Babi Yar

"The other arts persuade us, but music takes us by surprise," wrote the noted German music critic Eduard Hanslick.Who among us doesn't love surprises, so why not give the gift of great music this Christmas? Here are some suggestions for the aesthetes and aspiring highbrows who might be on your list this Christmas season.The Record of '94: The grim, powerful "Babi Yar" Symphony of Dmitri Shostakovich will never be confused with fa-la-la yuletide fare, but if there is a more extraordinary offering this year than the gritty, intense account recorded by Kurt Masur and the New York Philharmonic for Teldec, I haven't heard it.Shostakovich's blistering musical denunciation of Soviet anti-Semitism and Nazi atrocities in Ukraine is always a searing emotional experience, but add the recitations by poet Yevgeny Yevtushenko at this Avery Fisher Hall concert and the impact becomes truly overwhelming.

Celebration is the word that best describes the upcoming music season.For starters, the 1999-2000 season marks the beginning of Yuri Temirkanov's first season as the new music director of the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra.Oops. Make that the great Russian conductor's first half-season. Temirkanov doesn't make his official debut as the BSO's new music director until January 20 and 21, when he leads the orchestra in Mahler's Symphony No. 2 ("Resurrection"). If that first program suggests a rebirth of the orchestra, subsequent programs suggest ways in which Temirkanov will lead it in new directions: fresh repertory (such as Shostakovich's Symphony No. 13 -- "Babi Yar" -- the greatest work to come out of the Holocaust, June 22-24)

One day in March 1962, the telephone rang at the Moscow apartment of Yevgeny Yevtushenko, wunderkind poet of the Soviet Union's post-Stalinist thaw. It was someone claiming to be the famous composer Dmitri Shostakovich. So Yevtushenko's wife, Galya, hung up on the man, grumbling about stupid pranks. Then the phone rang again, and the diffident voice of the same man explained that he really was Shostakovich, and if it was convenient, he'd like to have a word with Yevgeny. And so began an extraordinary collaboration between a 29-year-old poet and a 56-year-old composer that produced one of the great choral symphonies of the 20th century.

IT HAS been fascinating to read the many viewpoints expressed over the last few weeks in The Sun concerning the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra's programming. We welcome the exchange of ideas and believe that this debate can help to bring about an even richer programming mix. When we plan the BSO season, we are inspired above all by the artistic vision of our music director, Yuri Temirkanov, the ideas of our guest conductors, the artistic aspirations of our musicians and the diverse tastes of our audience.

JERUSALEM -- During the Jewish holiday of Sukkot next week, President Moshe Katsav is scheduled to hold an open house at his official residence to greet the public. A few days later, he is to preside over the opening of the winter session of the Israeli parliament. But the normally festive events are expected to be awkward affairs, because Katsav is under police investigation for suspected sexual harassment and the possible rape of a former secretary in his residence. For years considered a colorless "Mr. Clean," Katsav, 61, is at the center of a scandal that has tainted the presidency, a ceremonial post that is the highest office in Israel and whose holder represents the nation in official functions at home and abroad.

In a move that has startled Baltimore Symphony Orchestra musicians and staff, David Zinman has resigned his title of "music director emeritus" in protest of the BSO's current artistic direction, specifically a decline in programming of works by contemporary American composers. He also has canceled previously scheduled appearances with the orchestra in March. Yuri Temirkanov, who succeeded Zinman as music director in January 2000, has emphasized Russian and European repertoire, including several important works new to the orchestra, such as Dmitri Shostakovich's Babi Yar Symphony and Prokofiev's Ivan the Terrible.

"A dream come true" is how Rheda Becker describes being invited by the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra to narrate "Peter and the Wolf" more than 25 years ago. The longtime narrator of the BSO's children's concerts recalls that even as a little girl, "I had an enormous love of music," and "Peter and the Wolf" was a favorite. "I thought, `I would love to be the person who told the story.' " She's now been telling that story - along with musical settings of "The Story of Babar," "Green Eggs and Ham" and "Tubby the Tuba" - to two generations of young concertgoers and their parents at the popular concert series.

THE MAN FROM BARBAROSSA.John Gardner.Putnam.303 pages. $14.95. James Bond is back -- but this time it would be better if he weren't. John Gardner's interpretation of the Ian Fleming superspy is again that of the agent who has no idea who his enemies or allies are. He somehow muddles his way through.The story deals with a mistaken identity kidnapping of one Joel Pendrek from his home in New Jersey. An unknown Russian organization named the Scales of Justice takes the credit. It says he is really Josif Voronstov, a Ukrainian who was involved in the Babi Yar massacre, and vows to bring him to justice.

Total victory for the Japanese at Pearl Harbor slips away at 8:10 a.m. The aircraft carrier Lexington eases out of Hawaii at that hour, the last of the three aircraft carriers based there to leave port.For all the carnage and destruction the Japanese would wreak on Pearl Harbor in two more days, it is the aircraft carriers they are after. The attack on Pearl Harbor is not so much an attempt to defeat the United States as to cripple the Americans long enough for Japan to seize and hold the Western Pacific and Indochina.

IN ALL THE years that I heard David Zinman conduct the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, whatever I felt was right about the music was diminished for me by what my ears told me this conductor could not do -- elicit from the musicians a consistently satisfying ensemble sound. Under Mr. Zinman, the BSO often sounded brash, jittery, off-center and, dare I say it, neurotic. The music could seem forced, imposed from the top down, made from the outside in. Some critics have blamed the acoustics of Meyerhoff Hall for shortcomings in the BSO's performance, and the players have claimed they had trouble hearing each other on stage (this was before the recent acoustical adjustments)