Healing from so much internal surgery can be slow. In fact, some members feel that only with this spring's European tour did the new Philadelphia Orchestra consolidate its identity. And as much as some people long for the good old days of conductors Leopold Stokowski or Eugene Ormandy, these days may well be better. If nothing else, the orchestra that opens its 101st season Tuesday night looks like an ensemble of the 21st century. There are gray heads, but also magenta ones.
Tattoos peak out from underneath the tailcoats.
We had to do an intense amount of listening because Ormandy wanted a full sweep of sound and he wasn't 100 percent precision-minded. We used watch his vest. When his baton crossed the second or third button, we came in. The secret to the sound was Ormandy's attention to the strings. Ormandy routinely referred to the harps, trombones and percussion as loafers.