Kornilios Michaelidis: From the cockpit of the plane to the State Orchestra of Thessaloniki – A… flying musician

A …flying musician “lands” on March 3 in Thessaloniki to welcome spring, together with the State Orchestra of Thessaloniki (KOTH) and the public of the city. THE Cornelius Michaelidiswho is both a pilot and one of the leading up-and-coming conductors of his generation, is to present the concert “The Symphony of Spring” conducting the orchestra, as he did ten years ago, in his debut as a conductor, aged just 23 years.

The concert is called “The Symphony of Spring”, because of Robert Schumann’s symphony of the same name, which will be heard in the second part of the program, but also because it will be presented at the beginning of the first month of this season. “It is an emblematic symphony of the Romantic era written by Schumann in a very flourishing period of his life, when he had just married his beloved Clara and they were expecting their first child, living and leaving in history an “ideal” love and in essence, it symbolizes the multi-layered blossoming experienced by a person in love,” states Cornelios Michaelidis to the Athenian/Macedonian News Agency.

As he explains, there are two other very interesting works in this concert, Zoltan Kodai’s “Galada Dances” and Galina Ustvolskaya’s concerto. “The first is, in my opinion, a very interesting dance work, accessible to the public and at the same time with great musical depth, while the second is a very rarely performed concerto, which also deals with love, but from a completely different point of view, which probably leaves bitter feelings”, explains Mr Michaelidis.

He is a lifelong collaborator and admirer of the artistic director of the State Orchestra of Thessaloniki, Simos Papanas, whom he describes as “a musician of unimaginable magnitude”. He states that when they were preparing the concert, they had the main goal that it could appeal to everyone, whether someone knows music well or not. “I think that if someone comes to this concert, they will find that they finally know a lot more than they think and also that this music speaks to the listener anyway, without needing to know specific information,” he points out and invites people to let go in the experience and to enjoy the concert exactly as he wants, since – as he says, there is no right and wrong way about it.

Conductor from …cradle

Kornilios Michaelidis returns to the State Orchestra of Thessaloniki after ten years. At the time, he was 23 years old and making his professional debut as a conductor. “Thessaloniki is a beautiful city that I love very much, as well as KOTH, from where I have many memories. Apart from me who collaborated with her previously as a pianist, both my brother (S.S. Vassilis Christopoulos, also a conductor) made his debut in Greece with the Greek Orchestra, and my mother, as a pianist, has also collaborated many times I was there with her to see them,” she recalls.

Mr. Michaelidis grew up in a family of musicians, from where he had the corresponding stimuli initially and the appropriate support and guidance later. “My house was like a conservatory. Everyone studied in a different room, so contact with music was almost inevitable for me, even though my parents never pushed me to be professional. They just insisted that I get involved from an early age so that I could familiarize myself with and acquire a musical education,” he says. Although at first he reacted, because he preferred to be outside the house and play, then – as he says – it developed into a love, from which he could not escape. “I started at the age of 4-5 with the piano, while later, by my own choice, I started learning the violin. I had even joined a youth orchestra that was based at my school and through it I fell in love with music, since I had the opportunity to appear in important concerts at the Megaron Musikis and Herodeion, which brought me closer to the professional process,” he says.

At 18 he got a piano diploma, immediately after that he left for Paris for further related studies and then to America for university level studies now, with piano as the main subject. There he began conducting, where he gradually gained more. In fact, he did post-graduate studies in Finland, at an academy which – as he mentions – is considered top for orchestra conducting and in which one or two people a year are admitted after a competitive process. Finally, he did a three-year master’s degree and finished in 2018.

His professional path then had many important stops, great appearances as chief musician, while in the last year he undertook a series of emergency replacements for famous conductors. He was also Assistant Principal Musician at the Philharmonic Orchestra of the French Radio, the Symphony Orchestra of the Finnish Radio, the Paris Opera, the Teatro Real and the Hamburg Opera. In addition, he founded and was the director of the Chamber Orchestra “Beethoven Now!” of Finland, while he is the initiator and founder of the Koufonisi Classical Music Festival.

Flying and… conductor

Cornelios Michaelides’ path in music was not a one-way street, but a choice after a serious dilemma for him, between his second love, aviation. “From the age of 13 I started aviation lessons and for years I was the youngest trainee pilot in Greece. I started formal education at 15 and got my degree at 17, the youngest age that can happen. I intended to be professionally involved in aviation and aeronautical engineering, but at that time I also played piano and violin in a concert of very high standards in the Athens Concert Hall, which went very well and …I was sweetened to the point of no return” , he emphasizes.

He finally realized that he needs both in his life to be happy. “The question was what would be my main occupation, and I realized that if I were to focus on aviation or aeronautics, I would not have any substantial time to reach a high level musically and be able to maintain it to my satisfaction. On the contrary, if I was successful in music, I could also be involved in aviation”, he states.

Cornelios Michaelidis is currently an active pilot and is currently obtaining his professional degree, not for livelihood purposes, but as a parallel self-improvement activity. In fact, he finds a lot in common in these two activities. “To play music at a professional level, the expressive and emotional part alone is not enough. From behind it is required to have knowledge of theory and technique. The same in aviation, since to make a landing and fly a plane, you need both the theoretical background and technical training”, he points out. But both – as he says, are expressed through a transcendental process. “The purpose in music is the creation of feelings, achieved through self-transcendence, and the expression of what cannot be put into words. On the other hand, the plane also has the transcendental feeling, because it is awe-inspiring when a man conquers the ethers, since that’s how you feel when you are at 10,000 feet and look at the world below,” he concludes.

RES-EMP

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