Director or Dictator?

The question pulsing in Mexico's musical clearings last week was whether shaggy Composer-Conductor Carlos Chavez was Mexico's No. 1 artistic director--or its artistic dictator.

Twenty years ago Chavez had rounded up musicians from Mexico City dance halls, movie theaters and churches to form Mexico's first symphony orchestra, made the classics almost as well known as La Cucaracha. Following his lead, four more orchestras started up in the provinces. Chavez' troubles began when his friend President Miguel Aleman asked him to help set up an Institute of Fine Arts to direct Mexico's music, art and theater.

Fortnight ago, after Mexico's magazine Manama had published a piece calling him a "musical monopolist" who didn't give young musicians a chance, Chavez roared back. Hot-blooded, he called his assailant "a veritable calumniator ... an infantile mind." Then, last week, two out of Mexico City's three leading critics jumped in. One called Chavez "a cacique [a corrupt political boss] who dominates all musical roads." Another came to his defense: "He's still the best man we've got."

Carlos Chavez' best defense was his record--and the fact that two of the youngsters he was accused of holding back are now conducting two of Mexico's seven symphony orchestras. His conservatory is full of students able for the first time to get complete training without leaving Mexico (although his critics impatiently say that "it hasn't yet produced one first-rate anything"). This fall the Institute will stage three commissioned one-act operas on Mexican themes. The drama department is drawing crowds. Chavez had cannily priced the tickets just under the cheapest movie in town.

Working full-time as a cultural executive, Composer Chavez at 49 has had little time to turn out any more music like his fine, cactus-flavored Indian Symphony or his Antigone Symphony. So now, every fourth week, he skips town with his wife, Pianist Otilia Ortiz, to one of the several places about the country where they have pianos cached, to work undisturbed. By fall he wants to finish a violin concerto, get on with his third symphony. Growls Chavez: "Leisure. I need leisure, as a banker needs leisure to run his business."

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