In a remarkably blunt but fair-minded piece for The Washington Post, the Post's newly appointed classical music critic, Anne Midgette, interviews and looks back over the Washington career of the National Symphony Orchestra's departing music director, Leonard Slatkin.
[Slatkin] skitters across topics [in the interview], anticipating the criticism that may be lurking behind every question, mentioning it, steering away from it, then returning to it to show that he is not steering away from it, until one is left with the impression that outside criticism, despite his protests to the contrary, matters to him very much indeed.
The general impression is that conducting is a difficult métier for a man who describes himself as having been chronically shy in his youth. The particular impression, as Slatkin talks about his 12-year tenure at the head of the National Symphony Orchestra (which concludes with a gala concert tonight), is of encountering someone in the final throes of a failing marriage, going over ground that has been trodden many times before, prodding the scars of old wounds that still have a tired ache.
"It was probably time to go," he says.
"I know inside of me," he adds, "that I could have been better."
[...]
[Slatkin] generally gives the impression of fluency rather than profundity [in his music-making], and the orchestra sometimes seems not to care. He is effective in his signature American pieces because he is best at activity and complexity: Del Tredici, Christopher Rouse. But he is not someone you turn to for profound meditation. His modus operandi is to do a lot, quickly.
[...]
He excels on paper. He is great at coming up with unusual ideas, talking to the audience, sitting in on planning meetings and looking at Web sites in Detroit [where Slatkin will assume the post of music director of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra this fall], glad-handing patrons at fundraisers in St. Louis [where Slatkin was music director of the St. Louis Symphony]. In fact, he is outstanding at all the parts of the music director's job that aren't about making music.
RTWT here.
