The Philharmonic’s Once and Forever King

Like that famous half-filled glass, Los Angeles Philharmonic executive director Ernest Fleischmann is a test of perspective. In both legend and current commentary, he is either a genius/ogre or an ogre/genius, with the difference very much a matter of emphasis.

The vast body of Fleischmanniana, however, does not reduce so simply, and is growing all the time. The Hollywood Bowl season that officially opens Tuesday will be the 20th for Fleischmann.

“It’s ridiculous to think it’s been 20 years,” Fleischmann mused. “When I first came here, there were a lot of people who gave me six months.”

“He rubbed many people the wrong way,” H. Russell Smith said of Fleischmann’s notoriously abrasive style. A member of the Philharmonic’s board of directors for the last 25 years, Smith said, “I can remember, in those early days they were about ready to throw him out a couple of times.”

“People kept predicting Ernest’s demise,” recalled Richard Houdek, a public relations director who came to the Philharmonic shortly after Fleischmann, “but it never happened.” Fleischmann survived and the orchestra thrived, facts not unrelated. Today, Fleischmann is almost an institution in himself, and an international figure of mythic proportions in the business of classical music.

“His strengths far outweighed his weaknesses,” said Smith, who indicates that Fleischmann’s combativeness is much appreciated when employed on behalf of his orchestra. “The turmoil continues,” Smith said, “the pulling and tugging within the Music Center Operating Company continues, and Ernest is always there.”

As one indication of Fleischmann’s stature, he is the only active orchestra executive to have a biographical article in the prestigious New Grove Dictionary of American Music. Even people with little affection for the man agree on his place in his chosen field.

“The whole industry is led by a few people. Ernest, through personality and longevity, is like a guru. He’s on every committee in the world,” said Dinah Daniels, who left the Philharmonic in 1986 after serving as director of marketing and communications for two years.

Fleischmann’s dual reign as executive director of the Philharmonic and artistic director of the Hollywood Bowl Summer Festival has been controversial from the start. Shortly before he arrived in Los Angeles, High Fidelity magazine published an article in which Fleischmann argued that American orchestra boards are not competent to run their orchestras directly, and that music directors were not be able to shoulder the burden either. What is needed, he wrote, “is a breed of professional supermanagers.”

The situation that Fleischmann described in that article two decades ago has come true, he said. “Managers have become impresarios because they’re there minding the store while the music director is away. Boards have become less important for their wealth and more important for their involvement.” Fleischmann told the June American Symphony Orchestra League conference in Chicago that “who’s in charge is really the most delicate aspect of music leadership.” He described the ideal relationship between music and executive directors as one of “total trust, total understanding.”

He added, however, “In the end, of course, someone, somewhere has to take responsibility, and it is still my contention that it is the person who is there all the time, the executive, who must face the music, so to speak.”

In describing his relationship with his own music directors in Los Angeles, Fleischmann said in a recent interview: “Zubin (Mehta) and I were like brothers. With (Carlo Maria) Giulini, it was more like father and son.” After a pause, he added the current name, “It’s getting better and better all the time with (Andre) Previn.”

The first seasons of Previn’s tenure at the Philharmonic, which began in January, 1986, have been rife with rumors of friction with the executive director. “I think he wasn’t used to it (an actively involved executive) before he came here,” Fleischmann said.

Previn views it the other way around, suggesting that Fleischmann wasn’t used to a music director participating so much in decisions. “For years and years, Ernest had to do everything,” he said.

The situation came to a head this year when a February press conference that was abruptly called off. Young Finnish conductor Esa-Pekka Salonen was to have been officially named a principal guest conductor with the Philharmonic, but the agreement Fleischmann had negotiated infringed on some of Previn’s contractual prerogatives and Previn’s objections canceled the appointment.

“There were a few odd issues about touring,” Fleischmann said.

“He had made certain promises and deals with Esa-Pekka’s agent,” Previn said, “of which I was entirely innocent.”

The disagreement has now been smoothed over, with Fleischmann acknowledging responsibility for the contretemps. “I think I may not have been as diplomatic as I might have been. I was trying to find the right moment to talk to Andre about it, and I waited too long.”

