'So when are they going to find someone to replace that guyBarenboom?" I am asked that question, with one or another variantson the pronunciation of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra's now-formermusic director, several times a week.
These inquiries come from CSO subscribers, journalisticcolleagues in other cities, even taxicab drivers who have never beeninside Orchestra Hall -- but this question almost never comes frommusicians.
That's because serious musicians -- including the 100-plusmembers of the CSO -- know that finding a new music director for oneof the world's top orchestras is not comparable to finding a newcoach for a sports team or a new CEO for a retail chain. It's noteven comparable to hiring a new head of a major art museum or ageneral director of an opera house, because those individuals,however talented and hard-working they might be, don't have to paintthe pictures in the galleries or conduct the operas from theorchestra pit.
A music director has to provide an impossible-to-quantify mixtureof artistic leadership -- technical, social, psychological -- withorganizational competence, political judgment, a marketablepersonality and vision, and in the best instances some sense ofcivic connection and responsibility.
"These are not the kind of things you can just print out on a jobdescription," says William Strong, the Morgan Stanley investmentbanker and former chairman of the CSO Association, who chairs theorchestra's ongoing music director search committee.
The committee includes CSO trustees, senior staff and orchestraplayers in roughly equal measure. Its members' names have alwaysbeen disclosed publicly, and it has solicited public input bycorrespondence, over the Internet and by holding some publicsessions. Under the leadership of Strong and CSO President DeborahR. Card, the committee has taken on the much broader role of askingwhat a music director needs to be in the 21st century -- a time ofunforeseen technological advances, shifting musical tastes,tremendous choices in how people spend their leisure time and extradollars, and a widespread abandonment of music education in theschools.
On top of these philosophical questions, the committee is wellaware that the availability of top-flight candidates is in itselfsubject to almost chance variables. Forty and 50 years ago, theroster of outstanding orchestra conductors, including George Szell,Fritz Reiner, Eugene Ormandy, Antal Dorati and Georg Solti -- manyof them refugees from European fascism and anti-Semitism -- wasastonishing. Today the number of such eminences might be countableon the fingers of one hand. The historical, sociological andartistic reasons for this top conductor shortage are hotly debated.
Second-tier and mid-level orchestras are seeing a trend in theother direction with so many intriguing candidates in their 30s and40s that hiring choices, in Dallas and Pittsburgh most recently,have been unpredictable and seem almost random.
"You just do not have a new Theodore Thomas or Frederick Stock orReiner or Solti or Barenboim standing around looking for a positionnow," Card says.
The conjunction of a time for a deep think after almost fourdecades of Solti surge and a Barenboimian roller-coaster ride andthe limited availability of proper candidates allowed the searchcommittee to propose an unusual solution for the time being that wasembraced by CSO trustees and players: Engage two of the world's mostesteemed conductors, each of whom has a great rapport with theorchestra and the audience, to take the lead while the thinking andlistening goes on.
Principal conductor Bernard Haitink and conductor emeritus PierreBoulez might have seemed unusual choices for these posts a whileback. But the formerly controversial Boulez built up a relationshipwith the CSO over his years as Barenboim's alter ego here, andHaitink made up for many years of absence in Chicago by finding analmost instantaneous aura of fellow feeling when he returned toOrchestra Hall last season.
"Something just connected," the Dutch maestro, 77, said. "I wishthat I could explain it to you."
While players, audiences and committee members wait to see if anysimilar connections will take place in the coming year or two, theCSO has a roster of top helmsmen (but no women) to give it a tasteof varied leadership styles and repertoire strengths. Haitink andBoulez have taken eight weeks and two Carnegie Hall tours betweenthem. Italian conductor Riccardo Muti, a generation behind the CSOmaster leaders, is one of the few at their level -- and in goodphysical health -- to be without a permanent podium today and willopen the CSO's 2007-2008 season with two weeks of subscriptionconcerts and the opening night gala followed by a very high-profileEuropean tour including three CSO debut concerts in Italy.Prognosticators point to Muti's fiery departure from Milan's LaScala opera house as a mark against him, but the end of that longand productive stewardship was much more about Italian politics andtemperament than artistic choices or music making. And at the otherend of the experience spectrum, the much sought after Venezuelanphenom, Gustavo Dudamel, still in his 20s, makes his Chicago debutin April.
Eventually, the CSO will have to make a decision: There is a needfor an overall stamp and sense of artistic direction and style. Ananointing out of the blue, without a chance for conductor,orchestra, and public and private supporters to get to know oneanother, can have disastrous or stultifying consequences as havebeen the case in Philadelphia (the in-over-his-head ChristophEschenbach) and New York (the uninspiring Lorin Maazel) in recentseasons.
The CSO leadership could still err, as well. They are, like therest of us, only human. But thus far, by taking time and attracting,connecting and reconnecting with a number of the best in the field -- and allowing these various guests to do so on their own terms --they have given some assurance to members and friends of the CSO andof great orchestral music making that a serious analysis is beingmade before any puffs of white smoke emerge from 220 South MichiganAvenue and a voice proclaims, "We have a music director!"
Andrew Patner is critic at large for WFMT-FM (98.7).
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