Carlos Kleiber, the celebrated perfectionist conductor whose mystique grew partly out of the rarity of his performances, has died. He was 74.

Kleiber died last Tuesday on Julu 13, 2004, after a long illness and was buried Saturday at Konjsica, Slovenia, the Slovenian news agency STA said. A relative, speaking to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity, confirmed that Kleiber had died and said the conductor wanted to be buried next to his wife, who was Slovenian and died in December.

"The greatest living conductor has left us," Ioan Holender, director of the Vienna State Opera, told the Austria Press Agency.

The son of famed conductor Erich Kleiber, Carlos Kleiber was an independent who refused to accept positions with companies, instead preferring to guest conduct wherever and whenever he pleased.

He was considered one of the great conductors of the late 20th century along with Leonard Bernstein, Herbert von Karajan and Georg Solti. Kleiber was a mysterious figure in the music world, refusing all interviews, but he repeatedly left orchestra players notes filled with instructions, which became known as "Kleibergrams."

"Carlos Kleiber was a musical genius beyond words," Luciano Pavarotti said in a statement released through his spokeswoman, Terri Robson. "Music-loving audiences the world over were deprived of the privilege of experiencing him in public in more recent years, but he was a unique conductor and an extraordinary interpreter and the music world has suffered a tragic loss."

Kleiber"s performances were electric, filled with precise tempi and unusual color. The tenor Placido Domingo, himself a conductor, called Kleiber the consummate conductor. Asked what attributes he would want from every living conductor, Domingo was quoted in Helen Matheopoulos" 1982 book "Maestro" as saying he would want "the cheering of Jimmy Levine, Claudio Abbado"s special way of indicating a legato, Zubin Mehta"s incredible facility.

"But from Carlos Kleiber, I would want ... everything."

Kleiber largely retired after 1994, conducting only a pair of concerts each in 1996 and 1997 before his final public performances, five concerts of Beethoven"s Fourth and Seventh Symphonies followed by the overture to Johann Strauss Jr. "Die Fledermaus" with the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra in Spain and Italy in January and February 1999.

When encountered by an AP reporter in his hotel"s rooftop restaurant after the opening performance on Grand Canary Island and asked whether he had plans to conduct again in New York, he replied, "Maybe next year," sounding more like he was trying to end the conversation quickly than give an accurate answer.

Kleiber made his U.S. debut with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra on Oct. 12, 1978, conducting the overture to Weber"s "Der Freischutz," Schubert"s Third Symphony and Beethoven"s Fifth. He returned to Orchestra Hall in June 1983 for Butterworth"s English Idylls No. 1, Mozart"s Symphony No. 33 and Brahms" Symphony No. 2.

His only other American performances were at the Metropolitan Opera, where he made his debut on Jan. 22, 1988, in a revival of Puccini"s "La Boheme."

"Puccini"s bittersweet tale of bohemian lovers in Paris had been heard 639 times at the Metropolitan Opera before Friday night"s performance, but it"s doubtful it ever sounded better," AP critic Mike Silverman wrote.

Kleiber conducted 19 performances in all at the Met over a two-year period, also leading the company in a new production of Verdi"s "La Traviata" and revivals of Verdi"s "Otello" and Richard Strauss" "Der Rosenkavalier." After that, he refused all overtures to return to the United States.

Carlos Kleiber was born in Berlin on July 3, 1930. His father had performed for the first time in the United States in 1930-31 with the New York Philharmonic and after the family fled Nazi Germany in the 1930s, the young Kleiber grew up in Argentina.

After the war, he studied chemistry in Switzerland, but his love for music led him to a 1955 conducting debut in Potsdam, East Germany, in Karl Milloecker"s operetta "Gasparone." Instead of conducting under his own name, Kleiber conducted that night under the name Karl Keller, Matheopoulos wrote.

There was no immediate information on survivors....

Slovenian article:

"Če maestro neopažen umre v Konjšici" by Branko Maksimovič

"Z grozo sem prebral, da je v Sloveniji umrl dirigent Kleiber, da je tukaj pokopan, da je dolgo časa živel med nami in da je bila njegova zadnja želja, da bi bil tukaj pokopan. Kako grenko je to, če vidiš, da ves svet piše o smrti tega človeka; New York Times, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung in vsi pišejo o tem, zakaj je ta človek želel živeti in umreti v Sloveniji in biti tukaj pokopan," je včeraj med svojo prvo tiskovno konferenco pripovedoval zunanji minister Ivo Vajgl kot povsem osebno opažanje. Ob tem je potožil, da so ga prej obveščali prijatelji iz Berlina in Dunaja, preden je v katerem od slovenskih medijev dočakal zapis, kakšnega človeka smo imeli med nami.



