Word: podium
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...first test eliminated no one: each contestant transcribed from memory the score of a short composition right after he heard it played. Then, working with a list of approved works that included symphonic selections from the baroque to the contemporary, each was given the podium of the Symphony of the Air for a 15-minute tour. Half were dismissed with thanks. The preliminary rounds lasted five full days-a tense ordeal for the conductors, an exhausting one for the musicians. While the contestants conducted, Bern stein occasionally patrolled the aisles making elephant ears with his hands, the better to judge...
...Minor, a recitative and duet for tenor and soprano from Mozart's Don Giovanni. Then, as a harrowing surprise treat, each was given the score to Tadeusz Baird's Czetry Eseje-a contemporary work none of them had seen before-and told to be on the podium in four minutes, ready to conduct. Six survived. Said Chief Judge Bernstein darkly: ''One provocative fact: there is not one American among the six finalists...
...find themselves watching helplessly as their musicians betray them in a thousand ways. The New York Philharmonic has made a refined art of ignoring any inept visitors among the conductors who substitute for Leonard Bernstein each year: the players keep all eyes studiously away from the podium in hopes of informing the audience that it is hearing their performance, not the maestro...
Sculptor's Hand. On the podium, Szell is formal and correct-his beat firm, his style understated. His baton moves stolidly. but his left hand-often called the most graceful in music-is a sculptor's hand, shaping and molding each sound, grasping the fortissimos, summoning the dominant voices and, for excited counterrhythms and violent colors, fluttering like a bird caught in a storm. "Between conductor and orchestra," Szell says, "a great deal must occur below the conscious level. There must be an understanding that is mystical and even occult. The freshness of the eyes, the mood-each...
...Philadelphia for 27 years, a longer tenure than that of any other major conductor. He shares with Bernstein an unbounded confidence in his players (though none call him "Gene," as New York musicians call Bernstein "Lenny"); in rehearsals, he treats them with a firm but gentle hand. On the podium, he uses no baton and, with his right hand liberated, gives his deepest concentration to color and balance. Perhaps as a result, his tempos sometimes drift...