Zubin Mehta | |
|---|---|
.jpg) Mehta in 2011. | |
| Born | (1936-04-29)29 April 1936 (age 89) |
| Occupation | Conductor |
| Years active | 1958–present |
| Known for | Directing and conducting: Montreal Symphony Orchestra; Los Angeles Philharmonic; New York Philharmonic; Israel Philharmonic Orchestra |
| Spouses | |
| Children | 4 |
| Father | Mehli Mehta |
| Relatives | Zarin Mehta (brother) Bejun Mehta (distant relative) |
| Website | zubinmehta.net |
Zubin Mehta (born 29 April 1936) is an Indian conductor of Western classical music. He is music director emeritus of theIsrael Philharmonic Orchestra (IPO) and conductoremeritus of theLos Angeles Philharmonic.
Mehta's father was the founder of the Bombay Symphony Orchestra, and Mehta received his early musical education from him. When he was 18, he enrolled in theVienna state music academy, from which he graduated after three years with a diploma as a conductor. He began winning international competitions and conducted theRoyal Liverpool Philharmonic at the age of 21. Beginning in the 1960s, Mehta gained experience by substituting for celebrated maestros throughout the world.
Mehta was music director of theMontreal Symphony Orchestra from 1961 to 1967 and of the Los Angeles Philharmonic from 1962 to 1978, the youngest music director ever for any major North American orchestra. In 1969, he was appointed Music Adviser to theIsrael Philharmonic Orchestra and in 1981 he became its Music Director for Life. From 1978 to 1991, Mehta was music director of theNew York Philharmonic. He was chief conductor of theMaggio Musicale Fiorentino inFlorence from 1985 to 2017.
He is an honorary citizen of both Florence andTel Aviv and was made an honorary member of theVienna State Opera in 1997 and of theBavarian State Opera in 2006. The title of Honorary Conductor was bestowed on him by numerous orchestras throughout the world. More recently, Mehta made several tours with the Bavarian State Opera and kept up a busy schedule of guest conducting appearances. In December 2006, he received theKennedy Center Honor and in October 2008 he was honored by the Japanese Imperial Family with thePraemium Imperiale. In 2016, Mehta was appointed Honorary Conductor of theTeatro San Carlo, Naples.
Mehta was a member of the executive committee of the Writers and Artists for Peace in the Middle East, a pro-Israel group.[1]
Mehta was born into aParsi family inBombay (now Mumbai), India, during theBritish Raj, the older son ofMehli (1908–2002) and Tehmina (Daruvala) Mehta.[2][3] His native language isGujarati.[4] His father was a self-taughtviolinist who founded and conducted theBombay Symphony Orchestra and later theAmerican Youth Symphony, which he conducted for 33 years after moving toLos Angeles. His father had previously lived in New York to study withviolinistIvan Galamian, a noted teacher who also taughtItzhak Perlman andPinchas Zukerman. His father returned to Bombay as an accomplished violinist of the Russian school. Mehta has said that on many occasions when he conducts in the U.S., someone approaches him to say, "You don't know how much I loved your father!"[2]
Mehta has described his childhood as surrounded by music at home all the time, and has said he probably learned to speak Gujarati and sing around the same time. He says his father had a strong influence on him, and he listened to his quartet daily after his father returned from the US after the Second World War.[5] Mehta was first taught to play violin and piano by his father. When he reached his early teens, his father allowed him to lead sectional rehearsals of the Bombay Symphony, and at sixteen, he was conducting the full orchestra during rehearsals.[6]
Mehta graduated fromSt. Mary's School, Mumbai and went on to study medicine atSt. Xavier's College, Mumbai, at the urging of his mother, who wanted him to take up a profession more "respectable" than music.[6] At age eighteen, he dropped out after two years to move to Vienna, one of Europe's music centers, in order to study music underHans Swarowsky at thestate music academy.[6] He lived on $75 per month, and was a contemporary of conductorClaudio Abbado and conductor-pianistDaniel Barenboim.
