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| ISBN-13: | 9780253349149 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Indiana University Press |
| Publication date: | 07/20/2007 |
| Pages: | 192 |
| Product dimensions: | 6.12(w) x 9.25(h) x (d) |
| Age Range: | 18 Years |
About the Author
Read an Excerpt
The Right Place, The Right Time!
Tales of Chicago Symphony Days
By Donald Peck
Indiana University Press
Copyright © 2007 Donald PeckAll rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-253-34914-9
CHAPTER 1
Music Directors
During my tenure with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, it had four music directors: Fritz Reiner, Jean Martinon, Sir Georg Solti, and Daniel Barenboim. In addition we worked with three principal guest conductors: Carlo Maria Giulini, Claudio Abbado, and Pierre Boulez. The summer Ravinia Festival had its own chief conductors, each of whom served for some years: Seiji Ozawa, James Levine, and Christoph Eschenbach. All in all, quite a group of musical notables.
Fritz Reiner, in 1953, inherited a very fine orchestra. It was not yet a great orchestra but he proceeded to quickly make it so. It was unmatched in flexibility and variety.
Jean Martinon came on the scene in 1964, which was an unfortunate time. In orchestras throughout the United States there was bickering between management, the musicians' union, and the players. Martinon had to face these problems and yet maintain the high standards of the orchestra, which he did.
These conditions were abating in 1969 when Georg Solti assumed the music directorship. Solti made use of the orchestra's greatness to advance his own world reputation, but at the same time he took the orchestra with him in this venture, thereby making it an internationally recognized icon. It was an outstanding marriage.
An enigma was Daniel Barenboim. He was a frequent guest conductor in the '70s and '80s. We made many recordings with him in those years: Bruckner's complete symphonies, the Schumann symphonies, etc. He showed us that he was a magnificent pianist and a fine musician. We enjoyed him, as did the audiences. As a guest conductor, he was pleasant and productive. Although other artists were considered for the musical directorship after Solti, it seemed natural to most of us that Barenboim was the best choice. He was hired. But the music director Barenboim did not have the same persona that we had known for the past twenty years when he was a guest conductor.
Fritz Reiner
Dr. Reiner, as we had to address him, was a great musician and a wonderful conductor. He did instill fear in the orchestra, but perhaps that was what made us so attentive. It was said that he was a tyrant. He was not alone in that. It was the modus operandi of the day. Toscanini was a tyrant, as were Szell, Koussevitzky, Klemperer, and so on. Orchestra musicians had no say about their working conditions. Tenure didn't exist, so there was no job security. In the early '60s orchestras finally responded by forming representative committees and demanding more union backing. This story later.
Reiner always had to test a new player in the orchestra for musicianship and personality. Soon after I joined the orchestra in 1957 he scheduled Symphony no. 3, the Eroica, by Beethoven. In the last a movement there is a rather difficult flute solo that enters abruptly. At the first of the three concerts, Thursday evening, a few measures before this solo I gestured discreetly with my flute, hoping I could get the other woodwind players to hold the tempo so that when the solo came up I could play it with ease. Dr. Reiner took note of this and immediately began to push the tempo. Needless to say, the orchestra followed him instead of me. When we arrived at the solo the tempo was quite fast. I played it. It was fine. Friday night's concert came. Several measures before the solo Reiner began to aggressively push the tempo. By the time we got to the flute solo it was outrageously fast. I just gritted my teeth, and played it!
At Saturday evening's concert I saw Reiner on the podium waiting for the moment. He had probably plotted his scheme the whole day. He started the last movement at a supremely fast tempo and proceeded to push from there, a little here, a little more there. By the time we arrived at the solo the speed was ridiculous! This made me angry, so I gathered my focus, closed my eyes, and just played the damn thing. I will say, to Dr. Reiner's credit, that when the solo ended he looked over at me and gave me a large salute with one of his hands. Nevertheless, it was a frightening experience.
