I'm not sure where this belongs, but I guess it's bizarre and mostly off-topic enough to be here.

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And also:

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<small>[ 17 February 2004, 05:33 PM: Message edited by: Andre Yew ]</small>

Well, you're certainly right about the bizzare part! Though I guess the man is a good conductor, unless the performers were so practiced that they didn't even need direction, he doesn't seem to have all that much stage-sense. I wonder if he's ever heard the phrase "the customer is always right"? The customers seemed to think it was a fairly good performance, and while modesty is certainly a virtue, I don't think his particular type of modesty, I.E., saying the group did badly due to their accomadations, is particularly virtuous. I think this breaks some other law of virtue or something like that. All told though, in general stage terms, (and I know, having led a sub-group of a choir on live national TV! ), if something was bad, as a performer <I>it did not happen</I> until you're back in the dressing room.

He is fortunate to have pulled this childish temper tantrum in Florida and not in Italy, where he would have been the target of boos, hisses and catcalls, if not hurled projectiles. Stopping in the midst of the Eroica to reposition the violins onstage? Bush League.

Orchestras go to Florida in February in order to make an impression on the promoters, agents, and other influential operatives who winter there. (The Seattle Symphony made a circuit of Florida last February; it resulted in a Carnegie Hall appearance scheduled for this March.) Clearly, Maestro Gatti fails to comprehend his mission there.

I think that sort of lecturing is very off-putting. I attended a concert at the NC School of the Arts many years ago in which the new head of the music department turned around and glared at the audience when it applauded after the end of the first movement of a piece. He stayed there for several seconds with a very unpleasant expression.

Later that year, a different conductor had a different reaction when the audience applauded after the first movement of Brahms' 4th Symphony. It was a beautiful performance (in fact, someone exclaimed "beautiful" just before the applause started), and even the knowledgeable people joined in the applause. This conductor looked startled, but he turned around and beamed at the audience. That was a much better reaction, in my book.

I went with some friends to a bar in NY that had live Irish music, to hear Tommy Makem and the Clancy Brothers (this was also a long time ago). It was a very long bar, and a man and women at the far end of the bar (far from the stage) were chatting and laughing throughout the performance. I should think that since it was a bar, the musicians should have expected some of this, and the people really weren't even very loud, but suddenly Tommy Makem stopped the music and proceeded to lecture them, at length. He was very stern, and sounded like a very mean schoolteacher. And when the music resumed, we in the audience sat very still and looked very serious (even though I was laughing inside, as, I'm sure, were others). I thought it was quite uncalled-for, but I rather enjoyed it, because Tommy Makem had a very nice speaking voice.

<small>[ 19 February 2004, 12:38 AM: Message edited by: djb ]</small>