Seiji Ozaawa

Seiji Ozawa photos Tanglewood July 12, 2002

February 2, 2016 Article by Dave Read
Now that Seiji Ozawa hass been added to the 2016 Tanglewood schedule, here is another look at photos from Maestro Ozawa’s 2002 Tanglewood farewell press conference.

On Friday afternoon July 12, 2002, at the start of a weekend of special programs in celebration of his 29 year tenure with the BSO, Maestro Ozawa met with the press just outside the Koussevitsky Music Shed, where these photos were taken. By the 2002 season, he was music director emeritus; his last concert at Tanglewood as music director was Salome on Aug. 8, 2001.

Seiji Ozawa’s Tanglewood farewell press conference, July 12, 2002; photos by Dave Conlin Read.

2016 Tanglewood tickets

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Seiji Ozawa’s Tanglewood farewell press conference, July 12, 2002

February 2, 2016 Article by Dave Read

Maestro Ozawa’s opening remarks:

My private thoughts – its kind of rare in my profession, 1960, July, I came from Paris to Boston airport, on Pan American, first time in my life to come to America. And then I took autobus from there to Lenox, to join this school here, so – 1960, which is 42 years ago, I came here as a student, and to me, my kind of study in Japan with my great teacher, Professor Hideo Seiko, who was a wonderful teacher but kind of focused on areas like ear training, score reading and how to conduct Bach, how to conduct Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, Brahms, and some Tchaikovsky and never go out of that kind of repertoire.

Mahler, for instance, I never faced a Mahler score. Here, when I arrived, in our room, my classmate is studying Mahler’s Sixth Symphony, very intensely, which I think he was conducting at the end of the summer somewhere and that gave me a shock, that I did not know one note of Mahler. And I never had any opera experience and here we had many students and conductors studying opera. So I had a shock… really my studying of wide repertoire, by shock, I started here.

Seiji Ozawa's Tanglewood farewell press conference, July 12, 2002; Photo: Dave Conlin Read — Seiji Ozawa’s Tanglewood farewell press conference, July 12, 2002; Photo: Dave Conlin Read

I was invited as artistic director by the Boston Symphony to come here, at that time musical director William Steinberg had a health condition, he could not do hot, summer, outdoor concerts, so they invited me. That moment was really for me the beginning of surprise miracle – that I came back to Tanglewood permanently. And then I become conductor for the Boston Symphony, so all my circle – my repertoire, my studying, started here, using my knowledge from Professor Seiko in Japan.

For me, it’s a really special place, and now I must say goodbye. It’s really very amazing emotional thing for me.

I don’t have much thinking more than that, but this place has become my system, and the Boston Symphony is really in my system, and many of you know, the school here, where I came in 1960, I was really very involved in the school, so that also is in my system. And this nature here, same lake – we used to have a swim, now still we swim together, so it is something very special for me.

So this weekend for me is very special, and for you to come, I appreciate very much. Any questions from you?

Ellie Tesher, Toronto Star: Do you feel that going to Vienna is really the pinnacle of your career?

Seiji Ozawa: No. First, for my type of profession, orchestra or me, I think changes are good. That’s what people say and I accept that. And anyway between myself and my wife, we felt professionally I must finish my work. I did not know it would be opera, but I love opera and during my years here we tried from the stage – sometimes from the Shed and the Theatre, Peter Grimes.

But very limited opera repertoire I have, so when I got the opportunity to do opera, I thought very good chance for me to do it before I die, to enjoy opera. This is why I made the decision, so I will try anyway.

Dave Conlin Read: Maestro Ozawa, do you see any similarities between Vienna and the Berkshires, goegraphically, culturally, artistically?

Seiji Ozawa: I don’t know! Funny thing, last week in Boston a Japanese TV crew took me to the other side of the Charles River, to a beautiful area where I’ve never been, where the sailboats are. They asked me, where do you usually go?

