Metropolitan Opera’s oncebeloved conductor
James Levine, the guiding maestro of the Metropolitan Opera for more than 40 years and one of the world’s most influential and admired conductors until allegations of sexual abuse and harassment ended his career, died March 9 in Palm Springs. He was 77.
His death was confirmed Wednesday by Dr. Len Horovitz, his physician. The cause was not immediately released, nor was it clear why the death had not been announced earlier.
After investigating accounts of sexual improprieties by Levine with younger men stretching over decades, the Met first suspended and then fired him in 2018, a precipitous fall from grace at the age of 74. Levine fought back with a defamation lawsuit.
Before the scandal emerged, Levine was a widely beloved maestro who helped define the Met, the nation’s largest performing arts organization, expanding its repertory and burnishing its worldclass orchestra. And his work extended well beyond that company. For seven years, starting in 2004, he was music director of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, earning high praise during his initial seasons for revitalizing that esteemed ensemble, championing contemporary music and commissioning major works by living composers.
Levine also served as music director of the Munich Philharmonic for five years (19992004). He had long associations with the Berlin Philharmonic, the Vienna Philharmonic and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, as music director of its Ravinia Festival for more than 20 years.
His final years as a maestro were dogged by health crises, including a cancerous growth on his kidney and surgery to repair a rotator cuff after he tripped on the stage at Symphony Hall in Boston in 2006.
Rumors of Levine’s alleged sexual misconduct with younger men had trailed him for decades. Although periodically news organizations had looked into the story, nothing concrete turned up until 2017. Amid the tide of allegations against powerful men in what came to be called the #MeToo movement, three men went public with accusations that Levine had sexually abused them. The acts were alleged to have taken place as far back as 1968 and began when they were teenagers.