Lawrence, regarding the blogging, that’s a tough call since professional musicians blog about their work, so where do you draw the line regarding complaining. This situation is an example of how fast things blow up in our internet age (of course the NY Times might flared things up a bit).

But the example of the players performing their job, I would restate that there should be a nice system in place where they respect the conductor and play with a smile, or at least not a frown.

This sort of reminds me of something I saw (I would bet its on Youtube), where symphony players were filmed exiting to the backstage after supporting Guns @ Roses (might have been another band) and as each player walked by the camera they gave either a sick look to the camera or laughed. I’m not exactly an elitist and there are great examples of symphonies backing bands, but this really was awful. At least IMO.

In that scenario I agree 100%, but when someone dedicates a huge portion of their time, amateur or pro, to conducting a Mahler symphony, we shouldn’t sneer or laugh.

High Fidelity named his recording of Mahler 6th as the best classical recording of 2002; his recording of Mahler’s 9th Symphony was nominated for a Grammy Award; and his recording of The Rite of Spring was named as one of the ten most important Musical Events of 1992 by the New York Times.

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Lisa, I love your comment regarding the Gordon Getty music on the SF opera Adler Fellows fundraising concert at his Pacific Height’s ‘urban palace’ (near MTT’s):

“I assume it was on the program as a courtesy to him.”

I might have thought so too, until I realized years back when doing some research work on a (Getty-funded) documentary film project about the Russian National Orchestra, that Mr. Getty has works performed on a large share of RNO performances whether they are in the Russian Federation or the United States (and probably Monaco and Europe, as well, I can’t now remember).

[Gordon Getty has admitted to mentally composing/daydreaming during Corporate Board of Directors meetings.]

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[I spoke with Mr Getty briefly at a Levine School of Music fundraiser (featuring some of his songs) in Washington years ago, and we didn’t connect. I recall him mentioning Massenet as one of his models (and heroes) -- an interesting and not necessarily unfavorable comment, in my view.]

I’m not sure what you are talking about allowing or not allowing to continue: people expressing their opinions? That should be a personal choice, not something we allow. And one could easily extrapolate the following: “if Kaplan’s behavior is allowed to continue, before you know it, corporate CEOs will be seizing the batons from every trained conductor in the country.” It may be a logical sequence, but it’s not particularly likely.

I probably sounded more ornery than I intended in my last post. Of course it’s never a very good idea to denigrate your employer on a public blog (especially one that seems to have been made specifically for that). I’m not sure if I completely agree with the “act according to his/her role”…obviously playing the instrument is important, but I would think it had more to do with maintaining a standard of loyalty to the ensemble, not the particular conductor. It would go hand-in-hand for the most part, since if you’re not working with the conductor, you’re not making your ensemble look very good, but in this particular case I get the sense that the musicians felt that Kaplan was making their ensemble look bad, which caused them to speak out.

It has been interesting to follow how quickly this story has blossomed into a “thing”, with mentions on several blogs as well as the Orchestralist listserv I belong to. It seems to one of those issues that is everything to everyone – whether or not you’re bothered by amateur conductors, rebellious musicians, fetishism of long-dead composers, or the image-driven mindset of orchestra management, it’s all there in a simple package.

To be able to blog and share your opinion literally with the world is great, but perhaps one should draw the line concerning one’s employer. I wouldn’t dare complain about my job at my blog unless I were looking to get fired.

And I also agree that the player should act according to his role, which is to play his instrument and maintain a standard of loyalty to whoever is conducting.

If Finalyson wants to conduct, and from reading his blog it sounds like he feels more suited in that role than Kaplan, than more power to him. But if this sort of behavior is allowed to continue, before you know it the trombone and tuba players will start improvising in the middle of a symphony because they felt they could add something to the work.

What’s bugged me is Norman LeBrecht’s pompous reaction to the whole mix-up (http://www.artsjournal.com/slippeddisc/2008/12/the_player_who_forgot_his_plac.html). The idea of telling someone who has been playing professionally for over 20 years in the NY Phil that they should know their place, keep their mouth shut and let the “real” critics do the critiquing of the conductor is pathetic, considering it’s coming from someone who has been talking about the death of classical music for some time AND on friendly personal terms with the conductor. Finlayson took a huge gamble by airing his opinions online, but from reading the comments, it seems that most of the positive reaction has been from musicians and most of the negative has been from the sidelines (i.e. media, critics, etc. – see the Time’s article here: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/18/arts/music/18kapl.html).

It would have been one thing if Finalyson’s rant had been emotionally-driven spew; instead, his comments were well-thought out and seemed to be generally driven by a desire to perform the music to the best of the ensemble’s ability. The more composers, conductors and critics understand that the performers are not simply empty vessels but hard-working, creative professionals, the better.

My point is just that it’s horribly wrong to assume someone is a fraud because they’re not professionally trained just at it’s horribly wrong to assume a woman can’t be serious in a pursuit because she lacks a y chromosome. If Kaplan is lousy at what he does and it’s all crap, then fine. But I’d hate for those of us who did not take the standard path to becoming composers to be tarnished with this guy because we are also not “professionals.”

David, good comments. I don’t know what I would think if his passion were, say, for L’amour de loin or The Rite of Spring. The monomania is weird in any case.

I think there is something wrong with your analogy to women getting traction in classical music, mainly, that the women being excluded were generally highly trained and professionally qualified.

Calls into question the rest of his comments!

That’s the same cloistered attitude that kept a lot of women out of music circles. And that’s the same attitude that keeps nonprofessional composers, like many of us, out of the mainstream. Personally, I’m fine with not being in the mainstream. Kaplan wants to be in the mainstream with regard to his Mahler performance, and none of that would have been possible were it not for the orchestra managers who engage him. He doesn’t have the NYP at his “beck and call.” Rather, someone at the NYP engaged him (and whether or not his donations played a role is purely speculative. It has the appearance of a conflict of interest, however), and for whatever reason, he did his thing.

The Philharmonic has a notorious reputation for being horrible to conductors, all the way back to Boulez and earlier. I don’t dispute Finlayson’s frustration with Kaplan, and he has his right. But I think he painted him with pretty strong colors, and suspect the truth is somewhere in the middle.

I say this as someone who finds what Kaplan does to be undesirable, and don’t think much of his conducting talent. But I think folks need to give him some credit for having a passion for Mahler’s second. If he had a similar passion for new music, even the Ives’ Fourth, would we have the same level of moral outrage at what he does? Personally, if someone wants to use his or her financial or marketability leverage to increase the number of performances of Feldman’s music, I’d be the first to applaud.