Zubin Mehta
on his 90th birthday

“Wherever Zubin Mehta has worked, people love him.”

This is what Sir Peter Jonas, who had brought the conductor to Munich as the city’s music director, wrote on the occasion of his 70th birthday. Even today, two decades later, it remains true: wherever Zubin Mehta appears – whether he is rehearsing, performing, or speaking – he captures people’s hearts. His mere presence in a room transforms the atmosphere. What he has dedicated his life to – through his music and far beyond – achieving understanding among people and fostering reconciliation between hostile nations and religions – he also brings about on a smaller scale through his personality: In his presence, people listen to one another; conflicting opinions find common ground more quickly; and from opposites, a higher third emerges. This openness and receptiveness also shape his music-making. Under his direction, all performers breathe as one. Sir Peter considered him a “man of natural gifts – of boundless generosity, energy, kindness, humanity; and above all: a man who, in his life and work, never, no matter how great the provocation, ever allowed himself to be carried away by malice– perhaps the rarest of all good qualities. He possesses a kind of inner peace.”

Zubin Mehta had long been a global star by the time he joined the Bayerische Staatsoper on a permanent basis in 1998. His debut at the Nationaltheater had taken place long before that: he made his debut on February 24, 1975, during the 4th Academy Concert of the 1974/75 season, with a program that, in retrospect, serves as a showcase of his artistic versatility. He conducted a symphony from the Viennese Classical period (Joseph Haydn’s No. 96), a late-Romantic virtuoso piece by one of Munich’s local heroes (Richard Strauss’s Also sprach Zarathustra), and a work by a contemporary composer with a political commitment (Krzysztof Penderecki’s Threnos, dedicated to the victims of Hiroshima). This breadth has characterized his work here from his first opera production to the present day.

In his very first season as artistic director, Sir Peter Jonas invited Zubin Mehta to serve as guest conductor for the new production of Richard Wagner’s Tannhäuser (directed by David Alden). It was love at first sight for everyone involved – whether the orchestra, the cast, or the staff. Another concert followed in 1995 featuring Anton Bruckner’s Eighth Symphony, another hallmark of his repertoire. He had served as chief conductor for many orchestras (including heavyweights such as the Los Angeles and New York Philharmonics), as well as the Maggio Musicale Festival in Florence; but he had never before led an opera house. In 1998, he assumed the position of Bavarian General Music Director – a post August Everding had unsuccessfully offered him years earlier – and held it until 2006; since then, he has regularly returned to the podium of this institution, both in the orchestra pit and on the concert stage.

To date, we have staged 19 premieres, ranging from classics such as Ludwig van Beethoven’s Fidelio to rarities like Hector Berlioz’s Les Troyens and works of the modern era. The focus, of course, is on Wagner: Tannhäuser was followed by Tristan und Isolde (directed by Peter Konwitschny), the new production of Der Ring des Nibelungen, begun with director Herbert Wernicke and continued after his unexpected death by David Alden, and Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg (directed by Thomas Langhoff). Italian opera also means a great deal to him. He conducted many repertoire performances of Il trovatore, La traviata, Aida and Tosca; he revived Falstaff (directed by Eike Gramss) and Don Carlo (directed by Jürgen Rose); and in the face of Doris Dörrie’s controversial production of Rigoletto, one could witness how Zubin Mehta’s sense of loyalty proved its worth. After the end of his tenure as music director, Zubin Mehta conducted Turandot (directed by La Fura dels Baus) and Un ballo in maschera (directed by Johannes Erath)—an opera he had never conducted before. Another color in his palette is, not least – as in his very first concert – modernism, represented by the world premiere of Aribert Reimann’s Bernarda Albas Haus (directed by Harry Kupfer) as well as by Arnold Schoenberg’s Moses und Aron (directed by David Pountney).

Zubin Mehta has conducted over 30 regular academy concerts, as well as New Year’s concerts, evenings featuring chamber ensembles, special concerts of choral works by Giuseppe Verdi, benefit events for earthquake victims in India and Turkey and for the victims of the tsunami disaster, several guest performances in Japan, and extensive orchestral tours. The BMW Advent Concerts, which serve a good cause, also began under his leadership. And most importantly: Together with Sir Peter, he made the open-air concerts and broadcasts under the title Opera for All an institution, right up until his final evening as acting General Music Director with Die Meistersinger on July 31, 2006.

