By Herbert Kupferberg

When the Philadelphia Orchestra set out to find a music director to succeed the departing Riccardo Muti, it could naturally have been expected to concentrate on the usually accepted qualifications for a successful modern maestro: youth, glamor, drive, and a proven flair for public relations.

In actuality, however, it came up with none of the above. Wolfgang Sawallisch is 69 years old, has never been a podium powerhouse or self-promoter, and with his conservative garb, graying hair, and quiet demeanor looks more like a symphonic board member than conductor.

Yet despite these characteristics (indeed, some might say because of them), he has developed a thoroughly distinguished conductorial career, is known to and respected by discerning audiences all over the world, has compiled an impressive recording list for EMI, and is particularly admired and even adored by the musicians he works with. All of these qualities, along with some intriguing indications of the changing approach he has in mind for the Philadelphians, have led to his selection as Musical America’s 1993 Conductor of the Year.

Sawallisch’s major post since 1971 has been as director of the Munich State Opera, and he has also served as conductor of the Vienna Symphony, the NHK Orchestra of Japan, the Hamburg Philharmonic, and l‘Orchestre de la Suisse Romande. He’s been a frequent guest conductor in Philadelphia, making his first appearance with the orchestra as far back as 1966 at the invitation of Eugene Ormandy, then its music director. He formally begins his three-year contract in Philadelphia with the 1993-94 season, but he’ll spend four weeks with the orchestra as music director-designate during the 1992-93 season, including a Carnegie Hall appearance on March 16.

Sawallisch’s past guest appearances with the orchestra have already indicated that the vaunted “Philadelphia Sound,” whose opulence had been deliberately modified by Muti, may well be on the way to regaining some of its former robust lushness. Several of his performances—and recordings—of Dvorák symphonies in particular have pointed in this direction.

Diplomatic by nature, Sawallisch implicitly acknowledges the likelihood of change. Asked by Musical America for his views on the kind of sound he favors, he replied:

“I admire the Philadelphians’ full and intensive sound. But much more important is the ability of an orchestra to change the sound for the different styles of music it performs. This is one of the mysteries of the Philadelphia Orchestra—due to its long education by Maestro Ormandy to perform each score with the right sound necessary for Haydn–Mozart, Bruckner–Mahler, Richard and Johann Strauss, Tchaikovsky, Shostakovich, and so on. I will try to continue this kind of performing and to keep the value of the Philadelphia’s special sound.”

The new conductor’s reference to Ormandy’s sound rather than Muti’s as a guidepost to the future would seem to be highly significant, particularly in conjunction with views privately expressed by several of the orchestra’s veteran members. The short list of prospects considered for the podium is said to have included, in addition to Sawallisch, such names as Colin Davis, Charles Dutoit, Bernard Haitink, and Simon Rattle. Among Sawallisch’s strongest supporters were many of the musicians themselves.

One observer close to the orchestra summed up the musicians’ views this way: “Most—not necessarily all—of the orchestra members felt that under Ormandy there was a richness and lushness of sound which he and they were creating together. Under Muti they felt he was controlling them so closely that the sound was more his than theirs. With Sawallisch they expect to again become more creative together.”

Other changes will inevitably involve repertory. Muti’s brilliant, febrile style led to memorable performances of such massive works as Prokofiev’s Alexander Nevsky and Ivan the Terrible; Sawallisch also likes to conduct large-scale pieces, but they are more likely to be drawn from the middle-European repertory that makes up his home ground. For example, he has already mentioned the possibility of Haydn’s oratorio The Seasons, which the orchestra has never performed (personal note: let’s hope he does it in English). He’s also talking about doing Britten’s War Requiem, which would be another Philadelphia first.

Sawallisch is interested in following Muti’s custom of presenting an occasional opera in concert form, but rather than the Italian repertory favored by his predecessor he is likely to give works like Richard Strauss’s rarely heard Friedenstag or Daphne. So far as contemporary music is concerned, he is on record as saying he is ready to explore new American scores and also has some German and Swiss composers whose music interests him. “However,” he adds, “I am not a friend of extremely contemporary music, with electronic sounds and so on.”

For all his traditional Kapellmeister upbringing, Sawallisch has in the past displayed a wide range of musical interests and adaptability. Nor has his musical life been limited to the podium; he is a fine pianist who sometimes plays and even records chamber music. Born in Munich, he studied there and worked his way up the German musical ladder, with stops in Augsburg, Wiesbaden, Aachen, and Cologne. During World War II, he was drafted into the German army at age 19, served as a radio operator in Italy, saw no combat, and wound up as a POW in U.S. and British camps. Sawallisch, who, incidentally, speaks an excellent if somewhat Bavarian-accented English, has been married to his wife Mechthild, a former singer, for 40 years; they have one son, who is “not, thank God, a musician.” Among the conductors who have influenced him most, he cites Wilhelm Furtwängler, Hans Knappertsbusch, Clemens Kraus, and Karl Böhm.

Although he has conducted many memorable performances, one that is particularly vivid in his mind is a concert he gave in Warsaw in 1964 with the Hamburg Philharmonic. “Germany and Poland then had no diplomatic or commercial ties,” he once told an interviewer, “but somehow arrangements were made and we played. It was such an emotional moment, and perhaps it helped open connections between the two countries.

“It also was a time that made me think about my name. People ask if it is Slavic, but it is German—an old German name, although perhaps somewhere, way back, we may have come from Czechoslovakia or Poland . . . . But that night in Warsaw, my wife, in the audience, heard people pronounce my name perfectly—Sa-VAL-ish.”

One has an idea that audiences here will soon be pronouncing it perfectly, too.

Herbert Kupferberg, a senior editor of Parade magazine, is the author of Those Fabulous Philadelphians: The Life and Times of a Great Orchestra.