Process

I've been posted here and there on the internet about the Levine and Dutoit sexual abuse cases. I've gotten some comments about process and the swift ending of careers in the cases of both the conductors. Herein some thoughts on process.

There was an article in the Washington Post a couple of weeks back about a sexual harassment case in a completely different part of the public world, but it's awfully similar in some ways to what happened with Dutoit, different in other ways that bear on Dutoit.

The case in question is that of Judge Alex Kozinski. Some features of the situation:

• Kozinski has a long history of questionable behavior.
• Multiple women attesting to this.
• Incidents took place over decades.
• There's a whisper network of women warning each other about him.
• These women generally told friends and family what had happened contemporaneously with the harassment.
• Non-denial denials: "In an initial statement to The Post, Kozinski said he would 'never intentionally do anything to offend anyone and it is regrettable that a handful have been offended by something I may have said or done.'"
• The federal judiciary has a procedure for dealing with this stuff, and a judge asked Chief Justice Roberts to appoint a an investigator. Kozinsky resigned (retired) a few days later.

Kozinski was not reported earlier in part because clerking is a big stepping stone in a lawyer's career and women he'd behaved inappropriately with were concerned about the effects of complaining on their careers. That's also a feature of the Dutoit case, where the conductor could hire or not hire soloists, and it's a feature of other music business harassment cases, I expect - nobody knows how many unreported harassers there are.

Also regarding Dutoit, with several of these orchestras, he resigned ahead of being fired. What I understand is that music director contracts almost always have "morals clauses," which govern how the MD is to behave, including not making the orchestra look bad. Guest conductor contracts can contain clauses setting forth circumstances under which an orchestra can fire the conductor. I would expect that some of these do cover the conductor's behavior. So that is part of the process: Dutoit signed contracts knowing what they contained and what the expectations are.

It is difficult to set a procedure for how to handle incidents that are far in the past. There's the question of whether behavior is unacceptable or illegal. There are statutes of limitations that come into play, but an organization that has someone under contract is also not obliged to ignore reports of past bad behavior, especially when there are reports from unrelated people and the incidents took place over decades. The fact that Dutoit withdrew from some engagements is telling, also: if these incidents never happened, he is free to hire a lawyer and take action against the accusers. He is apparently not doing this and his denials are of the sort "something happened and they're interpreting it differently from me."

Earlier this week, another six women came forward about their past experiences with Dutoit. He is alleged to have raped one of these women. Several of the women went on the record, though not the rape victim. Anne Sophie Schmidt, a now-retired opera singer, says that Dutoit never hired her again after she refused him.

Dutoit's behavior hasn't been a secret. Back in 1995, journalist Natasha Gauthier reported on this; nobody denied it and no orchestras did anything about it. The Philadelphia Orchestra passed over him twice as a potential music director because of his reputation for "extreme flirtatiousness" (and what a euphemism / lie that is).

The problem isn't that abusers such as Levine and Dutoit are losing their careers because of a lack of process. The problem is that musical organizations didn't have processes in place to protect musicians and other members of their organizations.

Here's an example: Fiona Allan, who says that Dutoit assaulted her at Tanglewood, was told the following by the BSO's manager:  "Before you see maestro, I need to tell you something,” she recalled the manager saying. “Look, we advise, we’ve had some complaints, and I wouldn’t go in there alone." That was the BSO's process! What bullshit! This was in 1997, 20 years ago, when Allan was an intern at Tanglewood. So if you see the BSO claiming that they never knew about Dutoit, well, they are lying. And if the BSO knew, other orchestras knew also.

If you work at a big company, and you find evidence that an accountant - or the CFO - has embezzled a couple of million dollars, you fire that person right away, before the charges are filed or the trial is held. You can't keep someone like that around. And nobody would complain about "lack of process."

This is no different. Don't tell me all about how Dutoit and Levine's careers were destroyed because of lack of process. Their own actions destroyed their careers. It's too bad that didn't happen decades ago, before they had the chance to damage their victims' lives and careers.

Replacement Report

Orchestras are announcing who will replace Charles Dutoit in upcoming concerts:

• Royal Philharmonic in San Francisco: Thierry Fischer, programs unchanged, Jan. 28 & 29
• New York Philharmonic: Joshua Weilerstein, program unchanged, Jan. 17-20

More on Dutoit and Levine

It's been a couple of weeks since the allegations about Charles Dutoit came out.  Here are some follow-up articles about him and about James Levine.

Dutoit Denies Accusations (AP) Dutoit's comments; apparently he thinks that whatever happened was "informal physical contact." We'll see whether he actually takes legal action to defend himself.

"The allegations made against me are as shocking to me as they are to my friends and colleagues. I do not recognize the man or the actions being described in the media," Dutoit said in a brief statement emailed to the Associated Press.

"Whilst informal physical contact is commonplace in the arts world as a mutual gesture of friendship, the serious accusations made involving coercion and forced physical contact have absolutely no basis in truth. I am taking legal advice and plan to meaningfully defend myself and I believe within this current climate, media accusations on serious physical abuse do not help society tackle these issues properly if the claims are in fact not true."

By the time this article was published on December 23, Dutoit had withdrawn from or been relieved of engagements with eight (8) orchestras in the US, Europe, and Australia.

Montreal Symphony Orchestra Launches Probe (AP) This probe, at an orchestra where Dutoit was music director for 25, involves a fifth woman, in addition to the four who had previously come forward. These days, Dutoit is a guest conductor there only.

Dutoit Out at Eight Orchestras (AP) "The four women who spoke to AP said Dutoit attacked them on the sidelines of rehearsals and performances with orchestras in five cities — Chicago, Los Angeles, Minneapolis, Philadelphia and Saratoga Springs, New York. All four told the AP they never filed formal complaints because they were young and Dutoit was the maestro; they figured they would lose their jobs, not him."

