Watch: Putin’s Conductor of Propaganda Plays a Show in Palmyra

Russia wants the world to know that its robust military role in Syria is reintroducing beauty to the war-torn country.

In the ancient city of Palmyra, the contrast could not be greater: A month-and-a-half ago, before Syrian forces retook it with the help of Russian airpower, the Islamic State still reigned there, able to destroy invaluable Roman monuments and pre-Islamic artifacts on a whim.

Now, with the city back in the hands of government forces, the pro-Putin conductor Valery Gergiev is making hearts sing where they once wept. On a sunny Thursday afternoon, Gergiev led his St. Petersburg-based Mariinsky Theatre Orchestra in a concert remembering the sacrifice of a Russian special operator who called in an airstrike on his own location as the Islamic State surrounded it during the campaign to recapture Palymra. Gergiev played Bach and a cello piece by Soviet composer Rodion Shchedrin to an audience of Syrian and Russian soldiers.

Last November, Islamic State militants chose the same Roman theater to make a dramatic show of executing Syrian teenagers. Gergiev is paid a reported $16.5 million per year to perform around the world — and dispense Kremlin propaganda with the beauty of music.

Watch the orchestral show below:

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9b0hFIf4Zaw&w=560&h=315]

Photo credit: YOUSSEF BADAWI/EPA