A few months later we were recording A Night on Bare Mountain, by Mussorgsky. It ends with a beautiful, pastoral flute solo, which to me signifies the redemption that follows the fracas with the demons on Bare Mountain. I loved this solo and wanted to be properly expressive. At the rehearsal I played it thus. Reiner stopped and banged his baton again and again on the wood of his podium. "No, no," he said. "In tempo. In TEMPO!" I was hurt and angry, since I felt that I had done a lovely job on the solo. We did it again. This time I played quite loudly and absolutely in tempo, accenting all the beats and looking at him defiantly. He didn't say a word, but one side of his mouth curled up into a bemused smile. He rather liked it that I had passed his personality test with a bit of ego. I must say, even after all these years, that that recording sounds beautiful. I was expressive, but perhaps not quite as free as in the rehearsal.
Another Mussorgsky incident occurred in Pictures at an Exhibition. One of our percussion players was ill so an outside player was hired, a fine percussionist from the Lyric Opera Orchestra. He came to the rehearsal and played tam-tam. At a climactic peak in the piece, Reiner stopped and mumbled softly to the player, "I can't hear the tam-tam." The percussion section was situated at the rear of the stage and often had trouble getting the word from the podium up front.
The nervous player responded, "Excuse me, Dr. Reiner, I can't hear you." Reiner answered, ever so slightly louder, "I can't hear the tam-tam." The fellow then said quite fervently, "Dr. Reiner, I can't hear you." Reiner then yelled, in the most clamorous voice that we had ever experienced, "I CAN'T HEAR THE TAM-TAM!" The player was so startled and shaken up that, as an unconscious reaction, he hit the tam-tam as hard as he possibly could! There was an incredible cacophony of sound. The rest of the orchestra players grabbed their ears, to plug them against the noise.
Reiner waited until the sound had echoed away. Then he looked to the back of the stage and said, very slowly, "I hear eet now. OUT!" That "out" meant that the guy was fired. He was out; he left the stage.
At one time the orchestra had Wednesday morning rehearsals at 9 am instead of the usual 10 am hour. I was living in a suburb then, River Forest. I usually drove into town. On one Wednesday I had trouble getting my car started and arrived late for the rehearsal. Reiner stopped the music and watched me slink to my flute chair in the center of the stage. "Ver vas you?" he said. I answered, "I'm sorry to be late, Dr. Reiner, but my car broke down." He looked at me for quite some time with his steely stare. Finally he spoke, with a sour tone: "Don't let it break down again."
Once a new player passed all of Reiner's tests he left you pretty much alone, as long as you continued to play well. He was even quite generous with his nods and smiles and bows. It wasn't all tyranny.
Reiner was famous for his small beat: the vest-pocket beat, it was called. Much of the time the orchestra couldn't see any beat, and the audience definitely didn't either. He conducted this way purposefully, believing that if the players had to pay more attention to see the beat, they would then be more attentive to the music that was being made by the director and other members of the orchestra. The concerts were generally wonderful, with a high musical moment in each one. At that climactic place in every concert Reiner would raise his arm over his head. All hell would break loose in the orchestra that had been playing so carefully with the small beat throughout the concert. That was the most exciting time of the evening. The audience always left the concert hall talking about that moment.
Because of a heart condition, Reiner had a much-diminished schedule the last few years of his tenure. He left Chicago in 1962 and died in November of 1963, a week before the death of President Kennedy. The wags in the music business tell that Reiner raised a storm when he arrived in the heavens because the assassination had stolen press coverage from him. Out of spite, they say, he even fired two of his pallbearers.
Making jokes about autocratic behavior is a way of relieving our tension. Nevertheless, everyone always agreed that Reiner's concerts were the absolute best presentations: musical, exciting, and expertly performed. There was no one equal to him at that time, nor is there now.
