LORIN MAAZEL: Beethoven rehearsal

Euro-American conductor LORIN MAAZEL (1930-2014) rehearses the New York Philharmonic in Beethoven's Third Symphony ("Eroica") on a 2006 telecast.
[Very beginning is here: • NEW YORK PHILHARMONIC:... ]

[@michaelanzelino5068]

I find it absolutely amazing, how the conductor can have the different sections of the orchestra bring out, and magnify a part. For instance, the horns, starting at bar 330. The first time we here them play that section @ 9:22, the chromatic line goes unnoticed. Then Maestro points it out and asks for it to be emphasized. Wow! what a difference.

[@JussiTTvanVickTheOperaAddict]

I always felt with Maazel that while it might feel a bit cool and "clinical", you could probably write down every note of the score, it was so clear and precise.

[@lyolevrich]

conductors like maestro Maazel made every time a huge different.I watched a rehearsal with the Wiener Philharmoniker and it was really a lesson....

[@welintomgabriel5546]

I had the pleasure to play with him in 2002 in brazil

[@andreaguarino8207]

How was he? People say he was terrible

[@hectorberlioz1449]

Maazel = great !

[@vincentlombardo9797]

great

[@nicholasfox966]

Not 1990, but in the 2000's, during his tenure as music director.

[@JussiTTvanVickTheOperaAddict]

Right, probably either 2003 or 2006. (it was on the same tape as some '90's stuff). I think I have the beginning of this feature which I will post separately, eventually.

[@FredMas-gt2uh]

He and his wife Israel lived down the street from me when I lived in Connecticut. Great people.Andre Previn and his wife Mia Farro not so .

[@gerontius3]

This is showing Maazel as a string player himself adjusting tone through different bowing techniques. Very interesting.

[@novagerio]

You are absolutely right. Lorin's string & bow knowledge released a plethora of sound, colour and articulation that added clarity in a very complex work like the Eroica, as it did in basically anything he conducted.

[@TimothyReeves]

Phil Myers seen at 2:35. Glenn Dicterow at 4:38

[@orientaldagger6920]

How about the beautiful principal violist of the NYPO Cynthia Phelps at 3:26 ?

[@sjpbrooklyn7699]

Phil Myers’s unparalleled sound was to die for. I also miss Dicterow (but got to sing a Beethoven 9 with him when George Mathews organized a benefit for Pakistani flood victims). Fortunately Phelps is still first chair, but must be getting seasick with the recent shifting around of the string sections.

[@user-rn1lb8sx2c]

Jim Ross Phil smith

[@user-rn1lb8sx2c]

I think a young Matt Muckey

[@JussiTTvanVickTheOperaAddict]

@@user-rn1lb8sx2c Not everyone may know, they are trumpet players?!

[@novagerio]

By the way, the video is awfully off-sync. Could it be fixed please?

[@JussiTTvanVickTheOperaAddict]

Hmmm. I see what you mean. I thought the original was ok; maybe YT does that in the conversion. I'll try to see what I can do! (?)🤨

[@steve.schatz]

It's a funeral procession and interment. Not some kind of intellectual argument or rumination about death.

[@aristideduplessis8151]

Isn't it?

[@violinhunter2]

Good, knowledgeable, musician (like so many other conductors) but not exactly Carlos Kleiber.

[@novagerio]

And what do you know about how Carlos rehearsed? Constructing a concert programme is a huge technical and analytical job that the audience doesn't need to know about.

[@violinhunter2]

@@novagerio Well,... okay. (Actually, I'm a veteran of more than 5,000 rehearsals - playing second fiddle in orchestras. I never knew Kleiber but, with all that experience under my belt, I know a mediocre conductor when I see one.)

[@novagerio]

​@@violinhunter2so, you are calling Lorin Maazel mediocre...well, good for you if you had more than 5.000 rehearsals with far better conductors than Maazel!

[@hectorberlioz1449]

Ridiculous remark about Maazel. He was as great as Carlos Kleiber and had a much bigger repertoire. Maybe Kleiber is even a little bit overrated. Heard him live with the Concertgebouw and they told me he wasn't as good as they had expected. I played with Maazel several times and in his own way he made a deep impression!

[@violinhunter2]

@@hectorberlioz1449 For Maazel, conducting was just a job - that's true of 99% of conductors. Celibidache said all conductors were idiots. I agree with him.

[@Sutherland2]

He was very mean to musicians.

[@blakley42]

I was at a concert where mazell was conducting the Madrid symphony orchestra,I.e. in Madrid. They were playing the Sibelius 2nd symphony, and the orchestra failed to play a pianissimo quietly enough for the maestro (sic), so he shushed the orchestra-twice -audibly. Still not quietly enough, so maazel stomped on the podium. What an asshole… 10:29 L

[@williamsackelariou1860]

They were probably asking for it

[@Sutherland2]

@@blakley42 There's a famous incident when he publicly humiliated Joan Sutherland about a question of style in Mozart. She withdrew from the project he was such a bully and dick. Maazel was a child prodigy who grew up to be bitter and angry. There is NOTHING he conducted that was exemplary. As an adult he was just another conductor. He wanted to be a major star and that failure caused him great bitterness.

[@blakley42]

@@Sutherland2 I never quite understood why Maazel was selected to be the music director of the Cleveland orchestra. Surely, there was someone available who was better suited to lead such an august band. I am reminded , as a Chicago music lover, of the selection of the successor to George Solti: there were apparently approx. five names put before the orchestra, to choose their preference. The story I heard was that Daniel Barenboim was at the bottom of the list. And, of course, we know who got the gig...

[@Sutherland2]

@@blakley42 Yes, he had no inherent suitability for Cleveland. Nor did Barenboim for Chicago. Trying to divine the "thinking" of Orchestra Boards and Selection Committees is futile. They make so many terrible mistakes and they almost NEVER listen to the musicians. Not that players would choose anyone better, but their voices should be part of the process. Every orchestra probably has its tale of the "Music Director from Hell" but certainly Maazel cut a swath of disappointment and dismay wherever he went. I never heard him conduct anything with distinction. He was a stick-waver.

[@stevenj9970]

WAY too many women in that band......

[@kangag3]

So what???

[@stevenj9970]

@@kangag3 lol