The organizers of an Italian music festival have decided to cancel a highly-anticipated concert featuring Russian conductor Valery Gergiev, following significant backlash from critics of the Kremlin and human rights advocates. Gergiev, a known ally of President Vladimir Putin, was scheduled to conduct an Italian orchestra alongside musicians from St Petersburg's Mariinsky Theatre at a royal palace near Naples later this month.
At 72 years old, Gergiev has found himself sidelined from Western concert stages since the onset of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022—a conflict he has notably refrained from condemning. Italian Culture Minister Alessandro Giuli referred to the cancellation by the festival organizers, Un'Estate da RE, as an act of "common sense" aimed at safeguarding the "values of the free world."
The Royal Palace of Caserta, the venue for the now-cancelled concert on July 27, did not provide a formal reason for the decision, which was supposed to be part of a broader music program. Earlier reports indicated that Ukraine had implored festival organizers to remove Gergiev from the lineup, branding him as "Putin's mouthpiece" and asserting that he should face exclusion as long as Ukrainian atrocities continue.
Yulia Navalnaya, widow of the late Russian opposition figure Alexei Navalny, expressed her approval of the cancelled concert, labeling the news as "good" on social media, and emphasized that no artist supporting Russia's current regime should be welcomed in European spaces.
In contrast, the Russian ambassador to Italy condemned the cancellation as a "scandalous situation," accusing it of being part of a wider trend of "cancelling" Russian culture. Gergiev, who directs both the Bolshoi and Mariinsky theaters, previously enjoyed a prominent presence at leading Western venues but has seen many institutions, including Milan's La Scala, the Munich Philharmonic, and New York's Carnegie Hall, sever their associations with him following the Ukraine conflict.
The controversy surrounding Gergiev’s scheduled appearance gained traction as Italy hosted European heads of state last week to reaffirm their support for Ukraine and discuss its post-war reconstruction. Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has consistently criticized Putin, and her culture ministry was among the festival's supporters prior to the cancellation.
