Word: stokowskis
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...London, Eugene Goossens, British conductor of the Rochester (N. Y.) Symphony, declared recently: "I have no hesitation in saying that the Philadelphia Orchestra is the finest orchestra in the world today. . . . Stokowski stands supreme...
...they rise and leave, bowing to their friends and murmuring goodbyes, and hurry away to scones and cinnamon toast and caroling kettles, leaving the music to make its swanlike end exclusively for the benefit of the ushers and those that have free seats, etc. Ah, if only Conductor Leopold Stokowski would treat these Friday excursionists as they treat him, lovers of music have said. If he would return their courtesy, the scene in the auditorium would be something like this...
...curtain rises. Two musicians?the first violin and the cellist?are seated, chatting. Conductor Stokowski strolls vaguely in from the wings. He bows. Puzzled applause from the audience?murmurs of "But good heavens, Victoria, where is the orchestra? . . . Down behind that backdrop? . . . I think it is simply too quaint. . . ." That no orchestra lurks behind the backdrop is clearly demonstrated when Mr. Stokowski raises his baton and the scrannel strains of the violin and cello tremble, quite unsupported, in the hostile air. . . . Now another musician comes in. He carries a horn and a handkerchief and flops down in the first convenient...
...Stokowski, conducting a symphony of empty chairs, churns on and on; the music must be coming to a climax, for now his arms wildly flagellate; he whips his fiddlers up to a crisis, holds his phantom cymbals and horns and woodwinds suspended in a terrific fortissimo of silence, and then, at a final mute drum-stroke, drops his arms to his sides. . . . Standing alone, his back to the audience, he orders his invisible orchestra to rise to the applause that does not come ? turns, smiles, walks quickly...
This is what music-lovers have often wished would happen. This, in substance, was what happened last Friday. Philadelphians were "dumbfounded by Stokowski's satire." Some applauded. Some hissed. Forty odd first-row patrons walked out. At last a conductor had had the courage to give a Philadelphia audience a few hints on behavior...