Leonard Slatkin Is An Amazing Man.........

[stenka razin]

From the New York Times with your comments appreciated:

'Leonard Slatkin, the music director of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, has agreed to donate four weeks of concerts next season to help out with its financial difficulties, the orchestra said Friday.

Mr. Slatkin will perform for 16 weeks in 2010-11 and will reduce his salary by an undisclosed amount. The orchestra also said Mr. Slatkin will extend his contract by two more seasons, through 2012-13. The orchestra said it ran a deficit of about $3.8 million last season.'



When you are faced with a life threatening event, like a heart attack, as Slatkin was, you reevaluate the important things in life. At this point in his life, Slatkin is seeing way beyond his own personal gains. This unselfish gesture will affect a countless number of people. I cannot say that Mr. Slatkin would not have made this amazingly generous move, if he had not had a heart attack. But, I would like to think something good comes out of a serious illness.

[diegobueno]

I still have to wonder why did he leave the National Symphony?

[Lance]

Was the departure due to some "problem" with a "percussionist," or did that happen in St. Louis?

I still have to wonder why did he leave the National Symphony?

[Chalkperson]

He had an affair with the percussionist Evelyn Glennie, maybe that is what you are thinking of...

Was the departure due to some "problem" with a "percussionist," or did that happen in St. Louis?

I still have to wonder why did he leave the National Symphony?

[Lance]

Yes, that's the "problem" I was alluding to without mentioning names. Apparently that event is well documented and realised everywhere these days.

He had an affair with the percussionist Evelyn Glennie, maybe that is what you are thinking of...

Was the departure due to some "problem" with a "percussionist," or did that happen in St. Louis?

I still have to wonder why did he leave the National Symphony?

[Chalkperson]

Yes, that's the "problem" I was alluding to without mentioning names. Apparently that event is well documented and realised everywhere these days.

I got it from Wikipedia...

[Lance]

Well, all I can can about that is that Mr. Slatkin has good taste!

Yes, that's the "problem" I was alluding to without mentioning names. Apparently that event is well documented and realised everywhere these days.

I got it from Wikipedia...

[NancyElla]

Evidently Lenny is taking his new band on the road. Visiting my mother in Florida this week, I was surprised this morning to open the local paper, the Gulf Coast, and see Slatkin's photo on the front of the second section. Evidently, I just missed him down here. The paper contained a review of a concert given by Slatkin and the DSO last Saturday night in Sarasota, FL. On the program, Berlioz's Le Corsair, Barber's Concerto for Cello and Orchestra, and Rachmaninov's Symphony No. 2. Of that last piece, the reivewer, Richard Storm, wrote "Snobbish audiences may consider this a guilty pleasure. Those more tuned in to real life just relax and love it, as did the welcome contingent of younger people in the audience." Slatkin must have some connections in this part of Florida; I shared a flight with him from Tampa to DC a few years ago.

[maestrob]

Slatkin is already one of my favorite conductors. That he has made this gesture can only enhance his reputation.

[pizza]

I could never understand why he left St. Louis. He built that orchestra into one of the finest in the country. I have many St. Louis SO recordings that I consider the equal of any, including a great all-Gershwin twofer on Vox, and a Mahler 2nd on Telarc that's right up there with the very best of them.

[Chalkperson]

I could never understand why he left St. Louis. He built that orchestra into one of the finest in the country. I have many St. Louis SO recordings that I consider the equal of any, including a great all-Gershwin twofer on Vox, and a Mahler 2nd on Telarc that's right up there with the very best of them.

The Gershwin, Prokofiev's Alexander Nevsky and Ivan the Terrible discs and the Mussorgsky/Borodin release are all on Mobile Fidelity SACD's, all are really great discs...

[Modernistfan]

I have many of those CDs, but not on the extremely expensive Mobile Fidelity transfers; they were on Vox at about 1/5 the price of Mobile Fidelity. I still have most of them, including the Gershwin (unbeatable!), a set including one of the rare recordings of Prokofiev's "Lieutenant Kije" with the vocal parts left in, and another set including some really rare Rachmaninoff pieces from early in his composing career. These are all late-analogue recordings with the St. Louis Symphony with the excellent Aubort-Nickrenz recording team. I believe that most, if not all, of those recordings are still readily available. (I have always maintained that Slatkin is underrated; if his family had stayed in Russia and he had been born there under the name of Leonid Zlatkine, he probably would have had an even bigger career.) In any event, I am looking to new recordings from him and Detroit on Naxos.

[NancyElla]

I still have to wonder why did he leave the National Symphony?

This was the Washington Post's take on it at the time. . .http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/ar ... tml?sub=AR

[diegobueno]

I attended Slatkin's last concert (I think it was the last) as director of the National Symphony. I wanted to hear him do Copland's 3rd, since I so much admired his St. Louis recording of the complete Billy the Kid and Rodeo. It was pretty good, though he restored some measures from the coda of the finale that Copland had wisely cut. There were a couple of mishaps in the performance. In the middle of the 2nd movement the oboe entered several measures early on an important solo, and the clarinet very nearly followed suit. Also in Beethoven's Leonore no. 3 he had the whole 1st violin section play the presto scale-fest that starts the coda, and that was a disaster.

[THEHORN]

Slatkin had already spent ten seasons in Washington, which is about average time for a conductor to stay as MD.
I didn't have a chance to hear any of his concerts there, so I can't evaluate his tenure in Washington, but even some of his supporters ,such as former Washington Post music critic Tim Page,
were having reservations about his work there, so when the opportunity to go to Detroit came, he jumped at the chance.
As far as I know, Slatkin made only one commercial studio recording with the National Symphony, music by Corigliano, if I remember correctly, which is unfortunate after all the fine recordings he made in St.Louis.
It's wonderful that Naxos is now recording him in Detroit, and I look forward to hearing these .

[Wallingford]

Apparently, the NSO guys weren't the only ones fed up: the BBC Symphony, a few years later, thought he was getting on their case.

But he IS a great guy for donating his services for four weeks.

[Chalkperson]

Slatkin had already spent ten seasons in Washington, which is about average time for a conductor to stay as MD.
I didn't have a chance to hear any of his concerts there, so I can't evaluate his tenure in Washington, but even some of his supporters ,such as former Washington Post music critic Tim Page,
were having reservations about his work there, so when the opportunity to go to Detroit came, he jumped at the chance.
As far as I know, Slatkin made only one commercial studio recording with the National Symphony, music by Corigliano, if I remember correctly, which is unfortunate after all the fine recordings he made in St.Louis.
It's wonderful that Naxos is now recording him in Detroit, and I look forward to hearing these .

His new Rach 2 is pretty good...for six bucks...

[Corlyss_D]

Slatkin set a great example for orchestral musicians as well as other orchestras' conductors with his gesture: sacrifice a little now to keep the business alive for a while. It wouldn't have to be a month at a time - a week here, a week there, and pretty soon you have 4 weeks.

[Wallingford]

As far as I know, Slatkin made only one commercial studio recording with the National Symphony, music by Corigliano, if I remember correctly, which is unfortunate after all the fine recordings he made in St.Louis.

There's also a CD (also on BMG) of Prokofiev's Sixth & Love For 3 Oranges suite; as well as a disc of Schwandtner's Concerto For Percussion with Glennie, and one of Kamen's New Moon In Old Moon's Arms.