Reflecting on Leonard Slatkin’s Half-Century SLSO Legacy

By Eric Dundon

In 1964, a young Leonard Slatkin took part in a conducting workshop in Aspen, Colorado. As a first-year student whose age didn’t yet start with the number two, Slatkin conducted one piece that summer, Samuel Barber’s Adagio for Strings.

The Music Director in Aspen was the Czech-born British conductor Walter Susskind. It was Susskind who first noticed Slatkin’s potential on the podium. That summer set in motion a chain of events that eventually led to Slatkin ascending to the music directorship of the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra.

By 1968, Susskind had been named the SLSO’s Music Director and Slatkin joined the SLSO soon after as Assistant Conductor. Since then, Slatkin has held nearly every SLSO conducting title and left an indelible legacy on the SLSO, in St. Louis, and on the orchestral landscape globally.

“Leonard Slatkin completely reshaped the SLSO, positioning it for years to come as one of the country’s leading ensembles,” said Marie-Hélène Bernard, SLSO President and CEO. “In the process, he redefined what an American orchestra could be.”

Slatkin and SLSO administration pursued a set of goals that would broaden the SLSO’s portfolio, raise its reputation globally, and sharpen its artistic mettle.

“When I think of Leonard, I think of champion, builder, visionary, and friend,” said Joan Briccetti, who served as the SLSO’s General Manager during Slatkin’s tenure.

The SLSO will celebrate Slatkin’s legacy October 25-27 with a weekend of activities that elevate the priorities he pursued with the institution.

Slatkin’s first concert with the SLSO took place on October 13, 1968, with a program including pieces by Franz Schubert, Gustav Mahler, Richard Strauss, and a series of dances by Johann Strauss, Jr.

“That first year, I was paid $8,000,” Slatkin remembered. “I slept on the couches a lot at Powell Hall, in the green room, or up on the fifth floor.”

Despite the at time grueling hours, Slatkin recalled the tremendous importance the SLSO placed on music education.

“We had an astonishing educational program,” he remembered. “I did 83 concerts for children in my first season. We would play some of them at Powell Hall. We would go out to schools. We did a lot of residencies throughout Missouri. So, there was a lot of work for me.”

That early exposure to education programs helped shaped Slatkin’s career-long championship of music educators and emerging conductors and musicians.

Throughout the 1970s and ‘80s, when most major orchestras focused on European standards, Slatkin chose to stretch the SLSO’s artistic palette to include more adventurous and lesser-known composers, as well as American composers. Some of Slatkin’s first recordings with the SLSO were a set of concert music by George Gershwin, including the famous Rhapsody in Blue.

“We were the hot ticket item in New York because when we came to perform at Carnegie Hall, as opposed to most other orchestras, we would play repertoire that nobody else was doing,” he said.

At the time, Slatkin said, not many leaders were commissioning music from American composers. Seeing a gap in the industry, Slatkin sought to fill it, and in the process “give St. Louis a real profile musically,” as he remembered. He forged relationships with influential composers and developed a Composer-in-Residence program, which generated meaningful orchestral works from talents including Claude Baker, Donald Erb, Joseph Schwantner, and Joan Tower.

This focus on American repertoire led a moniker for the SLSO as “America’s Orchestra,” and indeed in 1983, Time Magazine proclaimed the SLSO the second-best orchestra in the country under Slatkin’s leadership.

Though Slatkin sought to set the SLSO apart with its programming, his leadership also shaped the sound of the ensemble.

“Because of Powell Hall’s slightly cavernous space, there is a resonance to the sound,” Slatkin said. “I made this adjustment for the orchestra so that we didn’t try always to play to the very last person sitting in the final row of the balcony. The winds would fold into that string sound. Even though we had these incredible wind players, they knew as a section how to combine themselves into basically what was a luxurious carpet of sound.”

Longtime concert attendees noticed.

“Leonard really did change the sound of the orchestra,” said SLSO trustee Larry Katzenstein. “It had a much brighter, some might say more American, sound. Because of his growing up in a string family, there was more string emphasis, too, I think. You can still hear it today.”

Slatkin and the SLSO realized one of the most prolific recording endeavors of the time, introducing almost 70 albums over from the 1970s to the 1990s, sometimes releasing five or six albums per year.

That output included many European standards and a variety of American works, including multiple compilations of music by American composers. This vigorous recording portfolio led to an increased awareness of the SLSO nationally and internationally.

