The Lost Accord

Although the eight-week strike has been settled, the malady which plagued the orchestra still festers beneath the surface harmony

"There is no Philadelphia sound," he is quoted as saying in a booklet accompanying a 30th anniversary record album last spring. "There is just the conductor’s sound." The men themselves shrug and say, "Did you ever hear a sound come out of a stick?" As far as they’re concerned, they make the sound and it’s the same one whether Ormandy conducts or someone else does. Some say it was Stokowski who started it, anyhow.

But even those who try hard to be fair, sooner or later get carried away by personality prejudice. "You don’t know how vindictive he is," comes from different sources (who naturally don’t want to be identified). If you’ve offended him in some way, he sends messages to you like: "Stop talking during the applause," or, "You’re a menace to your section." He takes men who’ve moved up in their section and puts them back in the last chair again if they rub him the wrong way. One particularly bitter critic complained: "He does anything he can to kill the spirit of men who love music. He just doesn’t understand how you could really love it."

A particularly sore point is his lack of consideration in programming. Management retorts that if Ormandy can keep up with the pace at 67, the orchestra men shouldn’t gripe about overwork. But Ormandy turns over the baton to guests quite often (especially in recent years) and rests — as he should. But guest conductors usually come on strong and insist on new material and an exacting performance. As one orchestra man picturesquely put it, "What happens is they change drivers all the time, but they beat the same horses." The men feel especially driven on tours. They charge Ormandy often ignores their physical limitations and pours it on when sore arms and lips need to be rested and everyone needs more time to practice new material.

MR. ASSOCIATION. As for the rest of the cast in this music-drama, the board was able to present a much more united front than the orchestra, but there are only 23 of them, and besides, they seemed to be willing to let Balis and chairman of the board Orville H. Bullitt set the rhythm. One board member said, "You could be on the board and live and die and never know what’s going on." Most of these men sit on the boards of the city’s banks, insurance companies and railroads. This one is self-perpetuating and fairly static.

Musicians ask, "Why do they hang on? Most of them don’t care about music and don’t even go to the concerts." Maybe because they feel it’s their civic duty like helping the Red Cross. Besides, of all the boards of cultural institutions, those of the Art Museum and the Philadelphia Orchestra have the most status.

Balis is used to being a leader There’s no softness about his trim body or his manner. He treats his employees in a high-handed ("Goddamit, I told you what I wanted already") way. The men of the orchestra smart under this kind of treatment. "You know what he has here?" shouted one musician thumping his chest. "A stone!"