Perfection: Few musicians seem closer to it than Herbert Blomstedt, music director of the San Francisco Symphony. His baton makes no ambiguous movement. His every gesture commands the players’ attention to precision in this most important musical moment.
Off the podium, the trim, well-pressed maestro carries with him that same air of control. Appearing in a hotel lobby for an interview with CT, he looks as if his clothes were pinned taut by a catalog photographer. Perhaps his air of serenity and command is the result of his spartan lifestyle—and lots of hard work.
But no one is more conscious of his imperfections than Blomstedt himself. As a world-class conductor, whose name normally nasty critics speak with reverence, Blomstedt (pronounced Bloomstet) takes a dim view of his celebrity. In precise English he admits, “I always feel I have achieved just a small fraction of what I really want.
“And I never read reviews. They are dangerous. If they are good, you might start to think they are true—and think you are somebody and stop working. If they are bad, it gets you upset and you think you are nobody, you have no talent; that also puts the brake on your ability to make progress.”
Where Is Your Loyalty?
Blomstedt takes others with extreme seriousness, however. He describes the importance of sorting out a musician’s conflicting loyalties: the composer, traditions of playing, the patterns set by great conductors of the past, the tastes of the public, the desires of the critics, the artist’s own feelings, his reputation—and his own artistic integrity.
For example, in a recent guest appearance in Munich, the orchestra grumbled, but—in conducting Beethoven’s ninth symphony—Blomstedt insisted on ignoring both tradition and the players’ and singers’ comfort to follow the composer’s intent. “Where is your loyalty?” he asks. “To please the singers, or to please the composer?”
“For the Christian this all comes more easily into shape,” he says, “because we have one loyalty that is first. There is God,” he says, his hand above his head. “There is the composer,” lowering his hand a little. Then dropping his hand to the table, “And then all the others; and at the bottom, myself.”
Blomstedt finds this attitude very natural for a Christian. “My respect for the composers is so total, I am happy to be their servant. We all serve in different capacities. Some have more responsibility than others, but our basic function is all the same. We are servants.” As one critic wrote, “Blomstedt’s dedication to music as a kind of high moral responsibility can speak forcefully through his performances.”
A Peacemaking Occupation
Before coming to the San Francisco Symphony in 1985, Blomstedt had a long association with the world’s oldest orchestra, the Dresden Staatskapelle, founded in 1548. When a vacancy occured with the Dresden orchestra, the East German state attempted to appoint a conductor from a communist country. But nowhere in the Eastern Bloc could they find a director who could command the complete respect of this venerable orchestra’s players. Blomstedt’s experience as a Western Christian in East Germany was a test of his faith and witness.
Even in totalitarian states, says Blomstedt, talent can have its way. Thus the state bowed—slowly and cautiously—to the players’ demands. So they imported him—an American-born Swedish Christian from a capitalist country—to lead an organization that is the pride of an atheistic and communist society.
At first he was watched carefully. His driver picked him up for rehearsals and returned him afterward to his apartment. His careful, upright life eventually won him a contract, which included the right to refrain from work on his Sabbath—another anomaly in a country that may persecute those who live their religion publicly.
Did he ever feel used by East Germany? “Never,” he says. “I think they were happy, of course, to show the world that a collaboration between a capitalist musician and a socialist-operated orchestra is possible. But that’s a peacemaking occupation,” he says.
Nevertheless, despite great respect for the musicians, the people, and the artistic traditions of Dresden, Blomstedt feels deeply for Christians there who suffer for their faith: believers who as teens refuse to make a pledge to the state “in words no Christian can accept,” and are forever excluded from universities and good careers. He contrasts their steadfastness with much of the Christianity he meets in America. “I find the religion I meet in this country is often quite formalistic and polite. But in East Germany, those who dare profess Christianity, and live it, take a great risk, and it tends to make them more true to their beliefs.”
Full-Blooded Music
At the San Francisco Symphony, Blomstedt champions musicians liberated in 1980 from the bondage of playing as both a symphony and an opera orchestra. “They know how good they are. The orchestra has very good morale, and that explodes into music that is full-blooded.” Blomstedt is now aggressively pursuing the symphony’s advancement. In addition to national and overseas tours, a ten-record exclusive recording contract was signed with London/Decca. Two discs were released in 1988.
If Herbert Blomstedt sounds as if his heart is in San Francisco, that is true. But he does nothing without putting his whole heart behind it, giving himself fully to his musicians, his listeners, his beloved composers, and his God.
By David Neff.
ARTBRIEFS
PG or not PG?
What does it take to make or break a movie? A chance to reach the PG audience for one—and a single four-letter word will do the trick. But the producers of Dakota—a recent release starring Lou Diamond Phillips—chose to risk dooming their film to a G rating rather than include just one swearword.
“They told us we could ensure the PG rating by using it once,” coproducer Sandra Kuntz of the Dallas-based Kuntz Brothers said in a recent interview. “But we didn’t want to compromise.”
Because most people think G movies are strictly kid stuff, major movie distributors run from G movies. So Kuntz Brothers, who usually make films for the Christian rental market, find it difficult to place family films with a message on the general market, despite the apparent interest in such films.
“People say they want something,” Kuntz says, “but what they say they want and what they pay to see are two different things.”
In the end, Dakota received the PG rating, although its producers aren’t sure why. Perhaps it was the traumatic fall of one character from a water tower. Or maybe it was the footage of a horse giving birth to a wobble-legged foal.
“There’s a lot we don’t know about that whole system,” Kuntz says. “I have my suspicions, but I don’t know.”
Invading Russia
Picture 8,000 screaming Soviets. Are you thinking of tanks and soldiers madly scrambling across a battlefield?
Tom Newman, president of Tulsa-based Impact Productions, sees another picture: the 8,000 screaming fans crammed into the Leningrad Sports Complex last September to see “Toy-maker’s Dream,” a hodgepodge of ballet, modern dance, karate, acrobatics, pyrotechnics, and the kitchen sink, all interwoven to communicate the gospel.
“It totally blew the Soviets away,” Newman told CT. “They’ve never seen a collaboration of these art forms before.” For two weeks last year, Newman’s group toured the USSR and performed its dramatic dance presentation before more than 75,000 Soviet citizens. His group also performs about 200 shows per year throughout the United States.
Although they were forbidden to present the gospel overtly in the USSR, the show’s message came through loud and clear, even in Russian. “I’ve been an atheist all my life,” one viewer told Newman, “I can’t understand how I can be so confused after only one hour.”
View from Down Under
Chances are, not every Israelite knew what was going on when frogs invaded ancient Egypt, when the Red Sea parted, or when all there was to eat was manna. What about the guy nowhere near the center of action who was nevertheless swept along for the ride?
In One Two Three Four Five (the title refers to the books of Moses), playwright Larry Gelbart (the writer who brought “M*A*S*H” to television) comically explores what it might have been like for those ancient Jews who were not singled out for individual revelation or guidance—much less a simple explanation of what was going on.
The play, which ran through February 3 at the Manhattan Theater Club, is not intended to poke fun at the Bible. “The Bible is not funny,” Gelbart told the New York Times in December when the play was still a work-in-progress. “It’s not meant to be funny, and it succeeds. I find it hard to do comedies about funny things.”
By Dan Coran.
