Site hosted by Angelfire.com: Build your free website today!

Herbert Van Karajan, Famous Conductor

San Francisco Chronicle (CA) - July 18, 1989

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Deceased Name: LEGACY OF 800 RECORDINGS Karajan Left Nothing to Chance

There was no conductor in this era whose death would have had more historical significance than Herbert von Karajan's. The impact was not diminished by his retirement just three months ago from the unprecedented post he had held since 1955 as the Berlin Philharmonic's "conductor for life." In that role, he built that orchestra to preeminence and produced with it - and also with the Vienna Philharmonic and London Philharmonic - over 800 recordings that are more than a legacy. They constitute a document of an era and its commitment to the treasuring of the great symphonic repertory and tradition. The Karajan special strengths are there, the late romantic works of Wagner, Strauss, Bruckner and Mahler, the Mozart of course, and the Beethoven cycle that he recorded complete four times. The music he made has a possessive quality, tempos on the bright side, rhythm crisp and buoyant, the orchestral sonority rich, dark and intense, typically and surpassably so when it was the Berlin orchestra. Many critical listeners took exception to some of his interpretations, in particular objecting to the glibness that developed as he kept reworking the repertory and a certain machined finish was apparent. Even then, the most severe critics had to acknowledge the brilliance and the mastery of this figure who simply dominated the European musical scene. Inspired by Toscanini Mastery was the goal and key factor for the man. At the sheerly musical level, that entailed a meticulous attention for detail that may have surpassed that of Toscanini, who figured largely as an inspirational figure for Karajan. The interpretations went far beyond literalism of course, for there was a great vein of mysticism in Karajan, as a human and as a musician, and this comes into his Wagner, his Bruckner, and much else of the music he made. Control of detail by Karajan extended far beyond rehearsing and performing music. His insuperable will brought him to the point where he became as close to being a musical emperor as anyone ever has. In that he exceeded even Wagner, for the Karajan reign extended over vast dominions that included the Salzburg Festival, the Vienna State Opera (up to 1964), the Bayreuth Festival periodically and the orchestras he led in London, Vienna and Berlin, meanwhile, ringing the world in his influence through the undiminished flow of recordings, the sale of which brought him royalties, it has been estimated, of $6 million annually. Source of Controversy All the while controversy and discord never ceased. Karajan invited it from the outset, in the launching of a career that depended on his all-too-early and eager membership in the Nazi party, from 1933, and the active role he played associating himself with that regime. Even though Karajan never freely renounced that period but simply attributed it to "careerism" on his part, his musical gifts were simply too overwhelming to hinder him despite such a past. His star continued to rise, and as the disputes and controversies developed -his fight and break with the Vienna Philharmonic, his battles with the Salzburg Festival board - these very jousts, whatever the outcome, seemed to reinforce his hegemony. When Karajan had his greatest confrontation with the Berlin Philharmonic, though he had to back down, it still came out as if the emperor remained in charge. That was the occasion in 1982 of his hiring of a 23-year-old woman, Sabine Meyer, as associate principal clarinet, over the historic and prejudicial resistance of that self-governing orchestra. It was an excoriating struggle which Karajan eventually lost - Meyer finally withdrew - but not before Karajan had replaced the Ber lin orchestra with the Vienna Philharmonic at the Salzburg Festival that year. All the while, through this career coursing through the musical heavens, Karajan was presenting a public personage of not simply total authority but of physical and social glamour. He skied, he rode, he piloted planes and yachts, drove hot sports cars, leading the high-powered life. Control was everything, It was manifested in the corporations set up to govern and administer his far-reaching affairs, as for example, the opera films that he conducted, directed and produced and recorded in a concentrated industry characteristic of the man's drive to control and shape each musical project in its entirety. He was, in fact, working on such a production, of Verdi's "Un Ballo in Maschera," eight hours a day when he was stricken Sunday at his home in Austria with a heart attack that proved fatal. He was 81. He had survived a series of illnesses in the last 20 years of his life, a stroke, back operations, circulation problems, even Lyme disease that forced him to cancel a tour to the United States and Tokyo in 1986. But nothing could lay this indomitably willful man low, short of a catastrophic blow. Just 6 1/2 years ago, when he was conducting the Berlin Philharmonic in a concert tour of the United States, he appeared as though he would hardly last a few months, perhaps not even the tour. In the Ambassador Auditorium in Pasadena, he crept to the podium almost doubled over, proudly declined assistance in mounting the podium, and then proceeded to lead the performance with barely perceptible motions. It seemed for all the world as if the concertmaster and principal cellist were really leading - and of all mountainous works, Strauss' "An Alpine Symphony." Conducting With Power The performance was a triumph. The music mounted and soared on an unbelievably long line, the Berlin Philharmonic pouring out the work as it is rarely heard, perhaps only this way and under these auspices. What we had witnessed was what Karajan had always remarked - that the actual physical beat and gestures were not of crucial importance. He was conducting with his powerful personality, with the interpretation he had already imprinted on these musicians, with his deep, penetrating and hard eyes. Karajan went on conducting, shaping, controlling, dictating absolutely, for almost seven more years as the music world fussed and guessed and worried over his possible successor at Berlin. He must have loved this protracted sparring and speculating - in fact, he certainly stimulated and to a large extent caused it. Just a year and a half ago, a transparently cosmetic documentary video on "Karajan in Salzburg" was produced and distributed by Columbia Artists Management. It almost succeeded in making the 79-year-old man seem as energetic and youthful as the Karajan of 50. Of course, there was no doubt that his mind and direction were behind every one of the carefully contrived "candid" rehearsal and conversation scenes. In it, there was a telling moment when he was asked how things would be affected if he were to die, "I would sit up there with a big telescope and watch and listen to what is going on. What else can one do . . . but I must say, I have no fear of it whatsoever." With a will as powerful as his, it is just conceivable that he will be trying to do a lot more than just sit up there and watch and listen. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- San Francisco Chronicle (CA) Date: July 18, 1989 Author: Robert Commanday, Chronicle Music Critic Edition: FINAL Page: E2 Record Number: 591356 Copyright (c) 1989 The Chronicle Publishing Co.