The Latvian Experience : Director of O.C. Chamber Orchestra Finds Classical Music Draws No Crowds During Visit

You would think that concert tickets that cost less than a Pepsi might draw a big crowd. But that isn’t always the case, as Micah Levy, founding music director of the Orange County Chamber Orchestra, discovered during his recent 10-day stay in Riga, Latvia.

Levy traveled to the Soviet Union in May to meet with Latvian composer Peteris Vasks and to conduct a chamber orchestra made up of members of the Latvian State Symphony.

His concert--an American program of Copland, Barber, Ernst Bloch and Ellen Taafe Twilich--was broadcast on Soviet television and radio, and Levy was interviewed by representatives of both media.

But even with all that attention, there wasn’t a big turnout for the concert in the Kamermuzikas Zale (Chamber Music Hall).

“There were under 40 people there,” Levy said recently. “But that was standard there. I went to three concerts other than my own. One was for full orchestra and a 40-to-50-voice radio choir as well. . . . I turned around and counted about 40 people.”

Similarly, a recital by a Swedish pianist was “very poorly attended,” Levy said, as was a concert by the student conservatory orchestra.

“That is just the way it is there. My theory is that because the orchestra in Latvia is supported by the government, they do not need ticket sales to exist. They don’t have do what we do (in advertising and promotion). They don’t have subscription campaigns.”

Tickets cost from 20 to 40 kopecks, Levy said. “A Pepsi was 70 kopecks. So it was pretty cheap.”

Levy added: “(The musicians) themselves were complaining about the lack of attendance. They said that not enough music was taught in the schools.”

Sounds like a familiar complaint.

Otherwise, though, Levy said he was impressed with the “very rich sound” of the strings.

“It’s not the instruments, but the way they play,” he said.

“Another thing, I felt in general that the orchestra was more responsive to the conductor’s gestures, even on a first rehearsal, doing what I wanted. Maybe that’s because they’re playing all the time and that’s the one thing they do. They have no free-lance activities.

Still, he said there were “definitely problems.”

“I don’t think it was style. They are a fine orchestra, but they don’t read as quickly as American orchestras. So it took a little longer to learn the notes.”

Levy’s stay was sponsored by Inessa Vasks, an English teacher in the Santa Ana school district who was born in Latvia and who recently discovered that she had a cousin she hadn’t known about in the old country.

“She found out he was a composer,” Levy said. “She brought some tape recordings of his music. I happened by accident to hear these tapes. I thought, ‘This guy is really good.’ It turns out to be her cousin.

“She wanted to send me there, to get to know him, his music and maybe do something to help him. It’s very difficult for a composer there to promote his music. It’s difficult for any composer, but especially difficult there.”

It turned out that her cousin, Peteris Vasks, is a well-respected composer in Latvia, even though his name is missing from our standard reference texts.

Meeting Vasks provided Levy with an entree into Latvian society that an ordinary tourist wouldn’t have, he said. He called the experience “mixed.”

“It’s a hard life there,” Levy said. “There is a part of me that doesn’t want to say anything bad about this lovely area because the people we met were some of the most wonderful, warm people I’ve ever met.

“The mixed part was the sadness of seeing how they lived. They are not, after all, a primitive civilization, yet to a certain extent they live like that. We’ve all heard that in the Communist countries, they don’t have the material wealth that we have here. When you go there, instantly you see that’s absolutely right.

“The first thing that hit me--and it hit me in the stomach because I’m a vegetarian--I didn’t eat any of the animal flesh that was offered to me. That didn’t leave much to eat. There were hardly any fresh vegetables. And the dairy products I hardly would touch.”

Housing and daily essentials also were problems.

“You go around to all the stores,” he said. “There’s stuff you can buy, but really they don’t do very well at providing the essentials. People will stand in line for an hour to get a newspaper. I don’t know why there isn’t any paper.

“Some of the best stuff is in special stores that are reserved for foreigners. If a Soviet citizen goes in there, he can’t purchase anything because you have to purchase things with foreign currency.”

Anticipating certain problems, Levy had bought “maybe a gross of pens just to give away” before leaving.

“We take pens for granted,” he said. “They don’t have pens there. We took soap and toothpaste. Stuff we think is basic and ordinary they just don’t have. I could go on for hours about the experience.”

But above and beyond all that was the political situation.

“People there do not feel like they are part of the Soviet Union,” Levy said. “They feel that the Soviets are kidnaping them, holding them hostages in their own country.

“Between 1919 and 1939, they had political, religious, economic and social freedom. Then the Germans came, then the Russians came. . . . Right now because of glasnost and perestroika they are experiencing an opening. But they’re not convinced yet.”

Until recently, Latvians were not permitted to gather near a statue of freedom built in the middle of town around 1919 to celebrate the country’s emancipation from Sweden.

“Now they can congregate there without fear of arrest,” Levy said. “They go there every day. They talk, they take flowers there. The statue has got a lot of symbolic meaning for them. They want freedom so much. It’s a form of demonstration. That tells you something about the people.”

For all that, Levy found that Vasks remains a loyal native son.

“I became aware of how much he was in love with Latvia, even with how difficult it is to live there, when I asked if he would come to America, knowing how much easier life would be. He said no, he wouldn’t want to do that. Rather he would want to do something to better that situation there.”

Levy said that he will program Vasks’ “Musica Dolorosa,” a 13-minute work in one movement scored for string orchestra, on a May, 1990, concert by the Orange County Chamber Orchestra.

“His music is fairly conservative,” Levy said. “I’m not sure why. Whether that’s the way he wants to compose or because he’s kind of insulated there in Latvia. . . .

“But he’s a very honest composer. By that I mean to say, he only writes on inspiration. If he doesn’t have anything to say, he’s not going to say it. He’s the same way in conversation. He’s a very quiet man.”