Ivan Fischer would seem to be a near-perfect candidate to succeed David Zinman as the Baltimore Symphony's music director.
Fischer, who will lead the orchestra's subscription concerts this week, has guest-conducted here several times with success. The players appear to like and respect him.
His abilities as an orchestra builder and trainer have been dramatically demonstrated by the way he has nurtured the Budapest Festival Orchestra to international status in the 13 years since he founded it in 1983.
And because Fischer, 45, frequently guest conducts in America and was for several years the principal guest conductor of the Cincinnati Symphony, he is knowledgeable about American culture and sensitive (as many foreign-born conductors are not) to the considerable differences between the way American and European orchestras operate.
It is his awareness of those differences, however, that gives Fischer pause when he thinks about a post in the United States.
"American orchestras are fantastic, but I worry about the possibility of a crash," says Fischer, whose cultured Old World manner, sensitive face and gentle demeanor suggest the sad-eyed, idealistic heroes Paul Henreid used to play in films such as "Casablanca."
"The orchestras need to be more imaginative because the big danger here is routine. There are three to four rehearsals every week, followed by often boring concerts that are attended by dwindling audiences."
Fischer believes that orchestras in the United States have become prisoners of their own size. During the last 30 years, the creation of 52-week seasons at most of America's major orchestras has given musicians salaries, benefits, working conditions and job security that are unmatched anywhere else.
But maintaining that standard has made it necessary for orchestras to perform an increasing number of concerts -- including pops and children's programs. And the need to market those concerts and to raise funds have created an atmosphere in which the business of music in America sometimes appears to give short shrift to the art of making it.
"For American orchestras to survive, they must give up the priority of preserving intact their huge organizations," Fischer says. "American musicians would not believe how their colleagues live in Eastern Europe. My musicians play with poor instruments and for terrible salaries."
