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It's all about the music, dude! Sit down, relax and listen to some tunes.

Hit it Zubin!

213.201.207.81

To quote Zappa's famous remark that kicked off an orchestral performance of 200 Motels by the LAPO. I wish I had been there!
Zappa doesn't have much to say in his autobiography about this collaboration, other than it was pretty cut and dried and that he was not allowed to record the event by union restrictions.
But it seems Mehta as a youngster had a certain flair for the spectacular and a willingness to step outside the normal concert hall bounderies (in fact, I believe the 200 Motels concert was performed in a hockey stadium). Zappa and Mehta had a mutual interest in Varese and Stravinsky and must have had some sort of rapport on the basis of that. In any case Mehta's recording of the Varese pieces for decca was Zappa's favourite recording of his favourite composer's music. That particular endorsement has more value to me than the boring criticisms "offered" here. The Varese is one of my favourite recording as well, along with his Planets, Zarathustra, Alpine Symphony, Turandot and Sacre, all recorded during his early LAPO tenure.

The later Zubin as "celebrity" conductor, not to mention his role as the puppeteer of the Three Tenors atrocities, now that's a different story entirely. But I don't think it's fair to dismiss his earlier period by this unfortunate turn of events.



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  • Hit it Zubin! - hans 07:54:55 11/18/02 (0)


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