Trip to Moscow to attend a conference organized to mark the 100th anniversary of establishing the Scriabin Museum

It is October and I am finally in Moscow, a city that I have always wanted to visit because this is where my favorite composer Alexander Nikolayevich Scriabin lived and worked (Moscow, January 6, 1872—Moscow, April 27, 1915). His apartment is located right next to Arbat Street, which has been described in numerous Russian literary works, and since Bulgakov in his mystical novel The Master and Margarita even evoked a flight over it, I decided that the chosen hotel would have to be in it, or at least in the closest possible neighborhood (I still hoped that, unlike the poet Homeless and editor Berlioz, I would avoid a sudden encounter with the devil). Realizing that the hotel I liked was located in the Composer’s Street, there was no longer any doubt where to stay, and the Google Maps showed that Scriabin’s and Pushkin’s museums were only a two or three minute walk away.

The famous Arbat Street in which the main protagonists of numerous Russian literary works spent unforgettable moments

Synesthesia-based interdisciplinarity

The building where Scriabin lived is completely transformed into his Memorial Museum. On the ground floor there is a hall for chamber concerts, exhibitions, lectures, etc., while on the first floor one can enjoy the original preserved Scriabin’s apartment and his Bechstein piano, which later played numerous famous pianists (Sofronitsky, Neuhaus, Horowitz, Van Cliburn, Pletnev, etc.). The adjacent building has also recently been refurbished in order to create a bigger concert hall (it is necessary to pass the courtyard to get there), and it is worth mentioning that the hall is enriched with light effects, reminding us that Scriabin was a visionary far ahead of his of time, laying the foundations of the modern light-show. It is commonly believed that Scriabin, influenced by synaesthesia—a phenomenon characterized by the interaction of the senses, became aware that each musical tonality corresponds to a certain colour. Following this idea, in his famous composition Prometheus: The Poem of Fire, he composed a section for light organ in order to translate musical harmonies into color structures (more on the matter in my book Abstract Reproductive as Productive Art). Consequently, his colour system, grounded in Newton’s optics, is in harmony with the circle of quints (a five tone span), which is demonstrated on a light device from the early 20th century (picture with colorful light bulbs).

Moscow as a huge Fibonacci spiral

This trip once again confirmed that it is highly desirable to travel to the city where an artist lived and worked. Just like in Prague, where it becomes clear that Kafka’s The Metamorphosis could not have been written anywhere else, in Moscow it becomes clear that Scriabin’s flexible melody structures, rich in chromatics and thus challenging for the performer’s memory, may have its origins in the urban structure of his city. It was really difficult to develop a sense of space, i.e. to determine the north and the south; in fact in Moscow it is almost impossible to orient at first. Therefore, if I had to describe Moscow in one word, it would be the word “maelstrom.” The moment you immerse in the spirit and essence of this city, you feel that—not even knowing how—you have suddenly found yourself in a huge Fibonacci spiral, and in that particular moment the only thing you can do is to close circle by circle step by step, in the rhythm of Shostakovich’s Waltz No. 2., until you reach the very point of its origin, where you get overwhelmed at once with the shine of the flaming and picturesque beauty of Saint Basil’s Cathedral. It must be that Ivan the Terrible was not so terrible after all, leaving such a fabulous building behind, but the moment you reluctantly decide to leave, you realize that Shostakovich’s elegant waltz has turned into Khachaturian’s fateful three-fourths tact, and in this masked acceleration, to me it is still not clear how after Red Square I found myself in front of the Bolshoi Theater, because I was sure it was on the opposite side.

Transience of fame

The story is already too long for today, and the goal was not to document every single detail of the trip (much less in the chronological order), but to convey a breath of atmosphere and inspire someone else to travel to Moscow and get acquainted with the character and work of an artist known for his unusual destiny, because just a few were so famous like Scriabin during their lifetimes, and so quickly forgotten after death.