MUSIC : Her Star Rose in West After Defecting : Violinist Mullova performs 80 concerts a year since a daring escape from the Soviet Union in 1983; she now lives in Vienna

The story of Soviet violinist Viktoria Mullova and her conductor boyfriend’s defection back in the summer of 1983 reads like a thriller. The young couple’s daring dash for freedom--and their subsequent parting of the ways--is the stuff movies are made of.

But Mullova herself reflected recently that “it didn’t take courage to leave. You have to have more courage to stay there.”

Now 30 and living in Vienna, Mullova harbors no rancor or frustration about her struggle for liberation. Acknowledging that “times are so different now” for Soviet musicians who in the wake of glasnost are free to travel or leave, Mullova nevertheless remains convinced that she left Moscow at “exactly the right moment.

“I was 23 and was able to start a new career in the West,” she explained. “Now there are so many musicians leaving. It is very difficult to do well. I’m glad I didn’t lose all those years and stay there. Had I waited longer, I might not have been this successful.”

Today, Mullova calls all the shots in her career. She decides whether to do press interviews (she cooperated with The Times but declined to be photographed for this article). She decides what to wear at performances. And she largely determines where, when and what she plays.

“I am never without concerts and have so many engagements I can choose what I want to do,” said Mullova, who gives about 80 concerts a year. Last week she joined the Los Angeles Philharmonic for the Sibelius Concerto at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion.

Although associated with the Russian repertory--Mullova’s recording for Philips Classics of the Tchaikovsky Concerto (coupled with the Sibelius) earned her the Grand Prix du Disque--she seeks to traverse new territory. Last year, she added the Schoenberg Concerto to her repertory and hopes to “switch to the concerti of Berg, Beethoven and Brahms.” In 1991, Philips will release her recordings of the Mendelssohn concerti.

“Everybody makes his or her own decisions about what they are willing to do,” Mullova said. “Of course, this depends on your strength and will and talent and ability.”

It was Mullova’s triumph at the 1982 Tchaikovsky International Competition in Moscow (she shared the gold medal with Russian Sergei Stadler)--and her subsequent forced abstinence from the concert halls--that spurred her and her companion, Vakhtang Jordania, music director of the Kharkov Philharmonia, to entertain thoughts of defecting.

“I believed after winning the Tchaikovsky, I would have engagements,” Mullova remembered, “but that didn’t happen. On the contrary, my career was dead. Nobody cared there. The bureaucrats don’t care if you play or not because they don’t make any money.

“I didn’t like my career or my life. But it was difficult and risky to leave. You had to be committed 100%. If you were caught, it would have been Siberia. I decided not to wait too long.”

Pestering Soviet officials, Mullova managed to secure a recital series in Finland. And she helped con Soviet bureaucrats into permitting Jordania, an amateur keyboardist at best, to accompany her on the tour. They evaded their official escort and crossed the border into Sweden in a taxi, only to find later that the U.S. Embassy in Stockholm had closed for the July 4th weekend. The wait to request asylum was agonizing.

Mullova said it was her participation in a documentary of the Tchaikovsky contest, videotaped by a Western film crew for later airing in the United States (the film was seen on the Arts & Entertainment cable network), that convinced her she might well have a career outside the Soviet Union.

Los Angeles producer Robert Dalrymple remembers the “tall and graceful” violinist well. “She also was very sophisticated and in many ways calculating, and gave us clues she wanted to get out,” recalled Dalrymple, who went on to videotape the 1986 and 1990 Tchaikovsky competitions for airing on PBS-TV.

“For instance, in the film she says she wants to play all around the world. At that time, that was not easy. She is very clever and got out at a time when defecting created a lot of publicity. It probably helped her career.

Looking back, Mullova said it was easy to adjust to a “better” life in New York, where she perfected her rudimentary English and lived for two years before her parting with Jordania and her move to Europe. Jordania, 48, is married and since 1985 has been conductor and artistic director of the Chattanooga Symphony and Opera, a post he will retain through 1992.

Mention Jordania to Mullova and she bristles. “Why do we have to talk about him? He was my boyfriend, but that was six years ago.”

And no answer is forthcoming regarding Mullova’s relationship--widely known in musical circles--with Claudio Abbado, conductor of the Berlin Philharmonic and Vienna Staatsoper.

Mullova, anxious to move beyond her past, has no plans to return to her homeland.

“There is no danger and I have no fear, but in Russia the life is so difficult,” said Mullova, whose parents remain behind.

“You don’t have anything to eat or anything to wash with. People there are very angry and are afraid of war starting there any minute.

“Seven years ago, it was very hard to get food or simple things. It was terrible, but people tell me it was paradise then compared to now. Each year it gets worse. And now, it is unimaginable.”