6 New York Philharmonic

Green RoomBy Kenneth LaFave

Zubin Mehta’s“Sentimental” ReturnThis month the Philharmonic’s former Music Directorleads a program that looks back to their first collaboration, and forward, to a U.S. premiere.

F ew conductor-orchestra relationships have enjoyed a

span of five decades, but Zubin Mehta’s New York

Philharmonic performances this month mark nearly 49

years since conductor and orchestra first met. It was love at first

note in the summer of 1960, when Mr. Mehta led the Philharmonic

in Bartók’s Concerto for Orchestra at Lewisohn Stadium, then New

York’s summer cultural haven. History repeats itself this March 18

through 21, when he once again conducts the Orchestra in Bartók’s

masterful exploration of orchestral potential.

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“It is a sentimental piece for me,” Mr.Mehta says. “Playing the Bartók at LewisohnStadium endeared the Orchestra to me.When I first conducted it as the Philhar-monic’s Music Director, many of the musi-cians reminded me of the 1960 performance.”

As one of the only classical musiciansboth to win a Kennedy Center Honor andto have a muppet named after him (“ZubinBeck-messer”), Mr. Mehta is the mostprom-inent living conductor to enjoy acrossover career with pop culture presence,having appeared with Andrea Bocelli andin a Frank Zappa song. His New York Phil-harmonic years helped establish ZubinMehta as a name beyond the traditionalclassical music community.

His tenure as the Philharmonic’s MusicDirector, from 1978 to 1991, was thelongest of any conductor. He has sinceserved as Music Director for Life of theIsrael Philharmonic Orchestra (IPO) andhas enjoyed one of the busiest and mostvisible guest-conducting careers on theplanet. Last month Mr. Mehta was atCarnegie Hall leading the Vienna Philhar-monic; next month it’s off to Beijing andMumbai (the former Bombay, and the con-

ductor’s hometown), and then Florence,Italy, for Wagner’s Götterdämmerung. Still,he consistently makes room for the NewYork Philharmonic on his dance card.

“I have always loved this Orchestra, andthe 13 wonderful years I had as Music Direc-tor gave me many memories,” Mr. Mehtasays. Among the memories that pour outare of the once-a-year concerts at Harlem’sAbyssinian Baptist Church, where thePhilharmonic played for free as a serviceto the community; the Philharmonic’s10,000th concert, when he conductedMahler’s Second; and a performance ofBruckner’s Eighth at Teatro Colón in BuenosAires, when the Orchestra “went beyonditself.” The Concerts in the Parks were invig-orating for their sheer energy: “You wouldnot get technically perfect performancesin the parks, but huge crowds adoring theOrchestra — that makes a lot of difference.”

New music was also a vital part ofZubin Mehta’s time as Music Director,including in the Horizons series of the1980s. “The Philharmonic has always beena standard-bearer for new music,” he notes.“Jacob [Druckman, who was Composer-in-Residence at the time] was a great judge of

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Zubin Mehta conducting theNew York Philharmonic in 2007

the piles of scores that landed on his desk.”Mr. Mehta is still committed to new music,and the young composer highest on his current list of favorites is Avner Dorman,whose Spices, Perfumes, Toxins! for percus-sion duo and orchestra will open Mr.Mehta’s March Philharmonic program.

The 33-year-old composer, son of theIPO’s principal bassoonist, credits ZubinMehta with being “a big inspiration.” Mr.Mehta conducted the IPO in Dorman’sVariations Without a Theme in 2003.Around that time he auditioned a percus-sion duo called PercaDu, who played apiece by Dorman that so impressed Mr.Mehta that he threw his support behind acommission for the composer to write theduo a full-fledged concerto: Spices, Perfumes,Toxins! was premiered by the IPO in 2006.

Of this score, which will see its U.S. pre-miere in the upcoming Philharmonic per-formances, Mr. Mehta says, “This music isjust going to sweep the audience. It hasinvention, it’s so rich. There’s no eightbars the same. The Indian influence in thefirst movement makes me feel at home. The Middle Eastern atmosphere of the

second movement is just magical, and thethird movement is a tour de force.”

The New York Philharmonic was with-out a Mehta at the helm as of 1991, but thename has returned to the Orchestra’smasthead in the person of Zarin Mehta,Zubin’s brother, who was named thePhilharmonic’s Executive Director in2000, and President in 2004. Zubin boasts:“As a chartered accountant, my brothercan balance the books, but since he grewup in our father’s home, he has the uniquequality of knowing a lot about music.”

Their father, Mehli Mehta — the lateviolinist, conductor, and founder of theBombay Symphony Orchestra — “was alasting influence from my earliest days,”Zubin Mehta recalls. “Later I went toVienna and studied with Hans Swarowsky.These two gentlemen shaped me. It wasmy father’s undying love for music and hisinner discipline that influenced me most. Ihope I have integrated some of that disci-pline in myself.”

Kenneth LaFave composes and writes about music.

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Zubin Mehta (right) withAvner Dorman (second fromleft) and Adi Morag (left) andTomer Yariv of PercaDu

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