“That’s exactly right,” Previn said.

Salonen and Previn have since met and established a friendly working relationship. The Finn will return to the Philharmonic in the 1989-90 season, though not in a formal relationship.

“As far as Ernest is concerned, it was a bad moment, but now it is cleared,” Previn said.

“There are always going to be certain differences of point of view,” Previn said. “He finds it difficult to delegate, but now we’re both a little older and wiser. I like working with Ernest.”

Change as well as controversy came to Hollywood Bowl and the Philharmonic with Fleischmann. The smooth parade of record-breaking audiences now taken for granted did not always characterize the Philharmonic’s summer season. As recently as 1964, the Bowl season ended with a deficit.

The Philharmonic does not have precise figures for the first seasons of Fleischmann’s administration. In 1971, though, 35 concerts brought 250,000 people to the Bowl, for an average of attendance of 7,143 per event: Ten years later, 629,567 clicked through the turnstiles at 52 events, for a 12,107 average. Last year 786,181 people attended 62 concerts, for an average of 12,583 per concert.

These attendance increases were spurred in part by imaginative uses of the Bowl, such as the widely publicized and imitated marathon concerts--$1.50 earned admittance to five hours of music devoted to a specific composer or era--which Fleischmann instituted in 1971 with conductor Lukas Foss. “Those were heady days,” Fleischmann recalled. The last marathon until the all-American program last summer was his 1979 tribute to Lawrence Morton. Though the all-American concert “just didn’t work,” Fleischmann said “the concept of the marathon is not dead, it just needs to be rethought.”

Educational activities have also flourished at the Bowl during Fleischmann’s tenure. This is also the 20th anniversary of Open House at the Bowl, the arts festival for children. “Tell Me a Story” is the theme of the six-week season this summer. Opening Monday, the first week’s program features “Peter and the Wolf” and a workshop in instrument-making.

The Philharmonic Institute, a training orchestra established in 1982 and directed this season by cellist Lynn Harrell, is “something that maybe I’m more proud of than anything,” Fleischmann said. He claims that among young musicians, the Institute is now on a par with Tanglewood as the most desirable and prestigious summer training program.

Former public relations director Houdek said that “the genius of Ernest Fleischmann is that he realized Hollywood Bowl is not a concert hall--he made it a picnic. People came out and had fun.”

Critics, however, have not always shared in the fun, complaining particularly about routine, formulaic programming. “Purists may snipe at it, sometimes with good reason,” Fleischmann acknowledged. When asked about repertory at the Bowl, Fleischmann pulled his tie nervously through his fingers and said softly, “You know, if something works, why try to break it?” The need to maintain and even increase the audiences at the Bowl has created its own constraints. The Philharmonic itself earns roughly 80%--far more than any other major American orchestra--of its nearly $26-million annual budget, and much of that income comes from Bowl ticket sales.

The Philharmonic has a relatively small endowment of only $14 million which, according to Fleischmann, places it 15th among major American orchestras. With government aid an uncertain source of support, summer profits are counted on to subsidize winter losses. “The Bowl is tantamount to our endowment,” Fleischmann said, “in that it provides income to underwrite our deficit the rest of the year.” The overriding importance of keeping thousands in their seats at the Bowl leaves “little space for innovation,” he said.

Little innovation would seem an understatement, at least to characterize the basic summer repertory and artists that Fleischmann has brought to the Bowl.

His first season in 1969 found Previn conducting, Alicia de Larrocha and Andre Watts playing the piano and the Romeros their guitars--all of whom will be seen and heard again this summer. In ’69 there also was a Rodgers and Hammerstein evening, a Gershwin program and a Tchaikovsky Spectacular--all of which repeat this year.

In ’69 Hugo Montenegro led a program of movie music; this year it’ll be John Williams. Then, the New York Philharmonic visited; now, the Pittsburgh Symphony. In ‘69, Mehta was at the helm for a preview concert of the Philharmonic’s upcoming Japan tour, a program that included Ravel’s “Daphnis et Chloe” Suite No. 2. This year, Previn conducts a Japan tour preview that ends with . . . “Daphnis et Chloe” Suite No. 2.

