Waiting for Mr. Right

The Israel Philharmonic Orchestra is 30 years old, and has never known the security of a permanent conductor. Not that nobody will have it. The players just happen to be finicky, preferring to draw on an international pool of guest conductors until Mr. Right comes along. This has not always been easy. Beyond the customary growing pains, the orchestra has also had to weather the ravages of three wars, offering visiting maestros such inducements as "the largest and most luxurious air-raid shelter in the Near East, with excellent acoustics." Leonard Bernstein conducted one concert during an attack by Egyptian bombers in 1948; Sir Malcolm Sargent, traveling to a performance in Jerusalem in 1937, was nearly picked off by an Arab sniper. Often the orchestra traveled in armored cars, was so hard pressed on one occasion that it played a series of concerts without a conductor. But the Israel Philharmonic thrived--so well, in fact, that today it has the largest number of subscribers (32,600) and one of the longest seasons (205 performances) of any symphony in the world.

The latest guest attraction is the Los Angeles Philharmonic's brilliant young conductor Zubin Mehta, who is leading the Israelis through a schedule of 21 concerts over a period of 24 days, shuttling between Haifa, Tel Aviv and Jerusalem like a rush-hour commuter. Under Mehta's spirited attack, the orchestra's strings have bloomed into full brilliancy. Though staunchly rooted in the classics, the Israeli audiences received his reading of Bartok's First Piano Concerto, with Israeli Pianist Daniel Barenboim, as enthusiastically as they do their Brahms. Mehta was equally successful with Ravel's Daphnis et Chloe Suites, a piece that, until a few years ago, the orchestra could barely manage, owing to a marked deficiency in the brass and woodwinds sections. The short-windedness has since been cured by luring foreign talent--for example, Trombonist Ray Parnes from the Pittsburgh Symphony--with guarantees of rent-free $30,000 homes. Now, says Mehta, "the Israel Philharmonic stands up with the best in Europe, and in the strings it is superior to most orchestras in the U.S. It has virtuosity and temperament."

Brain Trust. Lots of temperament. The orchestra is a cooperative: the musicians set their own salaries (based, among other things, on the number of family dependents rather than talent), own a $500,000 guesthouse for visiting artists as well as half-interest in the $2,800,000 Mann Auditorium in Tel Aviv, their permanent home. This, and the freedom from the discipline of a permanent conductor, has nurtured a strong streak of independence. "If the orchestra has any shortcomings," explains Mehta, "it is in its tendency toward musical anarchy. At rehearsals you suddenly find yourself in the middle of a brain trust over how a phrase should be played. Everyone has a suggestion, and everyone thinks that the way he played it back in Poland is the only way." In addition, the parade of guest conductors has turned the players into musical chameleons, denied them a distinctive style that they can call their own. Says one flutist: "Under Paul Paray we play the Leonore Overture in eleven minutes; under Josef Krips we do it in 15 minutes."

That the orchestra has been so successful despite these drawbacks is due chiefly to Zvi Haftel, 54, concertmaster and chief wheedler-needier. Haftel was among the original 72 musicians, including 20 concertmasters and first-desk players, recruited in 1935 from the best European ensembles by Violinist Bronislaw Huberman, founder of the orchestra. Toscanini, as a snub to Hitler, conducted the debut performance of the refugee orchestra in 1936. But the orchestra foundered under Huberman until 1946, when Haftel, leading a musicians' mutiny, took over.

Flame Keeper. In the years since, Haftel has brought virtually all the world's top soloists to Israel, started a highly successful opera and ballet program, increased the players' average salary from $90 to $500 a month, launched the orchestra on tours of the world's concert halls. He is board of directors, chaplain, negotiator, booking agent and benevolent, all-round dictator all at once. In the band room the players jokingly refer to him as their "Jimmy Hoffa." Haftel, who draws a salary of only $70 a month more than the lowest-paid fiddler, has turned down several offers from major U.S. orchestras. His duty, as he sees it, is to remain as the orchestra's shamas (synagogue caretaker), keeper of the flame until Mr. Right comes along.

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