Superfluous Hullabaloo

Crazy Conductor Story

Royal Phil's concert marked by conductor's solo encore

By PEG GOLDBERG LONGSTRETH, Special to the Daily News
February 13, 2004

Wednesday evening's standing-room-only concert at the Philharmonic Center for the Arts, turned out to be notable, not for the concert, featuring the world renowned Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, but for the encore performance of its highly touted young conductor, Daniele Gatti, the Royal Philharmonic's music director since 1996 and also the music director at the Teatro Communale in Bologna, returned to the stage following a standing ovation at the conclusion of Beethoven's "Eroica" Symphony to — I thought mistakenly — acknowledge the accolades of the audience. Instead, this incredibly rude, ill-mannered, churlish, boorish young conductor, tripped over his enormous ego and, in the process, managed to insult and alienate an entire, enthusiastic, respectful audience who had paid nearly $100 a ticket for the evening.

He returned to lecture the audience. In so doing he confirmed my growing suspicions of his conduct during the evening: Maestro Gatti is a graduate of the Bobby Knight School of Social Diplomacy. That's right. Gatti, without benefit of a microphone and with a heavy Italian accent, let everyone in the hall know ... know what, exactly? I am
going to paraphrase his comments, but I believe he essentially said the following, since others, including Myra Daniels, the president and CEO of the Philharmonic Center for the Arts, with whom I spoke Thursday morning, have confirmed my interpretation of Gatti's comments:
The Royal Philharmonic is an important, world-class orchestra. They have
performed all over the world. For the past two weeks they have played nonstop performances. They have never played under such trying circumstances. Gatti went on:
The Phil's acoustics suck. The stage sucks. The placement of his orchestra on stage sucked.

While trying to make out his comments, I glanced up at Daniels' box, fully expecting to see her stand and fall over the balcony in shock. I am certain any number of pacemakers in the decidedly older audience went into overdrive, as person after person reacted with shock. A number of persons in the audience made the mistake of tittering, not certain what he was saying or why smoke was coming from his ears. He stopped the laughter dead in its tracks, said, "This is no joke. I am very serious,"and a hush came over the audience.

His tirade over, he exited, as did, finally, the members of the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra who, prior to last evening, had performed here on three other occasions since Gatti's appointment in 1996. People who had heard right were shocked and outraged. A number of them
sought out the ushers to voice their outrage over Gatti's conduct. People stopped me and were calling Thursday morning to ask if I had ever seen anything like that. One woman called Daniels to comment: "We honored him with applause and a standing ovation, and he told us we were idiots." Many asked, rightly so, if there were a problem with the acoustics or the stage, what the audience was supposed to do about it?

Indeed.

Reflecting back, I should have known it was going to be a strange evening. There were hints — a portent, as it turns out, of things to come: Gatti failed to utter a simple sentence at the beginning of the concert, informing concertgoers the order of presentation was being switched, which left more than half the audience sitting through the entire first number (which was supposed to be Saint Saën's Cello Concerto) wondering where the cellist was. In fact, the first hint Gatti was not a happy camper occurred when, at the conclusion of the first movement of the first number, many people in the audience committed a mortal sin: They applauded. Let's face it. Applause between movements is considered a sign of ignorance and poor breeding by many music snobs. There is nothing unique about music audiences in Naples applauding, as opposed to the rest of the world. They do it everywhere. Even in New York. OK, so it would be preferable if they hired someone to come out with an applause card, to eliminate any uncertainty about when it is all right to express enthusiasm at a classical concert.
But in the greater scheme of things, given so little to applaud in today's world, is this really worth getting your dander up? Wouldn't you rather they applaud at an inopportune moment rather than boo? But that wasn't bad enough in Gatti's eyes: At the same time, at the conclusion of that movement, in accordance with the Phil's policy, an usher quietly seated six adults on the far right side of the auditorium. They created no disturbance whatsoever, nor is there anything unusual about such a seating policy. Gatti chose that precise moment to turn toward them, fix them with his best Bobby Knight stare — you know the look: the one where the general faces you with his best stare, utters not a single word and, in the process, strikes terror in your heart — and waited until they had been seated to proceed with the second movement.
By now, everyone in the hall had turned to see what the "problem" was, when their seating otherwise would not have been noticed by 95 percent of the auditorium. Believe me, no one applauded during the remainder of movements in the
evening's three numbers. Gatti, without ever saying a word or turning to acknowledge the existence of the audience, anticipated the possible applause and shushed them with a hand movement behind his back.

In the midst of all these by now cumulative little signs the maestro was having a bad hair day of monumental proportions, he briefly stopped the
performance of Beethoven's "Eroica," turned toward the concertmistress, glowered, and the entire violin section got up and physically closed ranks, moving so close to the edge of the stage, the hapless fifth violinist had to grab his chair as it toppled off the stage.

That said, I am going to sum up the concert by saying it was very good. I am going to tell you the audience was attentive, polite and enthusiastic following the conclusion of each number. I am going to tell you Silvia
Chiesa, a passionate young cellist with whom I frankly was unfamiliar, gave a solid performance during the Saint-Saens piece, and I hope we have the opportunity to hear her perform again under less stressful circumstances. Then I am going to tell you, since so many people have called to ask if I have ever seen anything like what happened last evening, that I have not. I have seen many gaffes and disasters on stage or during performances in my lifetime: I have seen children wet themselves during their student recital; a graduate student in voice (whom I was accompanying) suddenly vomit all over everything during her doctoral recital; an organ short out and go totally silent during the procession of an ultra-socialite's wedding. I have seen parts break or fall off instruments. Reeds split. Strings break. Professionals forget their parts and flee the stage. I have seen musicians topple off stage; chairs break; batons suddenly take leave and fly through the air. But until Wednesday, I have never seen a highly touted, internationally much heralded conductor blow his stack, come back on stage following a standing ovation and berate the audience. Gatti could not be reached for comment on Thursday.

In the midst of all this post-concert shock and outrage, I had a sudden epiphany: In the five-plus years since my husband and I relocated to Naples, we always continued to think of Indiana and its musical venues as
home. Wednesday night I became a full-fledged Neapolitan, proud of the wonderful Philharmonic Center for the Arts, proud of the tremendous growth its orchestra has exhibited since we moved here. Thrilled with many of its world-class guest performers, of all the musical riches this community offers. And in the process, I was ready to do battle with this pretentious, angry little twit who ruined a wonderful evening of music for many of the concertgoers. He was unhappy with the setting? It was beneath him? I don't think he will have to fret about those problems anymore. I doubt there is a snowball's chance in Hell he will ever be invited back.

And you think classical music is dull!

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Speaking of Beethoven (and others) this is an interesting performance...

Steph
11:42 AM [+]