In 1970, the Rodgers and Hammerstein, the Gershwin and the Tchaikovsky concerts all repeated. “Daphnis et Chloe” appeared again, as did Beethoven’s “Eroica” Symphony and Fourth and Fifth Piano Concertos, the Brahms and Mendelssohn Violin Concertos, and Rachmaninoff’s Second and Third Piano Concertos--all pieces that will also be heard this summer.

“I think we have to play the standard repertory,” Fleischmann said, “and do it as well as possible.” He is very much aware of the difference between Bowl audiences and the Philharmonic’s winter following. “It’s amazing how many people got their first taste of symphonic music at the Bowl.”

Repertory is not the only Bowl constant. The summer Fleischmann arrived, the disruption caused by plane flights over the Bowl was the subject of editorials and much debate by L.A. County supervisors. Also, the sound system was improved, as it has been almost every year.

“I think we have a good chance for a major improvement this summer,” Fleischmann said cautiously, well aware of how often that has been promised.

The fact that so much of the Bowl’s physical plant has not been significantly changed is bad news for the future. “There are many, many millions of dollars that need to be spent there,” Fleischmann warns.

All that and more, though, may be outside Fleischmann’s most immediate worries in the future. When he arrived, it was literally to do two jobs--executive manager of the Philharmonic, and artistic director of the Hollywood Bowl Summer Festival. The Southern California Symphony Assn. and the Hollywood Bowl Assn. had only merged three years before.

“Both jobs have grown so enormously that its virtually impossible for one person to do it all,” Fleischmann said. He particularly regrets how difficult it has become for him to find time to travel in search of new talent.

“Robert Harth (who became the Philharmonic’s general manager in 1979 at the age of 23) will take over the Bowl next year,” Fleischmann said, “and he’s more than ready.”

With 26 years of experience as a critic, conductor, orchestra manager and record executive in South Africa and London prior to his arrival in Los Angeles, the German-born Fleischmann clearly saw himself as a paragon of that breed of supermanagers he described in his High Fidelity article.

“I still feel we need supermanagers,” Fleischmann told an standing-room-only session on orchestras and leadership at the annual conference of the Symphony Orchestra League, “but I am chastened by 20 years of running an American orchestra.”

Chastened or not, Fleischmann’s management style is usually described in extroverted terms. “Thunderous,” Houdek said. “Strong,” “confident” and “egomaniacal” were descriptions tossed out in response to casual questions at the Symphony Orchestra League conference.

“Ernest leads with an anvil,” former marketing director Daniels said. The results have been traumatic, at least in the personnel department. Reports of curtly fired secretaries and nearly hysterical resignations abound. Former Philharmonic staffers interested in future employment in the music industry refused to be quoted, indicating their respect for the extent of Fleischmann’s influence and their belief that he would use it against them if he were angered.

Not all ex-employees are so reticent. “It was just a totally frantic environment,” Daniels said. Working at the Philharmonic, she said, involves “being humiliated on an almost daily basis. The only way I could work for Ernest was to leave my soul on the other side when crossing the threshold of his office, and pretend it wasn’t really me in there.”

Houdek only lasted a year-and-a-half as public relations director, and described his sudden departure from Fleischmann’s employment in 1970 as “operatic, rather than symphonic. I just blew up and ran out. A person who works under those conditions can only do it so long.”

Some, however, have found homes on Fleischmann’s staff. Five key managers, including Harth (the son of a former Philharmonic concertmaster), have been there 10 years or more, a fact Fleischmann reported proudly. “We have a smaller turnover than virtually any orchestra in the country.”

John Toohey, who was director of marketing for 18 months following Daniels, agreed. “People who go to the Philharmonic stay there longer than at most other orchestras.”

Not that Toohey was oblivious to the pressure. “While you’re standing there catching it, sometimes its really hard,” he said. “It’s like boot camp. You have ego and pride, and he tears that down a lot.”