He remained at the academy for three years, during which time he also studied thedouble bass, which he played in theVienna Chamber Orchestra.[6] Swarowsky recognized Mehta's abilities early on, describing him as a "demoniac conductor" who "had it all".[7] While still a student, after theHungarian Revolution of 1956, he organized a student orchestra in seven days and conducted it in a concert at a refugee camp outside Vienna.[7]
Mehta graduated in 1957 when he was 21 with a diploma in conducting.[6] In 1958, he entered the Liverpool International Conductor's Competition with 100 contestants and took first prize. The prize included a year's contract as associate conductor of theRoyal Liverpool Philharmonic, which he conducted in 14 concerts, all of which received rave reviews.[6]
He then was a third-place prizewinner at the summer academy at theTanglewood Music Center in Massachusetts.[8] At that competition he attracted the notice ofCharles Munch, then the conductor of theBoston Symphony, who later helped his career.[6] In 1958, he boldly programmed an all-Schoenberg concert, which did so well that he accepted further bookings.[7] That same year he also married a Canadian voice student, Carmen Lasky, whom he met in Vienna.[7]
During 1960 and 1961, Mehta was asked to substitute for celebrated maestros throughout the world, receiving high critical acclaim for most of those concerts.[7] In 1960, he conducted a series for theVienna Symphony and later that summer made his New York conducting debut leading theNew York Philharmonic.[6]
[Mehta] has the capacity to control every sound made by an orchestra, and he does this with the simplest of gestures, every one of which has an immediate and perceptible effect. He has a talent for conveying a mood of serenity, or of serene grandeur, to both orchestra and audiences that is rare indeed among the younger generation of conductors.
In 1960, with the help of Charles Munch, Mehta became the chief conductor and Music Director of theMontreal Symphony Orchestra, a post he held until 1967. By 1961, he had already conducted theVienna,Berlin andIsrael Philharmonic orchestras.[8] In 1962, he took the Montreal Symphony and Canadian soloists (pianistRonald Turini and sopranoTeresa Stratas) on a concert tour to Moscow, Leningrad, Paris and Vienna. Mehta was most apprehensive about his concert in Vienna, which he said was considered the "capital of Western music". His single concert there received a 20-minute ovation, 14 curtain calls, and two encores.[10]
In 1961, he was named assistant conductor of theLos Angeles Philharmonic (LAP), although the orchestra's music director designate,Georg Solti, was not consulted on the appointment, and resigned in protest.[11] The orchestra had been without a permanent conductor for four years when Mehta started directing it.[6]
Mehta was named Music Director of the orchestra and held the post from 1962 to 1978. When he began his first season with the orchestra in 1962, he was 26, the youngest person ever to hold that title.[6] As he had also conducted the Montreal Symphony during those early years, he became the first person to direct two North American symphony orchestras at the same time.[6]
As the LAP's first conductor in four years, Mehta worked to polish its overall sound to something closer to theVienna Philharmonic's. He succeeded in making its sound warmer and richer by fostering competition among the musicians, shifting assignments, giving promotions and changing seating arrangements.[7] He also inspired the musicians; 21-year-old cellistJacqueline du Pré said, "He provides a magic carpet for you to float on." Cellist Kurt Reher recalls Mehta's first rehearsal with the orchestra: "within two beats we were entranced. It seemed this young man had the ability, the musical knowledge of a man of 50 or 55."[7]
In 1965, after Mehta's debut with theMetropolitan Opera's performance ofAida, music criticAlan Rich wrote, "Mehta brought to the conducting of the score a kind of bedazzlement that has no peer in recent times ... It was a lunging, teeming, breathless performance that still had plenty of breath."[6] He subsequently conducted the Met in performances ofCarmen,Tosca, andTurandot.
For Montreal'sExpo 67, he conducted both the Montreal and the Los Angeles orchestras together for a performance ofBerlioz'sSymphonie fantastique.[6] Also that year, Mehta conducted the world premier ofMarvin David Levy'sMourning Becomes Electra.[6]
By May 1967, his schedule was becoming overcrowded and he resigned his Montreal post. That fall he took the 107-member Los Angeles Philharmonic on an eight-week tour, including engagements in Vienna, Paris, Athens, and Bombay.[6] By 1968, his popularity kept him busier than the year before, including 22 weeks of concerts with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, three operas at the Met, television appearances in the U.S. and Italy, five recording sessions, and guest appearances at five festivals and with five orchestras.[6]Time magazine put him on its cover in January 1968.[7] In 1969 his schedule remained equally active.[6]
In 1970, Mehta performed with Frank Zappa's Mothers of Invention on Zappa's "200 Motels" and Edgar Varese's Intergrales, atUCLA's Pauley Pavilion basketball stadium with an audience of 12,000. There is no authorized recording, though some bootlegs exist.
In 1978, Mehta became the Music Director and Principal Conductor of theNew York Philharmonic and remained there until his resignation in 1991.
