Tuning in…
Tuning in…
Desert Island Discs
Presented by Roy Plomley
Conductor and former child prodigy, known for leading the New York Philharmonic and Vienna State Opera.
Eight records
La traviataFavourite
And he wrote the most glorious music. throwing away just a few notes and those notes meaning Well, just just words to the interpreter and and to the public. The entrance of Germain. Um in the second act of ... just a little trill in the strings, unison passage, and you feel the the drama, the darkness falling
The keepsakes
No book or luxury recorded for this episode.
In conversation
Presenter asks
You began studying the violin when you were very young. Was this your idea, or or were you put to it?
Well, I rather think that I was put to it, though I uh enjoyed listening to music, what little music I heard at that time. I had a cousin ... actually, three years my senior who played the violin and I was rather jealous and, um, I thought, well, Perhaps I could have a go at it too. But uh I think the fact that I found A violin at home [and] was provided with a teacher ... surely there must have been some scheme ... A foot to get me going in musical channels.
Presenter asks
Now, you conducted an orchestra for the first time when you were very young indeed. How old were you [and] how did this come about?
Actually I was up quite eight. ... my father had me studying the piano at that time and I was able to pick out to the tune of the Surprise Symphony and the piano ... And um he bought me an orchestral score and I was fascinated to find that what I had been playing was really A reduction for piano ... of a work written for large ... Symphony Orchestra. And uh I started to investigate the score and uh learn the orchestration and uh eventually I was provided with a recording and I started to give cues about the room. ... my father concluded that I must have talent for conducting and I was brought to um fairly well known uh musician who lived in Los Angeles at that time, who thought that there might be something in it and agreed to teach me and um I soon found myself conducting uh the March Slav ... at a rehearsal.
The recording
Timestamps play the recording from that turn
Presenter
This download is the only extract the BBC has of this edition of Desert Island Discs. The presenter was Roy Plumley.
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What did Sir Thomas say about Harpsycourt? Well, very naughty fellow he
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He said that um
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The sound of the harpsichord reminded him of two skeletons making love on a tin roof.
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Very nicely put. Uh mister Marcel.
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You were born in France, educated in America. Yes, that's correct. My father was abroad.
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uh studying singing and uh my parents lived in Paris uh for four years, twenty eight to thirty two.
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You began studying the violin when you were very young. Was this your idea, or or were you put to it?
Presenter
Well, I rather think that I was put to it, though I uh enjoyed listening to music, what little music I heard at that time. I had a cousin.
Presenter
actually, three years my senior who played the violin and I was rather jealous and, um, I thought, well,
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Perhaps I could have a go at it too. But uh I think the fact that I found
Presenter
A violin at home.
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was provided with a teacher. Was that precisely accidental? Uh surely there must have been some scheme.
Presenter
A foot to get me going in musical channels. Now, you conducted an orchestra for the first time when you were very young indeed. How old were you?
Presenter
Actually I was up quite eight. How did this come about?
Presenter
Well, my father
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had me studying the piano at that time and I was able to pick out
Presenter
to the tune of the Surprise Symphony and the piano, you know, bling, bling, blink, bling, blink, blink, blink
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And um he bought me an orchestral score and I was fascinated to find that what I had been playing was really
Presenter
A reduction for piano.
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of a work written for large um
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Symphony Orchestra.
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And uh I started to investigate the score and uh learn
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the orchestration and uh eventually I was provided with a recording and I started to give cues about the room. Yeah, we had a German shepherd and he was
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Fizz Violin section and uh
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Various pots and pans represented the brass and so forth and
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Um my father concluded that I must have
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talent for conducting and I was brought to um
Presenter
fairly well known uh musician who lived in Los Angeles at that time, who thought that there might be something in it and agreed to teach me and um
Presenter
I soon found myself conducting uh the March Slav.
Presenter
Yeah, at a rehearsal.
Presenter
Rehearsal of the WPA Orchestra, that's Workers' Project Orchestra, sort of an American phenomenon that grew out of the uh Depression. Yes. You had a career as a as a child prodigy. You conducted a number of the principal American orchestras, including the NBC Symphony Orchestra at the invitation of Toscanini. How did the musicians react to being directed by a child?
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Well, they were, generally speaking, very cooperative. Um most musicians understand that um
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The musical gift is a precocious one.