Between my house in West Newton, Symphony Hall, 2 Japanese, 1 Chinese, 1 Italian restaurant – that’s it, and I don’t know those places in Boston. Viennna – I know the Musikverein, I know the Schonbunn Palace, I know around it, but I don’t – Yes, I know the wine area, that I know. But other places, I don’t know yet.

Dave Conlin Read: Are there any tips or advice you would pass along to your successor, Mr. Levine, regarding life in the Berkshires?

Seiji Ozawa: About a week ago, I was in Japan on the subway around noon on my way to rehearsal and my portable telephone rang. You’re not supposed to do this, but I answered and it’s Jimmy!

I had to tell Jimmy, “I”m on the train.” So I got off at the next stop so I could talk in quiet; two minutes later, I’m on the platform, same question, exactly. He asked me, “Hey Seiji, you give me all the information you can give me.”

So I said of course I’d love to do it, but really I have nothing to tell, because different conductors have different ways…So, the orchestra is ready.

The only thing that is sad for me is that he doesn’t come right now – you know, he’s so busy, so there’s a gap that’s sad for me.

Dave Conlin Read: Where was he calling from?

Seiji Ozawa: Ah! He was calling from Rome at five o’clock in the morning. I said where? and he said he just came from New York where it’s eleven o’clock at night. He was going to Verbier, Switzerland. it was so funny. (James Levine is Music Director of the UBS Verbier Festival Youth Orchestra.)

Dan Levy, WTEN TV: What are your over-riding emothions this weekend?

Seiji Ozawa: Last April when I said goodbye at Symphony Hall, I was so sad, so sad – inside of me was like catastrophe, I was sick. Next day, I was reallty sick.

So I thought this place, it is open, and the public and the nature, I thought this would be for me and for my group, symphony and students, a big, happy celebration. The program is made for that, I hope it will be. Mahler’s 9th Symphony in Symphony Hall, the orchestra played so good for me; nobody between me and the orchestra and that was the best communication. Two weeks ago I watched the performance on Japanese TV and I was in tears. Something I did not know, I was so busy that moment. When I see the faces of the orchestra members, it was very special.

Seiji Ozawa conducts Salome at Tanglewood

August 4, 2001 Tanglewood concert review by Dave Read

For his Tanglewood swan song as BSO Music Director, Seiji Ozawa chose to conduct Richard Strauss’ Salome, Opus 54, performed without staging and costumes – no dancing the Dance of the Seven Veils. No matter; Strauss’ music and Oscar Wilde’s poetry, brought to life by the Boston Symphony Orchestra and an impressive cast of vocalists, led by Deborah Voigt, were more than enough to elicit an eruption of applause that lasted well after Maestro Ozawa had scurried off the stage of the Koussevitsky Music Shed. (Photo shows Seiji Ozawa seated behind podium while soloists took their bows.)

Salome Dancing Before Herod, by Gustave Moreau

This was an hour and three-quarters of incomparable aural beauty; a sonic statue sculpted by Ozawa. Whenever anyone present muses on the Maestro’s Tanglewood tenure, this performance should reverberate in memory, as Haiku does. Instead of a set full of scenery and costumes for the singers, they stood on a platform behind the orchestra. The opera’s literary and artistic antecedents include the Gospels of Matthew and Mark, a short story by Gustave Flaubert Herodias, and a panoply of paintings, including one by Gustave Moreau that inspired Oscar Wilde.

With only minimal dramatic action to follow on stage, one was free to focus on Oscar Wilde’s poetry via the supertitles. For example: As soon as Salome’s entreaty to Jokanaan,

“I am amorous of thy body!… The roses in the garden of the Queen of Arabia are not so white as thy body… Nor the feet of the dawn… Nor the breast of the moon…”

is rebuffed by Jokanaan: “Back daughter of Babylon! By woman came evil into the world…”

– Salome revises her opinion on his body and shifts her attention to his hair: “Thy body is hideous… It is like a plastered wall where vipers have crawled. It is like a whitened sepulchre full of loathsome things…. It is of thy hair that I am enamored, Jokanaan. Thy hair is like clusters of grapes… The long black nights, when the moon hides her face, when the stars are afraid, are not so black as thy hair.”