The very next year, he returned to the Bayerische Staatsoper for another Academy Concert, and soon after that again: for concerts, new productions, and runs of established productions; he went on tour (to Kashmir in 2013, for example) and performed Schoenberg’s Gurre-Lieder in a concert marking his 80th birthday. He has continued in this vein to this very day. Even during the difficult times of the COVID-19 pandemic, he actively supported the institution: the program planned as the 3rd Academy Concert of the 2020/21 season, featuring Richard Strauss’s Vier letzten Liedern and Franz Schubert’s “Great” Symphony in C major, took place as an online Montagsstück. He also played a key role in the Celebrating Sir Peter concert honoring the late General Manager. Most recently, Zubin Mehta celebrated the 500th anniversary of the Bayerische Staatsorchester at the 4th Academy Concert of the 2022/23 season with the world premiere of a work by Minas Borboudakis as well as performances of Mendelssohn’s Violin Concerto and Bruckner’s Seventh Symphony  – a program that can be understood as a free variation on his very first Academy Concert with this orchestra.

The Bayerische Staatsoper’s archives document a total of approximately 440 opera performances and concerts under the musical direction of Zubin Mehta. The sheer volume may seem downright intimidating – especially since his workload at the other institutions with which he is closely associated is no less demanding, whether at the opera house in Valencia that he opened, the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, or the other major Munich orchestras. He manages to handle all of this seemingly effortlessly; only serious illnesses have forced him to take breaks from time to time. When you witness Zubin Mehta at work, you could almost forget how much toil precedes his elegant conducting. In fact, he is a shining example of how genius is largely based on hard work, and that it is only recognized authority that enables the aura he radiates. The love shown to Zubin Mehta is – also – hard-earned. We thank him for every hour he has spent with us and look forward to, hopefully, many more encounters that lie ahead.

Malte Krasting

Congratulations from General Manager
Serge Dorny

Dear Zubin Mehta,

A 90th birthday is a rare occasion, not only because it marks a long life, but also because it provides an opportunity to honor an artistic legacy that has left an indelible mark on the musical world over the course of decades. In your case, however, this legacy defies any definitive assessment: it has not become a thing of the past, but has remained in the present, alive in sounds, in memories, and in an attitude toward music that extends far beyond the purely artistic.

My personal connection with you dates back to the late 1980s and early 1990s, when, in my capacity as Artistic Director of the Flanders Music Festival, I had the privilege of inviting you to Brussels. You came with the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra and the New York Philharmonic, two orchestras that are inextricably linked to your name. The concerts at the Palais des Beaux-Arts are among those experiences that defy forgetting  – not as individual programs, but as moments of musical revelation in which interpretation and work intertwined in an ideal way.

What impresses me most, both then and now, is the natural ease with which you make music. You do not seek grand gestures, demonstrative interpretations, or showy displays. Rather, a space emerges under your hands in which music can unfold, carried by an inner certainty that requires no assertion. This natural musical authority has become rare. It is rooted not in staging, but in trust: in the score, in the musicians, in the living moment.

This was particularly palpable in your collaboration with the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra – that sound culture cultivated over decades, which combines warmth, intensity, and inner cohesion. Yet even the New York Philharmonic, under your baton, demonstrated that defining characteristic of your conducting: clarity without severity, energy without harshness, expression without exaggeration.

Even before I met you in person, I was familiar with your artistic profile through your recordings. One of them has stayed with me ever since: your 1969 recording of Verdi’s Il trovatore with the New Philharmonia Orchestra. In that legendary cast featuring Leontyne Price, Plácido Domingo, Sherrill Milnes, and Fiorenza Cossotto, your approach to opera is already revealed in an exemplary way – dramatic intensity that develops from the musical line; a masterful balance between orchestra and voice; and that rare ability to get very close to the work while at the same time allowing it to retain its dignity.

When I later had the privilege of taking on a leadership role at the Bayerische Staatsoper – an institution with which you had close ties for many years – I became acutely aware of the lasting impact you had made there. Your tenure as General Music Director had a profound and lasting influence on the musical profile of this institution. Munich became a central hub for your operatic work, and under your leadership, the Bayerische Staatsorchester gained a sonic presence and identity that resonates far beyond the city’s borders.

It was not merely the quality of individual performances that defined your work, but the continuity of your artistic approach: the reliability of your musical language, the depth of your relationship with the musicians, and the naturalness of your presence. In an era of increasing acceleration and interchangeability, this form of artistic connection is of inestimable value.

For me personally, this also involves a sense of institutional responsibility. I follow in the footsteps of Sir Peter Jonas and Nikolaus Bachler, both of whom were connected to you in their own ways and considered your work at this institution to be formative. We want to preserve this continuity and carry it forward into the future.

Dear Zubin, your life’s journey crossed boundaries early on – geographical, cultural, and artistic. You have shown that music knows no origin, but is a language that connects. You live out this conviction not only as an artist, but also as a human being, with a generosity and openness that are inseparably linked to your name. The fact that I was able to meet you and work with you fills me with deep gratitude.
These encounters are among the most significant experiences of my own artistic journey.

On the occasion of your 90th birthday, I sincerely wish you peace, strength, and the serenity that comes from a life well-lived. 

With deep gratitude and affection. 
Serge Dorny