Mark Swed says some dumb things about James Levine: Among other comments: "The age-old discussion of whether you can separate art from the artist has once more been ignited." No, Mark, he's not dead and buried, like Wagner, where that is the issue. The problem with Levine is whether someone who committed unethical acts should be hired to conduct, especially given his enormous stature and influence. This is someone who could and possibly still can make or break careers. How much power do you want to give him? Do you want to let him anywhere near, say, 16-year-old, male, aspiring singers?

More stupidity: "But before everyone starts throwing stones, let me point out that we make peace with politicians, Wall Street and Silicon Valley. We convince ourselves that this is the way things must be because it is the culture, until we get a Weinsteinian shock." Speak for yourself, Mark. Women have been trying to get this crap changed for, you know, decades. (Centuries?) You're old enough to remember Anita Hill, right?

And more: "It would not be unreasonable to assume that the young Levine lacked emotional maturity. The most successful musicians spend much of their lives alone practicing. They bask in praise. They attend conservatories, institutional hothouses where they hone their aggressively competitive skills to make it to the big time. They are pawns of the Wilfords, who look after careers, not lives." Oh, come on! It is amazing how many men manage not to be sexual abusers.

And more: "Levine also brought the Met into the 20th century, greatly expanding the repertory." Mark, take a look in the goddamn Met archives. This just isn't very true.

And more: "Not coincidentally, opera is an art form that abounds in the value of forgiveness and the potential for redemption." SO? Real life doesn't work that way. This is a terrible, terrible argument. Is it...a call for the men abused by Levine to forgive him? Did you read about how the abuse eroded their confidence and affected them for years and decades?

Nobody is disputing the greatness of Levine's musicianship. That's not the question and it's not central to whether he should continue to work and in what position. The question is the extent of his past acts of abuse - do you really believe they stopped in the 1970s? - and whether or not he should continue to work. (His health problems also bear on whether he should continue to conduct.)

UPDATE, re Swed: He's making lots of attempts to explain and excuse Levine, and none to hold him responsible. That's the problem.

Hector, I Love You, But What Were You Thinking?

To SF Symphony last night for the second of three performances of Berlioz's Grande Messe des Morts, better known as the Requiem, Op. 5, of Hector Berlioz.

James Keller's notes for the piece are a hoot, but the first thing that caught my eye is that these performances are being done in a reduced version by conductor Charles Dutoit, who is on the podium this week. Reduced, and yet:

4 flutes, 2 oboes and 2 English horns, 4 clarinets, 4 bassoons, 8 trombones (all offstage), 3 tubas, 8 timpani (some timpanists also play percussion), bass drum, suspended cymbals, tam-tam, tenor drum, and strings (16 1st violin, 14, 2nd violin, 12 violas, 10 cellos, 8 double basses), mixed chorus of 80 sopranos and altos, 60 tenors, 70 basses, and a tenor soloist. In addition, 4 brass ensembles positioned at the four points of the compass, consisting of N, 2 cornets, 2 trombones, and tuba, E 2 trumpets and 2 trombones, W 2 trumpets and 2 trombones, and S 2 trumpets, 2 trombones, and 2 tubas.

The score also gives instructions should a performance feature more players.

In any event, holy cow, this is a bizarre piece even by Berlioz's standards. Completed in 1837, the composer revised it in 1852 and in 1866-67, so evidently....well, I'm curious about the earlier versions and might check whether the first version has ever been recorded. I mean, I am making an assumption here, that only the last version is performed and recorded these days.

As I said, it is a rather bizarre work. It is quite long at about 80 minutes, and Berlioz makes compositional choices that, shall we say, are not the obvious ones. Your typical Dies Irae is a flamethrower; see Verdi, for example. Not this one, which is hushed and slow-ish, with Berlioz holding the fireworks for the Tuba Mirum and, perhaps, Symphonie Fantastique. The text-setting is awkward and so is the vocal phrasing. Last night was the first time in a long while that I really regretted not getting a recording in advance of a performance, because I'd never heard a note of the piece, and, well. I wish I'd had an idea of what was coming.

It has some fabulous moments, some very loud, as when everybody is going at once and the only way you know there are strings is that you can see them bowing furiously, and some very quiet, as in the closing Sanctus, and some in the middle (whichever movement it is where the strings and brass do nothing for an extended period and it's just the chorus and winds). But formally, well, it is messy and awkward, the composer's immense ambition somewhat exceeding his ability to create something unified. By Les Troyens, with a great dramatic libretto to hang his fabulous music on, he'd come a long way.

I must also say that the performance itself left something to be desired. The orchestra, normally a miracle of precision, had some off moments at the beginnings of phrases. The huge chorus, consisting of the SF Symphony Chorus, Young Women's Choral Projects of San Francisco (Susan McMane, dir.), and Golden Gate Men's Chorus (Joseph Piazza, dir.) sounded as though it needed to live with the work for a good deal longer, which is one way of saying they sounded underrehearsed. There was a general lack of confidence, heads were deep in scores much of the time, and the sopranos in particular had noticeable tuning problems in exposed phrases, of which, alas, there are many.

This piece is nothing like the other big choral works in the SFS Chorus's repertory; that's a group that could probably sing the Brahms or Verdi Requiems from memory and that does amazing work on shorter and less oddball works. But it's strange enough to make the Missa Solemnis sound easy, and that is saying something.

Other opinions:

• Joshua Kosman, Chron, calls the performance anemic, and yeah, I'll go along with that. Surprising lack of energy for the number of people in the house. I found myself wondering at one point what Donald Runnicles would have done with it.