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Ormandy has led the Philadelphia for 27 years, a longer tenure than that of any other major conductor. He shares with Bernstein an unbounded confidence in his players (though none call him "Gene," as New York musicians call Bernstein "Lenny"); in rehearsals, he treats them with a firm but gentle hand. On the podium, he uses no baton and, with his right hand liberated, gives his deepest concentration to color and balance. Perhaps as a result, his tempos sometimes drift.
The Boston Symphony Orchestra was the supreme U.S. orchestra under Serge Koussevitsky from 1924 to 1949. Charles Munch, who led the orchestra from 1949 until last fall, allowed its standards to slip somewhat, sparing only the French repertory as Boston's private domain. Under Erich Leinsdorf, 51, one of the Metropolitan Opera's greatest conductors, the orchestra has already regained a degree of its lost precision of ensemble, and it retains its long reputation as the orchestra richest in virtuosos.
Leinsdorf uses no baton and conducts with a stiff and angular style. His dress coat reaches nearly to his ankles, and from the audience he looks like an aging seaman sending semaphore signals to some distant ship. The Boston has the longest season of all (50 weeks), including Tanglewood in the summer and—for the 92 members willing to play Viennese waltzes and champagne music—a stint with Arthur Fiedler's Boston Pops.
The Chicago Symphony Orchestra has begun a period of transition that could last another three or four years until things settle down. Before his resignation last spring, Fritz Reiner, 74, built the Chicago into one of the best-disciplined orchestras in the world. Chicago's new man, who will arrive next season, is Jean Martinon, 53, a composer and conductor and presently the General Music Director in Düsseldorf. Martinon, a Frenchman, will inherit the most Germanic orchestra outside Germany.