On and Off the Podium

In 1962, Zubin Mehta, 26, became music director of the Los Angeles Philharmonic. During his 16 years with the Philharmonic, the Indian-born conductor established a reputation for his flamboyance and dynamism.

Mehta left the orchestra in 1978 to become music director of the New York Philharmonic, a post he held until 1991. Currently, he is music director of the Israel Philharmonic and recently assumed the post of general music director of the Bavarian State Opera in Munich.

Mehta has returned often to the Los Angeles Philharmonic and is back again this week and next for a series of concerts including conducting Mahler’s Ninth Symphony through this weekend, and an appearance at the gala benefit concert Tuesday saluting the recently retired Philharmonic managing director, Ernest Fleischmann. Mehta will conduct the first half of that program, with guest cellist Mstislav Rostropovich performing the Shostakovich Cello Concerto No. 1, and starting Dec. 10, he will lead four performances of a Messiaen/Lalo program.

Zubin and his wife, Nancy, have found their names in the headlines recently due to the high-profile Santa Monica trial of Whitewater figure Susan McDougal, accused of embezzling more than $150,000 from the Mehtas, her former employers. On Nov. 23, a jury exonerated McDougal of all charges.

Question: Although you have returned often to conduct the Philharmonic, this tribute to Ernest Fleischmann’s almost 30 years as the orchestra’s managing director must trigger some early memories.

Answer: Well, I remember my first night [at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, which opened in 1964] as if it were yesterday. I have very pleasant memories of Ernest. I have only the happiest memories, although we had some very heated discussions sometimes.

Q: Was the first night a frightening night for you? Or a wonderful night?

A: It was the only time I ever stood on the stage with [violinist] Jascha Heifetz. There is no video, no radio recording of it; we were so myopic in those days. Today, it would be a coast-to-coast special. Not even the 10th anniversary in 1974--we had Frank Sinatra and Danny Kaye--not even that was recorded. Then, in 1978, for the 30th anniversary of Israel, we did a little concert here with Barbra Streisand. Those were those once-in-a-lifetime things.

Q: Highlights?

A: No, no, no, those were the pop things. Every time [pianist Arthur] Rubinstein came, it was the high point of my whole career. Arthur Rubinstein is the one musician that I miss most today.

Q: Speaking of “pop,” you conducted for the Three Tenors mega-concerts in Rome in 1990 and here at Dodger Stadium in 1994.

A: Well, with the Three Tenors, we earned a lot of money. I didn’t do [their more recent performances] because I was very committed to my work [elsewhere] and I would have had to cancel a lot. For me, it is not as interesting as it is for the three gentlemen, who are singing all the beautiful arias--I am just accompanying them. Once in awhile, I had fun.

You can’t compare it to the sales of “Titanic,” but the first Three Tenors record I think sold about 14 [million] or 15 million copies, that’s never been done in classical music. So, so many other people got to hear an aria of “Boheme” or “Tosca,” and probably went to the opera. So for that, it was worth it. The first concert was for charity, and to welcome back Jose Carreras after his lengthy illness--he was given up as a person who would not perform anymore after his severe bout with leukemia. We didn’t get paid for that concert, we earned nothing for the recording. So the second time we did it, we wanted to be paid! [Laughs] It is better to tell the truth.

Q: How would you describe the Philharmonic, compared to orchestras around the world?

A: You are asking me this at an advantageous moment. I have fallen in love with this orchestra again. It’s just wonderful. Every section of the orchestra is now on par with one another.

Q: Was it like that when you came here?

A: No, no, no. It wasn’t even like that when I left. The orchestra improved greatly over my 16 years, and that evolution has gone on. It’s been carried on by expert hands, you know, [Carlo Maria] Giulini, [Andre] Previn, then Mr. [Esa-Pekka] Salonen.

Q: Fleischmann’s retirement is not the only big change recently at the Music Center. Peter Hemmings has announced his retirement, to be succeeded by one of the Three Tenors, Placido Domingo. Disney Hall is soon to be built. And Music Center founder Dorothy Chandler, who handpicked you to be music director in 1962, passed away in 1997.

A: Yes--and I have something to say about that. I was really heartbroken that the Chandler family did not want to have a memorial for her in the Chandler Pavilion. I knew this lady very well, for over 16 years. Nothing, in my mind, would have pleased her more than that.

I was told that the family didn’t want it [a family spokesman confirmed that Chandler’s children felt a memorial tribute at the Hollywood Bowl “was enough”]. I would have canceled anything in Europe [to] do it, or do a part of it. I did not know her intimately, there was always a distance that she kept, that I kept. . . . Sometimes people whose names are on buildings are given too much credit. It is not true of Mrs. Chandler, not true.

Q: What will Domingo do for the Music Center?

A: Well, Placido is an Indian god with 10 hands. He is also the artistic director of the Washington Opera. Placido is one of the greatest singers in the world, I’m not even saying tenor. He is one of the greatest singers in this century. I hope, while he can still sing like nobody else, that he doesn’t sacrifice the time to administrate opera houses.

Q: Your career has become somewhat like his, dividing your time between orchestras, on planes all the time.

A: I’m very happy with my new job in Munich, I am doing five months a year at the Bavarian State Opera, and then of course I have Israel. I am about three months with the Israel Philharmonic, unless we go on tour, and then about three weeks with the [annual] Florence Maggio Musicale, I do an opera there.

Q: In November, the Bavarian State Opera fired American soprano Cheryl Studer from a planned performance of “Der Freischutz.” It was reported that you did the firing.

A: I find that if a singer cannot sing the notes that are written by the composer, it’s useless to pretend that she can. She used to be a very fine singer. Positively thinking, I would like to think she is going through a personal crisis. “Der Freischutz”--it’s a very national, German opera, everybody knows it. It’s like playing “Oklahoma!” If your singer can’t get the notes of “Oklahoma!,” what is the audience going to say? So, she is suing us. Not me, the Bavarian Opera.

Q: Speaking of lawsuits, how do you feel about McDougal’s acquittal?

A: It shows that crime pays sometimes . . . a common thief has convinced a jury that she is right. That is all she is, a common thief. She stole from us. That we spend our money the way we want is not a crime. We were accused of spending our money recklessly. I earn my money by working very hard. What business is it of anybody’s the way I and my wife spend it? It does not give her permission to steal it. [The media] portrayed Nancy as a lonely person--Nancy only stays in Los Angeles when I’m in Israel. Otherwise, she is always on tour with me. It was all lies.

Q: Has the publicity done permanent damage to you?

A: I think it has hurt my wife very much. It is not easy to be a very private person, and then read sheer lies about you. Politicians are maybe used to that, but private people are not.