THE PIT AND THE PODIUM

Gustavo Dudamel, at the Philharmonic, and Nathalie Stutzmann, at the Met.

- ALEX ROSS

Gustavo Dudamel may be the most famous conductor alive, but the second coming of Leonard Bernstein he is not. Such was the import of an ominously neutral, nondescript performance of Mahler’s Ninth Symphony which Dudamel elicited from the New York Philharmonic on May 20th. Any conductor with glimmerings of charisma is automatically likened to Bernstein, who embodied classical music for several generations of listeners. Although the comparison never does anyone favors, in this case there is no avoiding it. In February, it was announced that Dudamel, who currently leads the Los Angeles Philharmonic, will become the music director of the New York Philharmonic in 2026, inheriting a mantle that Bernstein once wore with immense élan. Others who held the post are Toscanini, Boulez, and Mahler himself.

The Ninth triggered several of Bernstein’s most soul-shuddering interpretations. There are recordings of him conducting the piece with the Concertgebouw Orchestra and with the Philharmonics of New York, Vienna, Berlin, and Israel. Histrionics aside, these documents shed valuable light on the score itself, since Bernstein paid scrupulous attention to its minutest markings. Consider how he builds the huge opening paragraph of the first movement, in which a gently swaying theme is unfurled, enriched, darkened, magnified, and left hanging. Each time through, he makes sure that the players observe the accents and phrasings that delineate this evolution. When the harmony sinks from D major to D minor, the melody takes on a more jagged, unsettled character. The ensuing restatement of the theme, in full-throated cry, is like an overcoming of crisis—and Mahler’s journey into the abyss is only just beginning.