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And that uh if a child doesn't have a good ear memory and and uh is not able to d display it at an early age, he's really not
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destined to become a musician. Uh most musicians actually who play in orchestras.
Lorin Maazel
Yeah.
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We're uh
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playing an instrument uh as a child and so I was always treated very sympathetically. There were uh unfortunate moments. There's a famous story of a MBC coming to rehearsal, the first rehearsal, with lollipops, you see, and uh all wearing short trousers, you know, that kind of thing. But uh I did know my business, I knew my scores very well and I was musical and I was a apparently a good little conductor and and uh did my job well and uh
Presenter
Professionals uh appreciate professionals.
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Well, then you had a spell as an orchestra musician. This must be essential experience for a future conductor, do you think? Very essential. I think it's the only bona fide school for conducting. Hm. You studied in the University of Pittsburgh. What subjects did you read?
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I studied
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Philosophy?
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History, Economics, Languages.
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When did your second career as a conductor start?
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Well, I received a Fulbright scholarship.
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Um to go to Italy.
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uh to do some research in old Italian music.
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While doing this research in Milan I received a call from
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An agent in Rome who had uh received some material, some publicity material about me, uh, to the effect that I had conducted uh uh a Gershwin piano concerto.
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a work which was on a programme to be given in Catania, Sicily.
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the conductor of which fell ill before
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the first rehearsal just hours before the first rehearsal and uh the connection was made and I received the
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I mean, in the agent's mind, I received the call, Well, you do know this concerto. Can you take over the concert? and I said, Well, yes. All right, what's on the rest of the programme? And I knew those works as well, with the exception of the Bottered Bride, overture which I'd never conducted, and I learned that on the train.
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though I'm afraid I missed the train, the first train.
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And uh yes gave you more time. Well uh there was no sleeper and it's a seventeen or used to be a seventeen hour trip.
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And um I just sat in the compartment learned the score, grab in time for the dress rehearsal.
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And the uh I'm afraid the director of the theatre fell into a deep faint when he saw me, because I was twenty two and I'm afraid I looked about seventeen.
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And uh at that time the youth barrier had not been broken.
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No conductor was younger than ninety three and three quarters. Uh and uh just was absolutely terrified and uh
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Um perhaps because he expected the worst, he was pleased with the result, pleased enough to uh recommend me to the Rome Radio.
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which engaged me for a recording session the following spring.
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And uh things went on from there. Yes. You were the first American to be invited to conduct Wagner at Bayreuth. What was the opera? Loewingen.
Presenter
And this was before you were thirty.
Presenter
Just thirty. Mm. Nineteen sixty. You were elected to freelance for quite a few years. There must be a great temptation for the successful freelance conductor to overdo it, to find himself being talked into taking on far too much work over far too big an area. Yes, well, uh I
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freelanced, as it were, in the fifties. There were no Jets then and uh
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Planes were rather.
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Uh tires and weren't they? Even the super
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what were they called? Uh super fortresses, yeah. And uh it took a while to get there and it was um an experience and uh so my flying about was
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Um
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Well, not terribly um rapid. And got me some place and I stayed there long enough to absorb something. Nowadays, I'm afraid uh the jet is um turning our younger musicians into
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They're flying saucers and uh the edge gets worn off very rapidly and uh
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Most singers, not to mention conductors and many instrumentalists, are simply flown out.
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by their thirtieth year. And uh that's why in nineteen sixty five I decided to associate myself with the Berlin Opera House as uh their artistic uh director. Yes. And I've stayed there for many years and uh
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Tried to leave.
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uh something of an imprint upon their work and um
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decided to give a great deal of my time to that organization and uh
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It was certainly well worth the effort. How many new productions did you mount there in that five years, was it? Uh well, I'm completing my sixth year now. And I'm leaving them at this the end of the season, but uh I shall have given uh
Presenter
18 new productions there, though I uh took over many other operas already in the repertoire, which don't count as a new production. You conducted at the Metropolitan New York at the Scala, but not yet at Cotton Garden. No. Uh I hope to have the pleasure of working with that theater sometime before 1990. Now you're married to a concert pianist, Israel and Margalit. Do you work much together? Do you have that opportunity?
Lorin Maazel
I have
Presenter
She's um a great artist and um
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I've enjoyed working with her.
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Uh enormously. We play uh duets at home. Uh she goes on concert tours of her own.