Left on the page, such language may look overblown, if descriptive and colorful. Its magic lays in the rhythm, the repartee of the dialogues, the contradictions and emotional swings. In performance, it allows the singers to display the full range of their gifts, as the score does the orchestra. What better choice than Salome as Ozawa’s swan song to Tanglewood!

It is delicious to speculate on the similies Wilde would draw if he were to describe Ms. Voigt’s performance. She was a commanding and brilliant presence; her performance was a masterpiece, rich as a Michelangelo.

This was Seiji Ozawa’s good bye to his beloved Tanglewood, delivered with the full vocabulary of music. He spoke no words to the audience – which would have been as silly as shining neon lights on the Sistene Chapel.

(Editor’s note: It would be 4 years before James Levine’s Tanglewood debut as BSO Music Director, with a performance of Mahler’s Symphony No. 8.)

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Seiji Ozawa Tanglewood on Parade

July 31, 2001 Article by Dave Read

Nearly 20,000 fans witnessed Seiji Ozawa’s last turn leading Tanglewood on Parade, the annual celebration of (and fund-raiser for) the Tanglewood Mucic Center. It was probably the last time we’ll see him cue the cannon of the Eastover artillery battery that joins the massed orchestras for the 1812 Overture, the traditional close to the program, but probably not his swansong as cannoneer. That’s because he received as a parting gift an authentic Civil War cannon, which is more likely to end up at his West Stockbridge cottage than to follow him to Austria, where he becomes director of the Vienna State Opera next year.

The spectacle of Tanglewood on Parade reminds us that these Berkshire acres are the world of music’s summer home. This year’s TMC fellows, who will go on to careers with the world’s great orchestras, came to Lenox from places such as: Tirana, Albania; Shannxi, China; County Louth, Ireland; Jerusalem, Israel; Amarillo, Texas; and Kishinev, Moldovia. Throughout the bright, sunny afternoon, they gave recitals, ensemble, and chamber performances across the Tanglewood campus.

Maestro Ozawa, of course, was the star of the evening program, taking turns on the podium before and after stints by André Previn, Keith Lockhart, and John Williams. Second star went to Chris Brubeck, whose composition, Convergence: Concerto for Pops Orchestra was given a wonderful performance by Lockhart and the Boston Pops.

The 8 PM brass fanfares by the TMC Fellows, including Copland’s elegiac Fanfare for the Common Man, serves to draw the audience’s attention away from the conviviality of the lawn and toward the Shed. The opening number, Verdi’s Overture to La forza del destino, focused their attention on music. It was loud and fun, marked by crescendoes that one could’ve walked away humming if it hadn’t been followed by even more memorable music.

Previn followed Ozawa on the podium to conduct the TMC orchestra performing Benjamin Britten;s Sinfonia de Requiem, which was commissioned in celebration of the 2600-year history of Imperial Japan in 1940. Previn, whose conducting style looks the antithesis of Ozawa’s, elicited a fine performance from the orchestra, which brought the piece to a stirring close.

Lockhart and the Pops opened the second half of the program with the very engaging and intriguing Convergence: Concerto for Pops Orchestra, which was commissioned just last year by the BSO and premiered at Symphony Hall on May 16. As the 49 year old Brubeck wrote then, “They wanted a piece that would weave classical, jazz, and even funk elements…to challenge and showcase all the sections of the orchestra.” Well, he scored big time, particularly in the second movement which had great jazz elements, including a trumpet and trombone duet, some deft brushwork by the drummer, and a teasing coda that fooled many in the audience.

