The mane event

Those seats were empty, except for a reporter and two visitors -- a retired first violinist of the Philharmonic and his wife, who had come in from the suburbs for an advance peek at what the fuss was about. Gabriel Banat, now 81, performed on the stage here for a quarter of a century, when he and his mates gained a reputation for making life hard for snot-nosed pretenders who thought themselves worthy of wielding a baton here. The problem was that some visiting conductors had little to offer, he said -- they'd bore the orchestra -- while others were too intimidated.

"They're afraid. This is New York. This is the Philharmonic. So they show their worst, not their best." What else could the musicians do? "We were trying not to let them ruin themselves," Banat explained.

Now he watched closely as Dudamel hashed out with the Philharmonic's current lead violinist, concertmaster Glenn Dicterow, the final measures of the Prokofiev piece, when most of the strings stop playing, leaving a few principals -- including Dicterow and Brey, the cellist -- to carry the day. Dicterow thought the young conductor might be taking this part a bit too vigorously, making them go impossibly fast.

"Maybe we try this. If it works, OK," Dudamel said. "If not, we change."

Then he led them through those measures again -- just as fast -- and Dicterow dutifully went along, just exaggerating the frenzy of his bowing, then breaking into a laugh when they were done.

Eyes on the hotshot

It was two days before the paid critics would have their say, but from 15 rows back in the otherwise empty house, old-timer Banat was ready with his review of the classical music world's new hotshot with the bouncing head of curls: "He's got this orchestra in the palm of his hand," the 81-year-old declared. "He's got the technique of Rattle and the spark of Bernstein."

A couple of hours after the rehearsal, Dicterow offered his preliminary take: This up-tempo program suited Dudamel well, the concertmaster said, but he'd like to see how the Venezuelan handles more "reflective" music -- Beethoven, say, or Brahms. And what was that business about saying he'd do the end slower, "then that didn't happen."

That said, "for a 26-year-old young man, it's amazing," the violinist went on. Plus, "It's not put-on. It's basically him. He's so impassioned . . . with very strong opinions he puts across so palatably." Oh yes, "he's just a lovely human being."