He became music director of theIsrael Philharmonic Orchestra (IPO) in 1977. He began the first of many guest appearances with the IPO in 1961. In 1966, he toured with the orchestra, and during the1967 Arab–Israeli war, he rushed back to Israel to conduct several special concerts to demonstrate solidarity with its people.[12] He was appointed IPO's Music Advisor in 1969, Music Director in 1977, and was made its Music Director for Life in 1981.[13]
During his five-decade connection with the IPO, he has conducted it in thousands of concerts in Israel and abroad.[2] He conducted concerts with the IPO in South Lebanon in 1982, after which Arabs rushed onstage to hug the musicians.[14] He conducted it during theGulf War in 1991, when the audience brought gas masks; in 2007, it played for an entirely Arab audience in Nazareth.[14] He claims to have a deep kinship with Israel's musicians and the spirit and tradition of the Jewish people.[12] He adds that conducting the IPO is "something I do for my heart".[12] Recalling those earlier years, he says: "How I would love to see that sight again today, of Arabs and Jews hugging each other. I'm a positive thinker. I know this day will come."[14]
In 1978, Mehta left the Los Angeles Philharmonic to become music director for theNew York Philharmonic (NYP).[14] Among the reasons he wanted to direct the NYP was that it allowed him to experiment with new ideas, such as taking the orchestra to Harlem. There, they played at the Abyssinian Baptist Church each year. Accompanying the orchestra with Mehta for various concerts wereIsaac Stern,Itzhak Perlman, andKathleen Battle.[14] He stayed with the NYP until 1991.[14]
| External audio | |
|---|---|
 You may hear Zubin Mehta with theIsrael Philharmonic inAntonin Dvorak's Symphony No. 7 in D minor, Op. 70 in 1968Here on Archive.org |
From 1985 to 2017, Mehta was chief conductor of the Teatro delMaggio Musicale Fiorentino in Florence.[15] From 1998 until 2006, he was music director of theBavarian State Opera in Munich. TheMunich Philharmonic named him its Honorary Conductor. Since 2005, Mehta has been the main conductor of thePalau de les Arts, the new opera house of theCiutat de les Arts i les Ciències inValencia, Spain.
While he was the conductor of the New York Philharmonic, Mehta commissionedRavi Shankar's Concerto No. 2 for sitar and orchestra. Following New York performances, the concerto was later recorded with theLondon Philharmonic Orchestra.[16]: vii [17][18]
In 1998, he went to Munich where he began directing theBavarian State Opera, because, he said, it provided "another panorama for me, to be involved in the running of an opera house".[14]
In 1990, he conducted the Orchestra del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino and the Orchestra del Teatro dell'Opera di Roma in the first everThree Tenors concert in Rome, joining the tenors again in 1994 at theDodger Stadium, Los Angeles. In between those appearances, he conducted the historic 1992 production ofTosca in which each act took place in the actual setting and at the actual time specified in the score. This production starredCatherine Malfitano in the title role,Plácido Domingo as Cavaradossi andRuggero Raimondi as Baron Scarpia. Act I was telecast live from Rome's Basilica ofSant'Andrea della Valle on Saturday, 11 July, at noon (Central European Daylight Saving Time); act II was telecast later that evening from thePalazzo Farnese at 9:40 p.m.; act III was telecast live on Sunday, 12 July, at 7:00 am from theCastel Sant'Angelo, also known as Hadrian's Tomb.
In June 1994, Mehta performed theMozart Requiem with the members of theSarajevo Symphony Orchestra and Chorus at the ruins of Sarajevo's National Library, in a fundraising concert for the victims of armed conflict and remembrance of the thousands of people killed in theYugoslav Wars. On 29 August 1999, he conducted Mahler'sSymphony No. 2 (Resurrection), at the vicinity ofBuchenwald concentration camp inWeimar, with theBavarian State Orchestra and the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra sitting alongside each other.
He toured India (Mumbai) in 1984 with the New York Philharmonic, and again in November–December 1994 with the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, along with soloistsItzhak Perlman andGil Shaham. In 1997 and 1998, Mehta worked in collaboration with Chinese film directorZhang Yimou on a production ofGiacomo Puccini's operaTurandot, which they took to Florence and to Beijing, where it was staged in its actual surroundings in the Forbidden City, with over 300 extras and 300 soldiers, for nine historic performances. The making of this production was chronicled in the documentaryThe Turandot Project, which Mehta narrated.
Mehta was a guest conductor for theAmerican Russian Young Artists Orchestra.[19][20]
On 26 December 2005, the first anniversary of theIndian Ocean tsunami, Mehta and the Bavarian State Orchestra performed for the first time inChennai (formerly Madras) at theMadras Music Academy. Thistsunami memorial concert was organized by the German consulate in Chennai along with the Max-Mueller Bhavan/Goethe-Institut. 2006 was his last year with the Bavarian State Orchestra.