This august institution on sacred grounds amid these hallowed hills being all about tradition, a new one seems to be Pops emeritus conductor John Williams‘ cienmatic interlude. This year’s entry was “Hedwig’s Theme” from the upcoming blockbuster movie, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone. Williams followed that with the lovely A Hymn to New England, which he wrote to accompany a documentary-travelogue for the Museum of Science in Boston.

Then Williams made the presentation to Ozawa of the cannon, which was rolled onto the stage temporarily. After brief remarks by the Mastro, he led the combined orchestras in a fresh and powerful rendition of Tchaikovsky’s famous overture. One wonders what thoughts lay behind the enigmatic expression on Ozawa’s face as he turned to cue the cannoneers one last time? Everything else was clear as a bell, including the sky over Stockbridge Bowl where the fireworks show brought a brilliant close to a memorable day.

2001 Tanglewood on Parade with Seiji Ozawa

July 31, 2001 performance reviewed by by Dave Read

Nearly 20,000 fans witnessed Seiji Ozawa’s last turn leading Tanglewood on Parade, the annual celebration of (and fund-raiser for) the Tanglewood Mucic Center. It was probably the last time we’ll see him cue the cannon of the Eastover artillery battery that joins the massed orchestras for the 1812 Overture, the traditional close to the program, but probably not his swansong as cannoneer. That’s because he received as a parting gift an authentic Civil War cannon, which is more likely to end up at his West Stockbridge cottage than to follow him to Austria, where he becomes director of the Vienna State Opera next year.

Maestro Ozawa, of course, was the star of the evening program, taking turns on the podium before and after stints by André Previn, Keith Lockhart, and John Williams. Second star went to Chris Brubeck, whose composition, Convergence: Concerto for Pops Orchestra was given a wonderful performance by Lockhart and the Boston Pops.

The 8 PM brass fanfares by the TMC Fellows, including Copland’s elegiac Fanfare for the Common Man, serves to draw the audience’s attention away from the conviviality of the lawn and toward the Shed. The opening number, Verdi’s Overture to La forza del destino, focused their attention on music. It was loud and fun, marked by crescendoes that one could’ve walked away humming if it hadn’t been followed by even more memorable music.

Previn followed Ozawa on the podium to conduct the TMC orchestra performing Benjamin Britten’s Sinfonia de Requiem, which was commissioned in celebration of the 2600-year history of Imperial Japan in 1940. Previn, whose conducting style looks the antithesis of Ozawa’s, elicited a fine performance from the orchestra, which brought the piece to a stirring close.

Lockhart and the Pops opened the second half of the program with the very engaging and intriguing Convergence: Concerto for Pops Orchestra, which was commissioned just last year by the BSO and premiered at Symphony Hall on May 16. As the 49 year old Brubeck wrote then, “They wanted a piece that would weave classical, jazz, and even funk elements…to challenge and showcase all the sections of the orchestra.” Well, he scored big time, particularly in the second movement which had great jazz elements, including a trumpet and trombone duet, some deft brushwork by the drummer, and a teasing coda that fooled most of the audience.

This august institution on sacred grounds amid these hallowed hills being all about tradition, a new one seems to be Pops emeritus conductor John Williams’ cienmatic interlude. This year’s entry was “Hedwig’s Theme” from the upcoming blockbuster movie, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone. Williams followed that with the lovely A Hymn to New England, which he wrote to accompany a documentary-travelogue for the Museum of Science in Boston.

Then Williams made the presentation to Ozawa of the cannon, which was rolled onto the stage temporarily. After brief remarks by the Mastro, he led the combined orchestras in a fresh and powerful rendition of Tchaikovsky’s famous overture. One wonders what thoughts lay behind the enigmatic expression on Ozawa’s face as he turned to cue the cannoneers one last time? Everything else was clear as a bell, including the sky over Stockbridge Bowl where the fireworks show brought a brilliant close to a memorable day.