Music: Gamble in Budapest

From Rome to Paris, music-lovers had cheered him when he appeared as guest conductor; but no city seemed to want him around for long. He was half paralyzed and shamble-gaited—the result of a brain tumor that struck him down in Los Angeles nine years ago. At times he conducted as if inspired, and at times he floundered hopelessly. His sudden rages and prolonged depressions seemed sometimes to border on madness. Even his friends had begun to doubt whether stormy Otto Klemperer, the once brilliant conductor of pre-Hitler Berlin, would ever have an orchestra of his own again.

Then, last year, Otto Klemperer went to Budapest. He appeared with the State Opera and with the Philharmonic, and the music he made was some of the best Budapest had heard in years. This year Opera Director Aladar Toth decided to risk hiring him for the full 1948 season of 40 operas and symphony concerts. When the season opened, Otto Klemperer had his first steady job since 1941. But this week Budapest was wondering how long he would be able to hold it.

Budapest expected some eccentricities. Last year, Otto Klemperer arrived at the Hungarian border with only a shaving kit: he had forgotten to bring his luggage or a visa from Prague. He shocked operagoers by making his first appearance in high leather boots, and by removing them right in the middle of his performance. Once, during rehearsal, he became so enraged that he strode over to a violinist, snatched his violin, and crashed it over his head. He fought with his prima ballerina and when her fellow dancers stuck by her, he conducted Die Fledermaus without any ballet. Once he had to be searched out in a café minutes before curtain time.

He could be pleasant and witty at parties; he could also be arrogant. When the opera hired him, he demanded 2,700 florins a night (about $230)—twice as much as any other conductor. Nightly, he was seen at cafés—a, scowling giant (6 ft. 6 in.) who shouted at waiters, flirted with young women, or just sat in a corner, thumping out jazz on the café piano.

Why did Budapest put up with him? Director Toth, who had long fought Hungary’s indifference to its own composers, Bartok and Kodaly, was willing to fight for Klemperer too. Budapest’s orchestras were far inferior to those of Vienna or Paris, and only a top conductor would bring them up again. If Budapest could only bear with Otto Klemperer, there was a good chance that it might get first-class music at last—the kind of music Berlin had heard, 15 years ago.