As I understand and have experienced, strikes are pretty common in Italy, but I wonder, how often, if at all, do Italian musicians strike?
Chris --- Fred Baucom <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > April 4, 2005Rebellion Made Fall of Muti InevitableBy JAMES R. OESTREICH > > With the attention of the world focused squarely on Rome over the weekend, > you may have missed what happened in Milan on Saturday: the culmination of > another drama of consuming national interest in Italy. > > After weeks of vitriolic public wrangling, the renowned Italian conductor > Riccardo Muti, who had been music director of the famous opera house Teatro > Alla Scala for 19 years, gave in to the demands of the house's orchestra and > workers, and announced his resignation. Though simmering tensions rose to a > boil only in mid-February, Mr. Muti's departure had come to seem inevitable. > The only real questions were the timing and whether Mr. Muti or the Scala > orchestra would finally force the issue. > > If Mr. Muti, who continues to turn down requests for interviews, was trying > to bury the news, he could hardly have chosen a better moment. But it doesn't > seem his style. The 63-year-old Mr. Muti has never shunned the spotlight, > whether in triumph or in conflict. It seems more likely, given his intense > pride, that he was seizing perhaps the last opportunity to leave more or less > on his own terms. > > He was scheduled to begin rehearsals today with the Filarmonica Della Scala, > the theater's orchestra, for concerts scheduled later this week, and many > were convinced, despite assurances to the contrary, that the orchestra would > strike, as it has done repeatedly in recent weeks. (Those concerts are now in > jeopardy, along with stage productions to have been conducted by Mr. Muti.) > He may have chosen to head the orchestra off at the pass. > > Then again, the intensely proud Mr. Muti may simply have been worn down by > unrelenting attacks in the media. Among the more recent, the influential > daily Il Foglio described him as a tyrant and an egomaniac. It also said that > he had a bad international reputation both as a conductor and as someone to > work with, a recurrent charge that has people mystified from the Philadelphia > Orchestra, where he was music director from 1980 to 1992, to the Vienna > Philharmonic, which he is to conduct at La Scala next month. > > The battle was touched off in February by what the orchestra saw as Mr. > Muti's heavy hand behind the ouster of Carlo Fontana, La Scala's former > general manager, and his replacement by Mauro Meli, the former director of > its theater division. The orchestra sought not only Mr. Muti's departure but > also Mr. Meli's. > > "We don't want Meli because he was Muti's page," Sandro Malatesta, a longtime > trumpeter in the Filarmonica, said yesterday. > > Mr. Meli, for his part, says he has no plans to leave. "Fortunately, it's not > the unions who decide on management decisions," he said. "It's not true that > we make decisions after deliberating with the unions. They were never > involved before." > > Of his immediate job prospects, he added, "I'm very unworried." > > So the impasse remains, with the orchestra saying it will continue to strike > the first performance of each production. But at least some players may have > begun to wonder whether they have thrown out the baby but not the bathwater. > > The orchestra, said Danilo Rossi, a violist, had not initially wanted Mr. > Muti's resignation. "If Meli had stepped down before," he added, "we would > never have arrived at this point." The players, he said, are "madder than > before." > > Both Mr. Meli and the players acknowledge that Mr. Muti will be hard to > replace. "It hurts just to think about it," Mr. Meli said, adding that he > hoped that the Scala board, at an emergency meeting called for today, might > persuade Mr. Muti to remain. > > Early speculation on a successor focuses on three Italian maestros, all > heavily committed elsewhere: Riccardo Chailly, Antonio Pappano and Daniele > Gatti. Whoever it may be, in the current politically charged climate, he had > better watch his back. > > > > Elisabetta Povoledo contributed reporting from Rome for this article. > > _______________________________________________ > post: horn@music.memphis.edu > unsubscribe or set options at > http://music.memphis.edu/mailman/options/horn/tedesccj%40yahoo.com > __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com _______________________________________________ post: horn@music.memphis.edu unsubscribe or set options at http://music.memphis.edu/mailman/options/horn/archive%40jab.org