“People got to know us from recordings,” Slatkin said. “Then, they wanted to see us. In Japan, there might be up to 400 people waiting in line for us to sign anything we could.”

Slatkin and the SLSO toured Europe, Asia, and across the U.S. to great success. During its 1995 Asia tour, the SLSO altered its itinerary to include a benefit concert in Kobe, Japan, which just five weeks earlier had been devastated by the Great Hanshin Earthquake. 

Early in his SLSO career, Slatkin observed that there was no place for young musicians to hone their skills with like-minded peers. This led to the creation of the St. Louis Symphony Youth Orchestra (YO), which performed its first concert in 1970 with music by Darius Milhaud and Aaron Copland.

“Forming the St. Louis Youth Orchestra to me was the defining accomplishment, especially since it continues to flourish and grow,” he said. “That is the accomplishment of a proud father.”

In the years following the first concert, the YO embarked on a tour of Europe, performed for President Jimmy Carter, hosted student musicians from around the globe, and continued to draw capacity crowds to Powell Hall. Thousands of students have participated in the YO, and many have gone on to careers in music, including in positions in the SLSO.

Slatkin’s commitment to emerging talent manifested beyond the YO. He championed emerging performers, touring with young talents including Midori and Joshua Bell, and giving Assistant Conductors like André Raphel Smith opportunities to shine.

Slatkin said he has always felt at ease in St. Louis, which cultivated a genial atmosphere. When he returned to the SLSO as Music Director in 1979 after serving elsewhere, Slatkin recalled that Henry Loew, the longtime SLSO Principal Double Bass, called him “Maestro.”

“I looked at him and said, ‘Henry, you have never called me Maestro,’” Slatkin said. “He said, ‘Well, you’re the boss now.’ I responded, ‘Yeah, but I’m still Leonard.’ And we always kept that slightly more relaxed and casual attitude.”

The rapport between Slatkin and musicians developed into a well-oiled machine, Slatkin said, and performance standards continued to increase.

“Whether we were playing in a snowstorm for an audience of 200 people or whether it was an arena with 15,000 people, there was always a standard,” he said.

He enjoyed hearing the orchestra under the direction of guest conductors, listening “with great pride.”

Slatkin conducts the SLSO yearly, but said he doesn’t dwell too much on his impact, choosing instead to remain forward thinking. He lives in the St. Louis area with his wife, composer Cindy McTee. Together, they still travel the world as Slatkin engages with a bevy of orchestras in North America, Europe, and Asia.

Not long ago, Slatkin decided to attend a St. Louis Cardinals game—a team he follows diligently, even with his ties to many U.S. cities. Instead of getting tickets online, he purchased his tickets at the Busch Stadium Box Office. There, the staff recognized his name. Wowed by Slatkin’s reputation and legacy, the Box Office team gathered for a group photo with the conductor (who has also thrown out the first pitch on multiple occasions).

“And I thought,” Slatkin said, “maybe when it comes to that feeling of legacy, it’s really something special when it’s just that person who doesn’t have a vested interest, but who knows who you are and what you did. That would be the highest honor I could expect.”

The SLSO will celebrate Slatkin’s 55-year legacy with the institution with a weekend of activities October 25-27, including a concert program with deep personal meaning, multi-day workshop and open rehearsal with emerging conductors, and career and book discussion in collaboration with St. Louis County Library.

The concert program (October 25 & 27), held at the Touhill Performing Arts Center at the University of Missouri–St. Louis with Slatkin on the podium includes music by Slatkin; his wife, Cindy McTee, and son, Daniel Slatkin; and Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 5, a symphony Slatkin took on multiple SLSO tours. Audiences can learn more about Slatkin’s defining career at a conversation (October 25) at the Clark Family Branch of St. Louis County Library, moderated by Julie Schuster, CEO and General Manager of Classic 107.3. Slatkin will discuss his latest book, “Classical Crossroads,” which traces the arc of his 60-year conducting career. Demonstrating his decades-long commitment to music education and rising talent, Slatkin leads a multi-day immersive workshop for three rising American conductors. The experience culminates in an open rehearsal (October 26) in which he gives insights and feedback on conducting an orchestra to the participants as they lead the SLSO at the Touhill Performing Arts Center.

Eric Dundon is the SLSO’s Public Relations Director.