On the beat: Eschenbach on Arabella's complexities; ill wind in Chicago; Gilfry makes his screen debut; sixty years for the Collegiate Chorale.(News Briefs)(Brief Article)

This month, CHRISTOPH ESCHENBACH makes his Metropolitan Opera debut, leading Strauss's Arabella, with a cast headed by RENEE FLEMING. Many regard Eschenbach's upcoming appearance as the best news that the Met's guest-conducting roster has offered in some time. According to Eschenbach, he and the company tossed ideas back and forth for seven years before settling on Arabella, which he previously conducted at Houston Grand Opera, also with Fleming. It's an opera close to Eschenbach's heart, and he feels that its reputation has suffered from constant comparisons with Der Rosenkavalier. "We should never compare these two pieces. Arabella is totally different from Rosenkavalier. It's a very intense, psychological piece. Unfortunately, [Strauss's librettist] Hofmannsthal died in the very important process of revision. He [revised] only the first act, which obviously is the most perfect one. The second is O.K. -- the third has dramaturgical things that have to be discussed. You see, even though the opera is set in the nineteenth century, it opened in 1933, and it's really playing on the couch of Sigmund Freud, say around 1912. All the characters are rather difficult and problematic. Arabella dreams of a kind of phantom lover -- an ideal man who doesn't exist. Fata morgana, in a way. Zdenka has a nightmare kind of life, and the parents are really in trouble, not only financially but psychologically. It's interesting that all the waltzes that Strauss put into it are never finished. It represents the going down of the empire."

Last spring, Eschenbach's name frequently popped up in the press, as the New York Philharmonic narrowed its search for a successor to its current music director, KURT MASUR. Eschenbach was hotly tipped to be a leading contender for the post, and in fact there was serious interest on both sides. Then it was announced that Eschenbach would assume the music directorship of the Philadelphia Orchestra; later on came the jaw-dropping news that the Philharmonic had bypassed a number of interesting candidates for ... LORIN MAAZEL.

What influenced Eschenbach's decision? "I went with Philly because I went with Philly," he says, somewhat testily. "I know it so much better than I know the New York Philharmonic, and I have high esteem for it. I feel that when I conduct there, [we create] a big amalgam of their personality and my personality."

Another blow for classical music on the radio: the CHICAGO SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA ASSOCIATION and WFMT Radio Networks announced in late September that the Elizabeth Morse Genius--Chicago Symphony Orchestra broadcasts would come to an end on October 1. HENRY FOGEL, president of the CSO Association, pointed to lack of adequate funding as the cause for discontinuing the broadcasts and said that the CSO will continue to pursue hope of restoring syndication eventually, but he added, "In these economic times, I am not optimistic. "With the ChevronTexaco--Metropolitan Opera broadcasts having been passed around among the various public and commercial ...