Carlos Kleiber, renowned for both his formidable interpretations of music and his often eccentric and reclusive nature, has died aged 74.
Carlos Kleiber, 1930-2004 (photo: DG/Neumeister)
For the last years of his life he refused to record (indeed, hardly ever performed) and was known to cancel at short notice. He never hired an agent, never gave an interview, and conducted all contractual negotiations himself. It was joked that he only conducted when his freezer was empty ?though on one rare return to the podium he was lured back by the fee of an Audi car.
But when he did work, Kleiber showed an unstinting devotion in the pursuit of excellence. The results were some of the most powerful, emotional and insightful performances of the last century.
His discography is slight, containing just a handful of symphonies, including Beethoven and Brahms, and a tiny number of operas, including Der Rosenkavalier and Tristan und Isolde. Yet if the question is one of quality not quantity, Kleiber抯 discography is rich indeed. His recording of Beethoven抯 Symphony No 5 with the Vienna Philharmonic, which became a legendary recording almost over night, was described in Gramophone as 憃ne of the most articulate and incandescent Beethoven Fifths I have ever heard? An entirely different sort of work, Johann Strauss抯 Die Fledermaus also attracted superlatives from its Gramophone reviewer, who said in 1986: 慣en years after its original release there is still no recording of Die Fledermaus that, for me, matches this one for the compelling freshness of its conductor抯 interpretation.?
Carlos Kleiber was born in 1930, an Austrian of German birth and the son of conductor Erich Kleiber. He held a number of appointments at various European opera houses, including r閜閠iteur of the Deutsche Oper am Rhein in D黶seldorf from 1956, becoming its conductor two years later. He worked at the Z黵ich Opera from 1964-66, and was first Kapellmeister at the W黵ttembergisches Staatstheater in Stuttgart for three years from 1966. From 1968, for ten years, he had a guest contract at the Staatsoper in Munich.
Career milestones included d閎uts with the Vienna Staatsoper in 1973 and Bayreuth in 1974, both with Tristan und Isolde; Royal Opera House and La Scala d閎uts in 1974 with Der Rosenkavalier; and d閎uts with the Berlin Philharmonic in 1982, and the New York Met in 1988. He conducted the Vienna Philharmonic New Year concerts in 1989 and 1992.
He was the first choice of the Berlin Philharmonic to succeed Herbert von Karajan, but turned down the offer.
http://www.gramophone.co.uk/newsMainTemplate.asp?storyID=2163&newssectionID=1