Jean Martinon
If any conductor faced insurmountable odds in taking over a music directorship, it was Jean Martinon when he came to Chicago in 1963. This was the period when orchestras all over the United States were organizing themselves to fight the dictatorial treatment by managements. Chicago musicians had extra weight to bear because the very man who had founded the American Federation of Musicians, James Petrillo, was from Chicago. Theoretically, this should have given us an edge in our managerial disputes, but it appeared to us, rightly or wrongly, as if Mr. Petrillo was indulging the orchestra management instead of helping "his" musicians.
Uppermost on the turbulent scene was the president of the board of trustees of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Eric Oldberg. He was used to the autocratic ways of management and was against the new idea of a players' committee, to be elected by the orchestra members to represent them to the management and to the union. To carry out his wishes, Oldberg hired as manager a second-string critic from a Chicago newspaper, Seymour Raven. Degrading events for the musicians followed one after the other.
Jean Martinon, not familiar with the United States, had to deal with these situations between the feuding parties yet at the same time attempt to produce fine music with the orchestra. At the beginning of his third season, the atmosphere was so heated and hostile that he had no choice but to fire Seymour Raven. This didn't help Martinon's relationship with Eric Oldberg. In addition, Raven's colleague on the newspaper immediately began writing negative reviews of Martinon's concerts, beginning with the very next one after Raven's dismissal. Formerly the notices had all been glowing — so much for the objectivity of the press.
Jean Martinon was a gentleman and a good conductor. He was not a show-off. He had a genuine love of music and tried to present it in an honest fashion. Some of the musicians didn't understand Martinon's civilized manner, since they had dealt with the attitude of Fritz Reiner for ten years. They found it difficult to lose their fear of the podium. A few others misinterpreted his gentlemanly behavior as weakness and attempted to promote themselves by defying his rightful musical authority. This was not a happy time for the orchestra or for Jean Martinon.
Despite the turmoil, the concerts were generally very rewarding. In particular I remember a glorious performance of Mahler's Symphony no. 10, in the first Deryck Cooke reconstruction of Mahler's sketches. These concerts of May 1966 were recorded for radio, and then issued as a CD many years later, in 1990. The next year there was a great concert with Eileen Farrell as soprano soloist in scenes from Wagner operas. Also on the program was Martinon's own Fourth Symphony, which had been commissioned by the Chicago Symphony. This was later recorded on RCA Records, coupled with Peter Mennin's Symphony no. 7.
Martinon was not well known in the United States during his first few years in Chicago, so RCA had concerns about recording with him. However, this feeling soon changed and we made thirteen records with him, encompassing twenty-one different works. Included on the list are Ravel's Daphnis and Chloe suite no. 2, Mother Goose, and Rhapsodie espagnole; Bartok's Miraculous Mandarin; Nielsen's Symphony no. 4; Frank Martin's Concerto for seven winds; and one with Benny Goodman as soloist in the two Weber Clarinet Concerti.
Since he was a composer, Martinon was aware of the contemporary music scene around the world and expanded the orchestra's repertoire and vision by introducing several outstanding compositions. But, most important, he maintained the glory of the Reiner orchestra, which certainly helped Solti when he took over in 1969. Finally, after five seasons, Jean Martinon had had enough of the turmoil. He left in 1968, going to conductorial posts in Paris and The Hague, Holland. Jean Martinon died in Paris in 1976.
Georg Solti
After Martinon's departure, Irwin Hoffman filled the position of temporary music director for one year. He then left to take over the Louisville Orchestra. Georg Solti arrived on the scene in 1969 with fanfare and ballyhoo, shouting to the city, "I am a great conductor. If you don't like me, I will leave!" I believe that this was the right approach to Chicago at that time. Solti was not about to take any of the treatment that Martinon had endured.