In 2011, Mehta's performance with the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra atThe Proms in London was picketed and interrupted by pro-Palestinian protesters,[21] which caused the BBC to halt the live radio relay of the concert, the first such incident in Proms history. In September 2013, Mehta appeared with theBavarian State Orchestra at a special concert,Ehsaas e Kashmir, organized by the German Embassy in India, at Mughal Gardens,Srinagar. Mehta and the orchestra renounced their usual fees for this concert.[22]
In October 2015, he returned toChennai to perform with theAustralian World Orchestra (AWO) at theMadras Music Academy.[23][24]
In 2016, the Harbin Symphony Orchestra and theIsrael Philharmonic Orchestra performed two concerts conducted by Mehta in the frame of 33rd Harbin Summer Music Festival atHarbin Concert Hall.[25]
In December 2016, the Israel Philharmonic announced that Mehta would conclude his tenure as music director in October 2019.[26] He now has the title of music director emeritus of the Israel Philharmonic.
In August 2022, Mehta conducted theAustralian World Orchestra (AWO) inSydney andMelbourne at Concert Hall,Sydney Opera House and Hamer Hall,Arts Centre Melbourne. He also conducted the AWO at theEdinburgh International Festival and theBBC Proms 2022.[27]
Mehta's first marriage was to Canadian soprano Carmen Lasky in 1958. They have a son, Mervon (since April 2009, Executive Director of Performing Arts for The Royal Conservatory in Toronto), and a daughter, Zarina. In 1964 they divorced.[28] Two years after the divorce, Carmen married Mehta's brother,Zarin Mehta, formerly the Executive Director of theNew York Philharmonic.
In July 1969, Mehta marriedNancy Kovack, an American former film and television actress.[29]
His second daughter, Alexandra, was born in Los Angeles in 1967, the offspring of an affair he had between his marriages.[30]His son Ori was born in the 1990s as the result of anextra-marital affair in Israel during Mehta's second marriage.[31][30]
A permanent resident of the United States, Mehta retains his Indian citizenship.[32]
One of his close friends wasRavi Shankar, whom he first met in the 1960s when Mehta directed him with theMontreal Symphony. Their friendship continued after they were both living in Los Angeles and later in New York. "This was a wonderful period in my life and Zubin and I really had a great time."[16]: vii
Mehta's life was documented inTerry Sanders's filmPortrait of Zubin Mehta (1968). Another documentary about Mehta,Zubin and I, was produced by the grandson of an Israeli harpist who played with the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra before Mehta assumed the helm. The filmmaker joins the orchestra on a tour of Mumbai and meets with him for two interviews, in India and Tel Aviv.[43]
InChristopher Nupen's 1969 documentaryThe Trout about a performance ofSchubert'sTrout Quintet in London byJacqueline du Pré,Daniel Barenboim,Pinchas Zukerman,Itzhak Perlman and Mehta, he plays the double bass.[2]
Mehta and the Los Angeles Philharmonic are featured in Alan Miller's 1973 filmThe Bolero.[44]
Mehta was also mentioned in the novelMaster of the Game (1982) bySidney Sheldon.[45]
Mehta has played himself as the pivotal figure inOn Wings of Fire, a 1986 film about the history ofZoroastrianism and prophetZarathushtra.
Zubin Mehta: In Rehearsal (1996) depicts Mehta rehearsingTill Eulenspiegel's Merry Pranks with the Israel Philharmonic.[46]
Mehta and hisorchestra stars in the 2017 Spanish film documentaryDancing Beethoven, which tells the preparation of theNinth Symphony.[47] The film was nominated in the32nd Goya Awards for Best Documentary Film and in the XXIII Premio Cinematográfico José María Forqué.[48]
A 2008 release by Unitel Classica/Medici Arts presents Mehta and the Los Angeles Philharmonic in performances of the Bassoon Concerto by Mozart, the Concerto for Orchestra by Bartók and three pieces of Dvořák including his 8th Symphony. These were filmed in January 1977.[49][50]
In 2009, Mehta established Mifneh (Hebrew for "change"), a music education program forIsraeli Arabs, in cooperation withBank Leumi and the Arab-Israel Bank. Three schools, inShfaram, theJezreel Valley andNazareth, are taking part in the pilot project.[51]
He and his brother Zarin constitute the Advisor Council of the Mehli Mehta Foundation.[52]
In 2005, Mehta and philanthropist Josef Buchmann founded theBuchmann-Mehta School of Music as a partnership between Tel Aviv University and the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra. Mehta is the school's honorary president and has remained actively involved since its inception.[53]
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| Cultural offices | ||
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| Preceded by Jean Martinon (Music Advisor) | Music Director, Israel Philharmonic Orchestra 1977–2019 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by | Chief Conductor, Maggio Musicale Fiorentino 1985–2017 | Succeeded by |
| International | |
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| National | |
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