On the Road

Conductor Leonard Bernstein is no stranger to adulation. But not even Bernstein was prepared for the reception he got last week as the first full-scale U.S. symphony to visit Turkey in years gave two concerts at Istanbul's bowl-shaped, Open-Air Theater. At the head of the 106-piece New York Philharmonic, Bernstein faced an audience of music-hungry Turks that overflowed the bowl's 5,000 seats, crashed through wooden barriers and stampeded past police lines to jam every aisle and step.

Lenny gave them two programs to remember; Mozart, Brahms, Beethoven and on to the U.S. moderns, with Aaron Copland's high-stepping Billy the Kid and George Gershwin's swelling, Turkey-fresh Rhapsody in Blue. Both nights he yielded to thunderous ovations, played encores till way past midnight. Even after the players had left the stage, spectators refused to budge, clamored for more. Only when Lenny was seen dashing for the exit (where he was swamped by autograph seekers) did the Turks go home.

Tired but thrilled, Bernstein wanted to spend a night in Turkey listening to the folk music he finds "deep, rich, untouched." But he had played so long himself that no cabaret was still open, and he settled for a Turkish meal of goat cheese, pilaf and kuzu firin (roast lamb). Too soon, it was time to head for the airport and a performance in Salonika, Greece. Among the concerts still ahead on the Philharmonic's world tour: 18 in Russia, five in Poland and Yugoslavia. By the time it returns in October, the Philharmonic will have seen ten weeks of touring, played 29 cities in 17 countries.

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