Тогда профессор отправился за подшивкой «Таймс», нашел ее, тщательно изучил колонку «Культурная жизнь» и наконец нашел, что искал. Статью написал ныне знаменитый Артур Фокс-Стрэнджуэйс (профессор Мэрри неплохо помнил этого студента по родному Баллиол-колледжу[91]), в основном занимавшийся музыкой Индостана и приехавший в Россию весной 1905-го с другими целями. Однако в России он написал о Ратленде – неожиданно страстно.

Rutland the Shakespeare[92]

The author of this attended a concerto of the Rutland Orchestra when its leader had already conquered both Russian capitals with his music. One must admit that one traveled to the Conservatory of St Petersburg with more than a sceptical seed in soul: the conductor was young, the Orchestra less than a year old; the ado around the new name was too great and the rumours far too silly to be believed. Sensation and true talent far rarer go hand in hand than is thought.

We shall on purpose omit here the name of the particular piece that was played, though maestro Rutland’s Orchestra even in Russia turned out to be international. What mattered, rather, was that one heard a different orchestra. The reader may well cringe at this and say, ‘Different? Why all ensembles must by the author’s witty definition be different’. And the esteemed reader would be wrong: true, all orchestras play similarly when they play well, but Rutland’s Russian orchestra did not play well…

Yes, to say that this group of musicians merely “played well” would be unfair, for it is not a specific musical piece that emanates from the Rutland Orchestra but its absolute. These masters of keys, bows and winds do not simply render Beethoven or Mozart; they do not invite you to interpret a score with them, but instead hold you by the scruff of the neck and force you into the painfully beautiful and awesome sanctuary of universal Harmony; and lo, the spectators together with the orchestra breathe – or not – at the wave of the conductor’s wand.

However, the audience was not “as one body” with the orchestra and the conductor, because there was no audience; no orchestra; and no conductor – there was nothing, because nothing was permitted to occupy that space but music.

And at a certain point, having understood this, one rebelled. You may well ask why – why fight epiphany, why not enjoy a unique experience but dissect it into parts? Because the duty to the reader, and to the work of musical criticism, moved your correspondent above all else. So therefore, having gained back the sight, he not only listened, but watched. What did he see? The conductor.

Maestro is a discovery in its own right. All that was being done that evening was done by him: he extracted the music from the heart fibres of the world and gave it to the orchestra, and through the orchestra to the readers. Besides, one understood after a while that he could not have been quite as young as he seemed: a twenty-year-old can’t have had enough experience in life or music to conduct so the Symphony No. 5 (your correspondent’s tongue has slipped) – and so one must adjust one’s perception of the maestro. He must be much, much older. And though you may do well at this stage to suspect your correspondent of excessive and lasting exposure to Oriental mysticism, at least have the goodness to believe him when he says: he has listened to many an extraordinary orchestra of Europe and yet he was conceited enough to avoid listening to the Rutland Orchestra while they still toured inside the realm of Roman Empire. Well, partaking of it in Russia was even more interesting.

Maestro Rutland behind his conductor’s stand puts one in the mind of a black lightning. His manner is unaffected, as one might expect of his age, and unhindered. He is precise and free, and it is doubly surprising: the conductor, you see, does not have the much-craved freedom of rehearsing at home. Apianist can play Fu#r Elise in the quiet of his house as many as a thousand times, whilst the conductor, to work, must every time go out to the orchestra. And if the reader suspects that an orchestra musician can be easily deceived by specious wand-waving, he is deeply wrong. A musician sees the orchestra leader for what he is already when the latter is only walking to his podium – and so the body that is the orchestra is only willing to obey a decent head. Our body surrendered itself to the orchestrator’s will entirely.

Maestro does not only have an English name. He also speaks King’s English as if he grew up in Britain, but I chose not to ask him about that: Rutland’s past is quite unexplored, and your correspondent was there for the music, not mysteries. And the maestro confirmed his reluctance to discuss himself – for reasons of its being dull – and about the orchestra’s pursuits he only told me that those were known full well to music lovers, and there was scarcely anything he’d want to add: the music was to be played and listened to, not talked about. ‘Why Russia?’ I asked. ‘A lot of interesting things are going to happen here soon,’ he responded. ‘Why not discuss music, still?’ I persisted. ‘There are no secrets,’ he said good-humouredly, ‘here are the notes, there the instruments, there the scores. Everything else is here,’ he pointed to his head. ‘As for the dexterity of the performers, that comes and goes,’ he continued, surprising one with the uncharacteristic absence of piety to his profession. ‘The true value lies in the musical material,’ Rutland said, ‘Bach or, say, Russian Tchaikovsky are valuable, not those who perform them. We are all mere… transport.’

The unexpected word was surprising. Transport? ‘Yes,’ said the maestro, ‘musicians are like readers of text, or actors. Shakespeare and Corneille are important, but not Mademoiselle Rachel or Mikhail Shchepkin, much as I may respect and admire them.’ ‘And you?’ I insisted. ‘I?’ here the maestro, for the first time throughout the discussion, it seemed, smiled thoughtfully. ‘I am a teacher of both listeners and… readers.’ ‘What about interpretations, ideas, renditions, readings?’ Here the author of this stuttered because he saw he was being ensnared in his interlocutor’s own philosophy. ‘Please, Mr Your Correspondent,’ said the maestro with some emphasis, ‘the author already has all that. Do you understand?’

Your correspondent did, and yet I had a persistent feeling that, in some uncanny manner, it was the conductor in front of me who was the true author of the music that had been played, not Mozart or Beethoven. And, reflecting on his surname, I suddenly thought back to the now-famous Roger Manners, fifth Earl of Rutland, the King’s ambassador to Elsinore and school-mate of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, whom some of the more sensationally-inclined heads now believe to have penned Hamlet. ‘The author has all that,’ says maestro Rutland? Very well. One understands.”