Roger Hecht asks:

>Question.  How good was the LAPO when Mehta took it over? I was under the
>impression it was less than first rank and got much better under Mehta, but
>from 3000 miles away, I have no idea.  I have heard very few, if any, of
>their pre-Mehta recordings.

While not the world class orchestra it became under Carlo Maria Giulini
and presently Esa-Pekka Salonen (we quickly draw a curtain over the Previn
years), it was not a bunch of stiffs by any means.  The three previous MDs
were Otto Klemperer (1933-1939), Alfred Wallenstein (1943-1956), and Eduard
van Beinum (1956-1959).

What Mehta did bring to the orchestra was a higher profile through the
marketing done about him.  What he also did was make some absolutely
dreadful appointments, a process he repeated in NY.

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