Home Run in Seattle

Conductors of the Seattle Symphony used to have about as much job security as French Premiers. In its 51 years the orchestra has had 13 "permanent" conductors, and few of them managed to last more than a season or two. Seattle's worst moment came in 1951, when French Conductor Manuel Rosenthal was forbidden re-entry to the U.S. for a Gallic breach of morals (the official reason was perjury concerning his marital status when he returned; the lady who traveled with him was not his wife). After the symphony's officials stopped blushing, they decided not to hire anyone for a while but to study a relay of guest conductors. By far the most popular of the visitors proved to be Brooklyn-born Milton Katims. The guest was asked twice, and last fall the board signed him up.

Life is not easy for the Seattle Symphony. At a salary of $11 a rehearsal or concert, musicians earn their livings at other jobs: two violinists are longshoremen., one cellist a bus driver, most others teach music or play in dance bands. But energetic Conductor Katims, 45, made the orchestra sound better than it has in years and proved himself a man to watch among the younger U.S. conductors.

"Barbaric!" With a springy step, a cheerful but firm manner and a superior baton technique, Katims can be as impassioned as Toscanini (he played the viola under the Maestro for eight years to study his technique, guest-conducted the NBC Symphony 52 times). "Warm . . . tender . . . dream with me!" Katims will shout in rehearsal, or "Barbaric! Make it barbaric!" "Come on," he once implored the cellos, trying to get them in the mood for Salome's final scene. "I want you to play like a bunch of sluts." At a recent rehearsal with Violinist Nathan Milstein, Katims called a halt to plead with the musicians: "Make it sparkle. Like--not like champagne, I've used that one too often ..." Milstein leaned over to whisper in his ear, and Katims' face lit up. "That's it." he cried, "like Seven-Up."

With his orchestra well in hand, Katims schedules everything from Brahms to Morton Gould, interests all sorts of listeners. This season, for the first time, the orchestra's eight-concert subscription series was a complete sellout (2,600 subscribers), Katims also expanded a series of $1-admission concerts in the suburbs (where he sometimes gets a local businessman to take the baton for the concluding number), and so excited one old music lover that she offered a $150,000 apartment building toward a new hall. Next year's budget will be jumped from $160,000 to $215,000 (half again as many concerts, more big-name soloists), and the prestigious Koussevitzky Foundation has named Seattle as one of the cities where its commissioned works will get first performances (others: Los Angeles, Washington, B.C.).

Critical Ball Game. Last month Seattle started to worry again. On his winter leave Conductor Katims did a grueling. 17-con-cert guest stint with the Houston Symphony. Word leaked out that Houston, which was in the market for a permanent conductor (TIME, Feb. 7), made Katims an offer--$30,000 a year, far more than he gets in Seattle (about $18,000). Seattle prepared itself to be conductorless once more.

But on his return Katims smilingly announced that he had turned down the Houston invitation.* Said he: "I felt a musically moral--or morally musical--obligation to carry on in Seattle what we have started. I feel I am backed completely by the orchestra, the board and the public. To leave now would be like leaving in the eighth inning of a critical ball game when victory is in sight." He was seconded last week by Guest Cellist Gregor Piatigorsky: "It is clear he has started something that is very exciting."

Katims is scheduled to stay in Seattle two more seasons. After that? "Where do baseball players always want to go?" he asks. "The New York Yankees. With a conductor it's the Boston Symphony."

* Houston later signed Leopold Stokowski, 72, as permanent conductor with a three-year contract.

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