We must play in every region, make some concerts in bad halls for 20 people, in bad district where nobody likes music. Gabdullin looks back happily to the last months of the Soviet Union, in 1990, when the RNO was formed. But the RNO had its problems. Some New Yorkers, hearing the RNO on this tour, thought the brass section sounded tinny. Asked about this, Sergei Markov, the orchestra's executive director, rubbed his thumb and forefinger together in the international symbol for money.
Orchestra management is business, but in Russia, circumstances in business are bad.
People say but don't do. Now nobody understands that orchestra management is a business. Nobody will understand till music is gone. If RNO's business side can't thrive at home, it's natural that the orchestra would seek support abroad. Enter black-tie galas in New York, Sophia Loren and a San Francisco lawyer named Rick Walker.