has appeared at the Palace of Arts conducting his orchestra on three occasions, whereas his first and last performance playing the piano in Hungary was in the Grand Hall of the Liszt Academy, seven years ago. At that time he played Chopin: the audience raved, the critics panned him. Pletnev remained indifferent to both sides.