"Če ne bomo znali seči dovolj visoko, kadar imamo za to razlog in možnost, potem nas pač na bo - ne kulturno ne sicer - nikjer na zemljevidih. Ne bomo segli visoko, če niti takrat, kadar nam drugi ponudijo možnost, tega ne zagrabimo in promoviramo," je sklenil minister Vajgl in ocenil, da bi se morala Slovenija velikemu umetniku primerno oddolžiti. Morda bi po njem poimenovali dvorano Slovenske filharmonije, lahko pa bi pripravili tudi komemorativen koncert.



Slovenska tiskovna agencija (ki so jo sorodniki edino obvestili) je prejšnjo nedeljo poročala, da je 13. julija po dolgotrajni bolezni v 74. letu umrl svetovno znani dirigent Carlos Kleiber. Prejšnji teden so ga v najožjem krogu pokopali v Konjšici pri Litiji, kjer je tudi grob njegove žene, baletne plesalke Stanke Brezovar, ki je umrla lani decembra.



Kot nam je pojasnila direktorica Slovenske filharmonije Monika Kartin (Kleiber jo v pismu imenuje "zaklad"), so dobro vedeli, da je maestro že dolga leta zahajal na družinski vikend nad vasjo Konjšica pri Litiji, a so spoštovali njegovo željo po popolni zasebnosti. Tako jih je zavrnil, ko so ga med boleznijo želeli obiskati. Spomnila se je tudi, da je morala kot avtorica koncertnega lista, ki ga je pripravila med njegovim gostovanjem v Ljubljani leta 1997, na maestrovo zahtevo črtati vse biografske podatke. Prav tako so odpovedali vse sprejeme, razen tistega, ki ga je na gradu Strmol za peščico izbrancev pripravil takratni predsednik Kučan. Takrat se je izkazalo, da poleg številnih jezikov izvrstno obvlada tudi slovenščino in da se ima "za Slovenca po ženi Stanki". Z njo se je spoznal leta 1956, ko je kot učenka Pina Mlakarja nastopala v Deutsche Oper am Rhein v Dūsseldorfu, kjer je tudi sam začenjal dirigentsko kariero.



Karlinova se tudi spominja, da so honorar s takratnega slavnostnega koncerta v počastitev evropskega meseca kulture na maestrovo željo nakazali škofijski gimnaziji v Šentvidu, ki jo je nekdaj obiskoval eden od ženinih sorodnikov.



Karlinova nam je potrdila, da naj bi v Slovenski filharmoniji dobili Kleiberjevo dvorano in da bodo v začetku jeseni pripravili spominski koncert. Kot dirigent se zdi samoumeven Marko Letonja, ki ga sloviti dirigent v že omenjenem pismu imenuje "Very special Maestro".



Kdo je bil maestro?



Carlos Kleiber se je rodil kot sin avstrijskega dirigenta Ericha Kleiberja 3. julija 1930 v Berlinu. Družina je leta 1935 zapustila Nemčijo in odšla v Argentino, kjer se je Carlos začel glasbeno izobraževati. Po koncu druge svetovne vojne se je vrnil v Evropo, kjer je v Zūrichu najprej študiral kemijo, leta 1952 pa se je odločil, da bo življenje posvetil glasbi. Postal je korepetitor v Mūnchnu, čez dve leti pa dirigent v Potsdamu in pozneje Dūsseldorfu, Stuttgartu in Mūnchnu. Kot gostujoči dirigent je deloval še v Bayreuthu, Milanu, Londonu, na Dunaju, v Salzburgu in Pragi, leta 1988 pa je prvič dirigiral v Metropolitanski operi v New Yorku. Veljal je za senzualnega, a neizprosnega, muhastega in hkrati hladnokrvnega dirigenta, ki je bil po pisanju The New York Timesa najbolj spoštovani dirigent po Arturu Toscaniniju...

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