“I’m not the greatest diplomat in the world,” Fleischmann said. “I’m always willing to be surprised by what is being done, but if I don’t like it, I don’t make any bones about it. There is too little time in the day to beat around the bush.”

At issue is Fleischmann’s reputed concern for details, penchant for long hours and insistance that subordinates do their jobs by his lights. Daniels, Houdek and others labeled it interfering and arbitrary.

Toohey only partially agreed. “There were times when he had to force me to do things, and there were times when he gave me a free rein. His ideal of management was that we should buy into his concept . . . and that we should think things through.”

Fleischmann sees it largely as a question of responsibility. The Philharmonic has responsibilities as a major, highly visible arts organization, and he has ultimate responsibility for the image of the Philharmonic.

“I don’t want anything amateurish to come out of a professional institution,” he said.

Nearly everyone agrees that Fleischmann subjects himself to the same pressure and demands he places on his staff. Significantly, perhaps, there is no clock in Fleischmann’s office. Fleischmann, however, does not consider himself a true workaholic simply because he enjoys his work too much.

“I love what I’m doing, and I get paid for it. There’s a very fine line between when I’m working and when I’m not.”

This devotion to his job--some call it obsession--has had its price. “I think in my earlier years here, while I was trying to build things up, my family suffered, my children suffered, my marriage suffered,” said Fleischmann, now divorced.

When Toohey left the Philharmonic for family reasons, to return to Texas as the general manager of the Fort Worth Symphony, he found Fleischmann unexpectedly sympathetic.

“I was quite surprised. He gave me a hug, and was really very warm about it,” Toohey said. “He said he felt he had made sacrifices and that his family had made sacrifices. He thought it was a good decision, that my family was a priority.”

Fleischmann watchers also suggest there have been changes in recent years.

“I’m 63 now. Obviously, as one gets older, you tend to take a less agonized view of things if they don’t go quite as you expected.”

If Fleischmann’s arrival made headlines, so has his departure--again and again. Reports of a potential move to other positions have become an almost annual feature of Fleischmann’s tenure here. Within a few years, there was talk of a move to the New York Philharmonic to join Pierre Boulez. Other lures beckoned from the Metropolitan Opera, the Boston Symphony, the Paris Opera (twice) and, most recently, the San Francisco Opera.

Yet for all the temptations, Fleischmann has remained here in Los Angeles. In November, 1985, he resigned to become general adminstrator and artistic director of the Paris Opera. A week later, he was back at the Philharmonic.

Future years will doubtless hear more talk of moves to other prestigious jobs. But the very real attraction and manifold challenges of working closely in building the new Walt Disney Concert Hall from the ground up may keep Fleischmann the once and forever king of the Philharmonic.

“I’m sort of a wandering Jew,” Fleischmann explains, citing his birth in Frankfurt, his upbringing and early career in South Africa and his years in England. He insists, however, “I feel more at home here than anywhere.

Daniels voiced a suspicion shared by many when she said, “I think the timing of the announcements (of interest in other jobs), and Ernest’s contracts being up is more than coincidence.”

In the summer of 1983, Fleischmann began to be mentioned as the prime candidate for the vacant post of general manager of the Met. In March the following year, while the search was still on in New York, the Philharmonic extended his contract.

The Philharmonic Assn. board clearly wants to keep Fleischmann, but not at any cost. Board member Smith reported that they made no offer to renegotiate his contract during the Paris affair or his recent flirtation with San Francisco.

Fleischmann was initially nominated in 1968 by Mehta, at a time when the orchestra and Hollywood Bowl were in a “depressed state,” according to Smith, citing both fiscal and artistic problems. “Ernest seemed to bring a unique combination of talents to that,” he said.

The hiring process brought Fleischmann twice to Los Angeles--where “What swung it all was seeing Zubin and the orchestra work,” Fleischmann remembers--and sent Smith to London for final negotiations that lasted until 1 a.m.

“He was expensive, he was a tough negotiator,” Smith said. “But he decided to take the gamble.”