Parisian hero

Your splendid feature about Daniel Barenboim (April) reminded me of his time with the Orchestre de Paris, which was in a sorry state when he took over in 1975. He brought them up to scratch, invited Arthur Oldham over to create a Chorus, involved the first desks in participating as soloists, created a series of chamber concerts and set up a junior orchestra headed by Mstislav Rostropovich. He even held a referendum among the audience one day about the starting time of concerts – at the time, 9.30 pm was frequent, so that the public could have a proper dinner but neglecting those from thesuburbs who needed trains to get home. We voted for 8pm. It wasn’t without friction, like the time when he insisted on Wagner tubas being used for a Bruckner symphony. When Barenboim left in 1989, the orchestra was among the top three in Paris. Brian Edmonds, Paris, France