John von Rhein, in a thoughtful piece on Riccardo Muti's Chicago appointment, quotes a phrase from my post the other day, but he takes it out of context. I did not say that a "'jet-set celebrity conductor' mind-set ... brought Muti" to Chicago. Rather, I said that if Muti had been guest-conducting frequently at the New York Philharmonic while Alan Gilbert was serving as music director, then Gilbert would have had "the shadow of a jet-set celebrity conductor hanging over him." That is not a statement about Chicago's motivations for hiring Muti. Nor is it intended as a putdown; I was simply pointing out that Muti is an international superstar among conductors, while Gilbert, as yet, is not. I made sure to state that Muti's repertory is unpredictable, that he has led quite a bit of new music, and that at his best he is an electrifying conductor.
