DOHNANYI LEAVES LABELS IN CLEVELAND

“Labels,” says a mildly scoffing Christoph von Dohnanyi. “They are simplistic. But people enjoy them and the media need them. So I guess we can’t escape them.”

The music director of the Cleveland Orchestra is talking about a label ascribed to him: intellectual modernist. It’s a convenient sticker that distinguishes the 57-year-old German from most conservative conductors who typically lead world-class ensembles.

As he points out, though, he “would rather be intellectual than its opposite, stupid. But, remember, the negative meaning of the word goes back to (Alfred) Dreyfus and his scandalous trial. He was branded a liberal intellectual by right-wing anti-Semites who were furthering their cause of fascism.”

While Dohnanyi is wary of code terms, there are lots of concessions he agrees to for the sake of a successful tenure with the Clevelanders. Their current tour, in which he makes his Southern California debut appearance this week (El Camino Wednesday, UCLA Friday and Saturday, at the Orange County Performing Arts Center Sunday), is a case in point.

The programs he will conduct--except for a single recent work (Ligeti’s “Lontano”)--firmly represent the standard orchestral repertory. Where’s the intellectual modernist?

“He’s probably too intimidating for unfamiliar audiences,” says Dohnanyi on the phone from Boise, “so we leave him behind. It would be difficult to insist that concert managers let us play more contemporary music. After all, I’m a stranger. Why should they trust me? And, of course, touring orchestras traditionally play the 19th-Century literature.”

But the audiences in Cleveland seem to know their man, now that he has been demonstrating his sensibility there for two years. Grandson of the Hungarian composer Ernst von Dohnanyi, with whom he studied, the conductor says he has found a way to assert his musical values and gain approval at the same time.

“Through labels, again,” he explains in mellow tones. “Word followed from my days at the Hamburg Opera, and from recordings, that I was a dedicated champion of Berg and Schoenberg.

“So to Cleveland I brought the reputation of specialist. And since people love specialists, they pay attention to an all-Bartok program I might do. But I regret the label anyway. Isn’t it true that any good musician can learn to conduct well a little piece by Schoenberg? He doesn’t need a great mind or a special status for that.”

Dohnanyi’s brand of psycho-musical scrutiny should stand him in good stead in Cleveland--where he and his wife, the German singing-actress Anja Silja, and their three school-age children live. There, a little non-elitism goes a long way, Dohnanyi suggests. It makes him appreciative, rather than scornful, of life in suburban Shaker Heights. It allows him to absorb the culture shock of going from European opera houses to symphony life in Middle America.

And because he applauds “the enthusiasm and imagination” behind efforts to produce opera “at such an unlikely place as Blossom” (summer home of the Cleveland Orchestra), Dohnanyi takes heart from his new situation.

As a child, however, he lived through devastating losses. His father, an activist in the Resistance, was executed by the Nazis. So were four other family members of similar conscience.

“But I knew what was happening then (at age 12),” he says. “People knew. When they saw a kind, good man, a math professor, suddenly appear wearing a gold star and sweeping the street garbage instead of teaching at the university, they knew. It didn’t require extra brainpower to understand the evil in our midst.”

Something of Dohnanyi’s moral legacy informs his career and his musical tastes. A Christmas concert he put together last year included two works by Schoenberg, among them “Survivor From Warsaw” one piece by Varese; a Mozart symphony and Beethoven’s Third “Leonore” Overture.

“The theme was the triumph of freedom,” he explains. “Because I had won the public’s artistic confidence--and that is the goal--such a program was possible. People in the audience cried. So did orchestra players.

“I wish such trust were possible on this tour. Then we would play the music of Ruggles and Ives, too. It’s such a pity these great Americans have so little recognition. Had they lived in Vienna or Paris they would instantly have been proclaimed geniuses.

“Well, that’s my job. To persuade. Proust can entertain as well as stimulate.”