Mexican Hayride

Mexico City may become the Western Hemisphere's musical capital. It has the money (tourist and refugee); it has the ambition; and it has an elaborate program.

It also has the critics: Mexico's music critics takes a dim and lofty view of music that U.S. critics accept with mild applause. Last month Conductor Leopold Stokowski, who is not accustomed to rough handling, got an abrasive going-over by Mexico City's music critics: he had the temerity to offer Mexicanos lush popular arrangements.

Said La Nacion: Stokowski seems to have taken great trouble to satisfy the tastes of a public which has acquired its musical appreciation through the cinema and canned music." Said El Universal: "Through the hall of our great Bellas Artes Theater there reigned ... a contagious chilliness. ..." Said the English-language critic of Novedades: "It seemed the result of a desire to outdo Kostelanetz in misplaced lushness. All that remains now is to transcribe the work [Debussy's Clair de Lune]. . . for the Wurlitzer organ."

Climax of Stokowski's Mexican hayride came when all the lights in the Bellas Artes Theater went out while he was conducting Mussorgsky's Night on Bald Mountain.

Last week a chastened Stokowski gave a bang-up performance of Brahms's St. Anthony Variations. Cooed Novedades: "At last Stokowski presented us with a program that gave both the orchestra and himself a chance to show what they can do with some good music."

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