Don't panic per the title, as this isn't about tea party bigots and their recent "contract on America" (although don't get smug - they could still *#(% us all over this November, if we don't stick together no matter what - but 3CM digresses, as usual).
That aside, the quote to launch tonight's SNLC is one attributed to Samuel Goldwyn:
"A verbal contract isn't worth the paper it's printed on."
While self doesn't have time (loser, he) to dissect the subtleties inherent in that "Goldwyn-ism", it does come to mind because of a developing crisis at a major Boston cultural institution, namely the Boston Symphony Orchestra (BSO). The crisis involves James Levine, the BSO's Music Director since 2004. His current contract is through 2012, as noted here. Except that there's a fly in the ointment....
Over the last few years, Levine, who is 66, has been suffering health problems that have caused him to pull out of a lot of concert dates with the BSO, as well the Metropolitan Opera ("the Met"), where he is also music director. In the Boston situation, the fly in the ointment is that at the time when the BSO announced Levine's contract extension, he apparently didn't sign on the dotted line, as Geoff Edgers of the Boston Globe has reported last week:
"As music director James Levine prepares for back surgery that could keep him from taking the podium at Tanglewood this summer, frustrations are building within the orchestra, and a stunning detail has emerged: Levine has no signed contract with the BSO.
The orchestra penned a contract extension more than a year ago to extend Levine’s tenure through 2012, but BSO officials say Levine never signed the paperwork."
Interestingly, in the same article, Edgers notes:
"Levine does have a signed contract with the Met, extending 'far into the future,' said spokesman Peter Clark."
This is a bit of a contrast with a bit of wailing and gnashing, journalistically speaking, by the NYT's Anthony Tommasini back in April 2005 when he compared Levine's programming and vision between Boston and the Met, and thought that Boston was coming out on top, in terms of creative vision:
".....if you compare the intensity and vision he took to the Boston Symphony this season with those of his recent tenure at the Met, and especially if you look ahead to the Met's timid plans for next season, you have to conclude that Mr. Levine is channeling most of his creative energy into his Boston post."
Just about a year later, however, in March 2006, an accident on stage in Boston may well have set off the chain of events leading to the recent simmering crisis:
"Mr. Levine fell on Wednesday as he was leaving the stage during a rapturous ovation for the performance of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony that he had just conducted. He was in the vicinity of the viola section when he tripped, Mark Volpe, the managing director of the orchestra, said in a telephone interview. The audience gasped, he added: 'All the air got sucked out of the hall, and then — dead silence.'
Recurring health troubles have asserted themselves since, as James Barron in the NYT recently noted:
"This is hardly the first time recently that Mr. Levine, who has been a centerpiece at the Met for nearly 40 years, has been absent because of health problems. The surgery for the herniated disk last fall cost him several performances of Tosca and of the Richard Strauss opera Der Rosenkavalier. The year before, he had had a cancerous kidney cyst removed. Two years before, he had rotator-cuff surgery to fix lingering problems from an onstage fall in Boston. (He fell during the applause after a performance.) He has also had hand tremors from time to time and sciatica."
One article about that kidney cyst surgery is here by Daniel J. Wakin of the NYT. If you've ever seen Levine on TV, or at some of the Metropolitan Opera's digital opera transmissions into movie theaters, you'll see that he's not in the best shape, if only noticing his weight and kind of pudgy appearance. He has also had to sit on a stool to conduct for some years now, rather than stand, as most conductors do. Usually, sitting in a chair is for conductors of a "certain generation", such as I saw recently with Andre Previn (review here, for those who care), who's in his 80th year (or thereabouts).
Plus, Levine is artistically in charge of two of America's biggest classical music organizations. Leading one of them would be tough enough, let alone both. In that 2005 commentary, Tommasini sort of crowed at people who thought that Levine couldn't handle both. However, in a commentary this week, Tommasini may be ever so gently starting to shift his tone:
"At some point the absence of the music director of an opera company or a major orchestra — even from day-to-day performances, let alone major artistic initiatives — becomes debilitating for the institution. That point may have arrived, certainly at the Boston Symphony and possibly at the Met.
Since it was announced last month that Mr. Levine, 66, must undergo surgery for a painful herniated disc, Mark Volpe, the managing director of the Boston Symphony, and Peter Gelb, the general manager of the Met, have made candid statements about the need to have serious talks with Mr. Levine to assess what he can realistically commit to."
One big Boston project that fell through, on Levine's side, was a chance for him to conduct a complete Beethoven symphony cycle. In classical-music land, a Beethoven cycle is a "so what?" kind of thing, except, per Tommasini:
"Last fall he was to have conducted all nine Beethoven symphonies with the Boston Symphony. A Beethoven symphony cycle is hardly innovative programming, but somehow, during his long career, Mr. Levine had never conducted the complete works. He sold the project to the management as a chance for him and his orchestra to make a statement. The performances were to be recorded live, in hopes of releasing a complete set of recordings."
Well, guess what happened:
"Mr. Levine missed all the Beethoven concerts because of spinal surgery. The project became simply another run-through of staples with a roster of guest conductors."
I used the phrase "ever so gently" with respect to Tommasini because he, as well as all the other NYT classical writers, have been pretty deferential over the years to Levine. Levine is one of the most powerful and influential figures in classical music. As the artistic leader of the most prominent opera house in the US, a lot of opera musicians' careers can swing on his whim. You don't want to cross that kind of power (unless, of course, you're a loser - hence we have Loser's Club). Being the musical leader at the Met for nearly 4 decades gives one that kind of influence, and hence the general deference towards Levine in NYC.
By contrast, Geoff Edgers' article comes out with journalistic guns blazing, in both the title and the opening sentence:
"Levine’s BSO future may be in doubt
Will the Boston Symphony Orchestra sever ties with its famed maestro?"
It says something that it's easier to pile on Levine now, when he's down and in perhaps less of a position to hit back, at least right away. OTOH, in the context of his power and influence in classical music, there's good practical reason why piling on hasn't happened, at least this much in public, earlier. Even now, Tommasini treads gingerly, at both the beginning of the article and at the end:
"No one is more frustrated over the serious health problems James Levine has struggled with since 2006 than Mr. Levine himself, as he has indicated in numerous interviews and news releases. For six years he has been juggling demanding music directorships at the Metropolitan Opera and the Boston Symphony Orchestra. But because of various surgical procedures and injuries requiring long recuperative periods, he has missed months of accumulated performances at each institution, not just in Boston and New York but on American and international tours......
It would be hard for even a completely healthy and tireless conductor to hold down these two directorships. At the very least, Mr. Levine may have to choose. If not, sadly, the choice may be made for him."
Of course, the first concern is that he gets well soon. After all, no one with a career like that wants to have health problems and not be able to do the work that he loves. But if he does get well fast, then (and granted, my own hypocrisy is showing, since I'm far from being Mr. Picture-of-Perfect-Health, or knowing how to have a happy life) he needs to take better care of himself, so that he can function well at both the BSO and the Met. Levine also needs to decide whether he wants to sign on the dotted line in Boston, at least officially through 2012. There's still no word yet that he's actually done so. We shall see.
Still here? ;) Well, if so, you know what to do below regarding the usual SNLC protocol, namely your loser stories of the week.....