In the Daily Telegraph. It's a conductor's world, says Norman Lebrecht THERE has never been a better time to be a good conductor. No fewer than nine North American orchestras are searching for a new music director, and the quarry are in a position to name their price. Riccardo Muti, for instance, has declined a $1,500,000 approach from the New York Philharmonic. Muti, who has scratched London out of his schedule because he cannot face its fearsome critics, appears to have been equally daunted by another citadel of free speech. Outside New York, which is the oldest, wealthiest and most turbulent of New World orchestras, there are jobs going in Boston, Philadelphia, Houston, Cincinnati, Atlanta, Minnesota and Indianapolis. All are among the 20 best-endowed orchestras in the US, and hence the world. Above the border, the Toronto Symphony, which has been on strike for a month, will need to replace the dismayed Jukka-Pekka Saraste. Few can recall a time when so many bands have chased new batons - the unutterable, as Wilde might have said, in pursuit of the inaudible. Much of the hunt is being conducted under cover of darkness. Toronto's Finnish conductor has not yet resigned, but his agent has fixed him up with an alternative French connection. Minnesota has not sacked Eiji Oue, a young spark appointed on Seiji Ozawa's say-so; it has rehired him for one more year while putting out word that it wants a bigger stick. Atlanta, by contrast, had a public falling-out with Yoel Levi, and Boston, having summoned the courage after 27 years to wave Ozawa on his way, is waiting by the phone. But unhappiness wafts from an orchestra like mephitis from a swamp, and many maestros are giving America's finest the widest of berths. Traditionally, the gaps would have been discreetly filled in a tenebrous office on New York's 57th Street, where the biggest talent agency, CAMI, runs the diaries of 100 leading conductors. However, CAMI's president, Ronald Wilford, turns 72 next week and appears to have lost the plot. Wilford was taken aback by the ousting of Ozawa and lacks convincing candidates. The only predictions that can be made with any conviction are that most orchestras will settle for someone less than the man of their dreams, and that no good conductor will commit to more than 12 weeks' residence, dashing any hopes of a mythical union between maestro, musicians and metropolis. In the deeper mid-West, Paavo Jarvi, Yakov Kreizberg and Osmo Vanska are in with a shout. Elsewhere, safety-first prevails. Boston is eyeing Christoph Eschenbach, latterly of Houston, and Philadelphia may renew Wolfgang Sawallisch, 77, a year at a time. New York, too, is contemplating renewal, albeit in more combustible circumstances. Early this month, Deborah Borda, the Philharmonic's executive director, took a flight to Los Angeles and signed up for a life-change. Borda, 50, is the toughest cookie on the circuit, a social charmer whose facial dimples conceal ferric muscles. In seven years, she transformed the New York Philharmonic from a somnolent band with a blue-rinse crowd to a cracking outfit with a taste for contemporary composers and interpersonal conflict. She fell out badly with musicians in the last union negotiations, and with her music director, Kurt Masur, for apparently coveting too much credit. When the Los Angeles Philharmonic offered her a new life, a brand-new hall, half a million pounds a year, and a place in the Pacific sun, Borda upped sticks and quit New York, leaving her adversaries dumbfounded, but not for long. Masur, whom Borda sought to replace with Muti, is now negotiating for an extension of his term and seems confident of getting it. Chicago, too, has renewed Daniel Barenboim's contract - not because he has greatly enhanced Solti's orchestra, nor because eight years was not long enough for him to make a mark, but because there was no one as eminent challenging for this most cherishable of posts. On the autumnal landscape, this is turning into a season of renewals, without a fresh bud in sight. Big orchestras demand big names. With the collapse of classical recording, young conductors are unable to acquire pedigree. Orchestral boards, under pressure, abjure risk and settle for the familiar. The effects are starting to show. In the past week, the Berlin Philharmonic under Claudio Abbado (not the happiest of teams) earned demonstrative ovations in Chicago, Boston and New York, with many in the audience applauding long after they had quit the stage. "How on earth do they play like that?" exclaimed astonished concert-goers, drawing unfavourable comparisons with America's finest. The balance of orchestral power has shifted decisively, and America risks losing its future if it continues to play for safety. Tony Duggan, England. My (developing) Mahler recordings survey is at: http://www.musicweb.force9.co.uk/music/Mahler/