However, most of the problems had abated by this time, especially with the accession of the new president of the board of directors, Louis Sudler. Mr. Sudler was a prominent real-estate mogul in Chicago and a baritone singer with a lovely voice. He loved music and he loved the orchestra. He hired as general manager John Edwards, formerly with the Pittsburgh Symphony and the National Symphony of Washington, D.C. John was a fine man who also was a music lover. The president of the union had also been replaced. This team, and Solti as music director, established an entirely different atmosphere on the stage of Orchestra Hall. Solti was a bit anxious at first, but when he heard the orchestra it became clear to him that Martinon had maintained the high standard and that the musicians were cooperative. He relaxed and proceeded to put his stamp on the orchestra, in a mild way at first, gaining more stimulus as time passed.
He was determined that the Chicago Symphony Orchestra should become known worldwide. This endeavor was launched with an East Coast tour in 1970. The Carnegie Hall concert in New York featuring Mahler's Fifth Symphony was hailed as the musical event of the year and inaugurated the identification of "Solti/Chicago" as a winning combination. The orchestra's first European tour was set up for 1971, a six-week venture.
Upon arriving in Europe, we were surprised to note that the people there didn't really know Solti that well. Our principal guest conductor, Carlo Maria Giulini, who shared the concerts with Solti, was very well known and loved. Needless to say, this didn't please the maestro. In any case, the tour was a rousing success. Audiences all over Europe were stunned at the musical and personal impact that we made. (See chapter 3, "Touring the World," for the full story.) When we arrived back in Chicago the city gave us a grand parade down Michigan Avenue. It was quite an event.
The response to this tour, coupled with the reception of our Carnegie Hall concert in 1970, awakened the world to the existence of a great musical force in Chicago, Illinois. Time magazine put out an issue with Solti on the cover with the headline "The Hottest Baton in the West." It contained an article glorifying Solti and the orchestra.
This warmth and appreciation inspired us to try harder to be even better in the ensuing years. Solti and the orchestra had a fine symbiotic relationship that is difficult to explain. Some conductors get along with some orchestras and not others. We had a good match with Solti, and he with us.
He was perceptive and quick. If you went into his office to discuss an issue, you would summarize your speech so as to not take too much of his time. But it was amazing! After only ten words of the twenty-five you had planned, he knew exactly what was being asked. He stopped you and said, "Oh yes, my dear, I understand. Just do this...." That was it, he was right, and you did it.
He was a brilliant conductor who achieved a sound of great clarity from the orchestra with his incisive beat. He was therefore a perfect director for the likes of Mahler, Strauss, Bruckner, and Wagner, whose music can sometimes sound a little thick.
Maybe as an antidote to this, he loved Debussy's Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun. He always called me in to discuss this work when we were about to perform it. He referred to it as Debussy's Concerto for flute. We did it numerous times in Chicago and recorded it twice. We played it on a Japanese tour, on two East Coast tours, on two European tours, on the Russian tour, on a West Coast tour, and on and on. Finally, when we had played it in every conceivable city as part of the regular printed program, he began to use it as an encore on the tours. This was problematic, as it is difficult for the flutist to play a sensitive work like the Faun after a long symphonic program. But we encored it everywhere. I honestly believe that I have played this piece more than any flutist ever has, or ever will.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from The Right Place, The Right Time! by Donald Peck. Copyright © 2007 Donald Peck. Excerpted by permission of Indiana University Press.
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Table of Contents
ContentsPrelude: Etude on a Life in MusicAcknowledgments1. Music Directors2. Staff Conductors3. Touring the World4. "And how was the tour?"5. Guest Conductors6. Learning a New Language; or, The Sayings of the Conductors7. Nights at the Opera8. Singers9. Knowing Some Soloists10. Making Recordings11. Solo Dates12. Outside Jobs13. Rondo FinaleAppendix 1. Orchestral RecordingsAppendix 2. Opera PerformancesAppendix 3. Peck Concerti with the Chicago Symphony OrchestraAppendix 4. Non–Chicago Symphony Solo DatesIndexWhat People are Saying About This
"A valuable memoir by someone with a unique vision of what it was like to perform in an American orchestra in the 20th century."--(Mary Ellyn Hutton, Music Writer, The Cincinnati Post)