«New-York Times», By James R. Oestreich - 4.10.2005

THE RUSSIANEST OF RUSSIAN ORCHESTRAS LANDS IN NEW YORK

The common wisdom today is that the music director of a major orchestra wears out his or her (if there were any women) welcome after 10 or 12 years and should move on for the good of all concerned. But Yuri Temirkanov has always played by his own rules.
… Mr. Temirkanov has been at the St. Petersburg Philharmonic, which he just conducted in three concerts at Carnegie Hall, for 17 years.
… This orchestra has always prized expressiveness, depth and color over immaculate intonation and obsessive precision. …The St. Petersburg Philharmonic remains in some ways the most distinctively Russian of the great Russian orchestras.
The performance of Brahms's Second Symphony, on Saturday, was especially telling in this respect, from the dark, viscous string sound at the start to the brilliant and incisive brass playing at the end.
Those same qualities seemed of the essence in the other work on Saturday, "... al Niente" ("... Toward Nothingness"), by the Georgian composer Giya Kancheli. Much about the piece is odd, including its title, since it flirts with nothingness throughout a static first half but then gathers momentum and heft before finally trailing off. A prevailing sweetness, a curious ambling swing and traces of jazz detract little from the work's evident seriousness of purpose.