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I don't think that a a woman having a profession uh um
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makes her any less of of a wife, quite the contrary, I think, uh, well, you know, the uh Ghibran sense of of what a marriage is all about, uh, two pillars supporting a common structure.
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And I think uh a woman is uh is an equal pillar in that structure and and uh she must be creative and and be able to stimulate uh just as as the man.
Presenter
Now you're very much an all round conductor, a very wide range. Is there any one composer for whom you have a very particular affection? You wake up in the morning and say, Oh, good, I'm going to conduct Good Old So and So tonight. Who's good old so and so? Well, that's mister Verde, indeed.
Presenter
Yes. And he wrote the most glorious music.
Presenter
throwing away just a few notes and those notes meaning
Presenter
Well, just just words to the interpreter and and to the public. The entrance of Germain.
Presenter
Um in the uh second act of
Presenter
Yeah.
Presenter
Um, just a little trill in the strings, unison passage, and you feel the the drama, the darkness falling as as Papa comes to
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Tell Miss Violetta that she better take her hands off that good bourgeois son of Germain, you know, and and uh just
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Leave the respectable name of a family.
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uh as it stood before this loose woman uh smudged it up, you say, with all sorts of dreadful goings on. And it's all there in in in eight notes. Who can do that to day?
Presenter asks
How did the musicians react to being directed by a child?
Well, they were, generally speaking, very cooperative. Um most musicians understand that um The musical gift is a precocious one. And that uh if a child doesn't have a good ear memory and and uh is not able to d display it at an early age, he's really not destined to become a musician. ... I was always treated very sympathetically. There were uh unfortunate moments. There's a famous story of a MBC coming to rehearsal, the first rehearsal, with lollipops, you see, and uh all wearing short trousers, you know, that kind of thing. But uh I did know my business, I knew my scores very well and I was musical and I was a apparently a good little conductor and and uh did my job well and uh Professionals uh appreciate professionals.
Presenter asks
When did your second career as a conductor start?
Well, I received a Fulbright scholarship ... to go to Italy ... to do some research in old Italian music. While doing this research in Milan I received a call from An agent in Rome ... to the effect that I had conducted uh uh a Gershwin piano concerto ... a work which was on a programme to be given in Catania, Sicily. the conductor of which fell ill ... just hours before the first rehearsal ... and I received the ... call, Well, you do know this concerto. Can you take over the concert? and I said, Well, yes. All right, what's on the rest of the programme? And I knew those works as well, with the exception of the Bottered Bride, overture which I'd never conducted, and I learned that on the train.
Presenter asks
There must be a great temptation for the successful freelance conductor to overdo it, to find himself being talked into taking on far too much work over far too big an area.
Yes, well, uh I freelanced, as it were, in the fifties. There were no Jets then and ... Planes were rather ... tires ... Nowadays, I'm afraid uh the jet is um turning our younger musicians into They're flying saucers and uh the edge gets worn off very rapidly and uh Most singers, not to mention conductors and many instrumentalists, are simply flown out. by their thirtieth year. And uh that's why in nineteen sixty five I decided to associate myself with the Berlin Opera House as uh their artistic uh director.
Presenter asks
Now you're married to a concert pianist, Israela Margalit. Do you work much together? Do you have that opportunity?
I have ... She's um a great artist and um I've enjoyed working with her. Uh enormously. We play uh duets at home. Uh she goes on concert tours of her own. I don't think that a a woman having a profession uh um makes her any less of of a wife, quite the contrary, I think, uh, well, you know, the uh Ghibran sense of of what a marriage is all about, uh, two pillars supporting a common structure. And I think uh a woman is uh is an equal pillar in that structure and and uh she must be creative and and be able to stimulate uh just as as the man.
“most musicians understand that um The musical gift is a precocious one. And that uh if a child doesn't have a good ear memory and and uh is not able to d display it at an early age, he's really not destined to become a musician.”
“Nowadays, I'm afraid uh the jet is um turning our younger musicians into They're flying saucers and uh the edge gets worn off very rapidly and uh Most singers, not to mention conductors and many instrumentalists, are simply flown out. by their thirtieth year.”
“I don't think that a a woman having a profession uh um makes her any less of of a wife, quite the contrary, I think, uh, well, you know, the uh Ghibran sense of of what a marriage is all about, uh, two pillars supporting a common structure. And I think uh a woman is uh is an equal pillar in that structure and and uh she must be creative and and be able to stimulate uh just as as the man.”