Lincoln Center's redevelopment plans heat up New York; Rudel hears things differently. (On The Beat).(Julius Rudel)(Brief Article)

For those who have followed it closely, the heated battle over the proposed redevelopment of Lincoln Center has contained more purple emotion and high-glamour venom than a boxed set of Falcon Crest episodes. A brief review: JOSEPH VOLPE, the Metropolitan Opera's general manager, has bitterly opposed two items on the renovation-project table: 1) a new theater, on Lincoln Center premises, for the acoustically beleaguered New York City Opera, and 2) a dome-covered arcade that would cut across the complex's plaza. (Can anyone on the Lincoln Center board really have thought that construction of a mini-mall would be an enhancement?)

In the reportage on the Lincoln Center follies, Volpe has usually taken most of the heat. In an emotional argument with other Lincoln Center constituents last year, Volpe reportedly walked out of discussions involving the redevelopment, returning only when assured that the final blueprint would have the approval of every one of Lincoln Center's constituents, not just the majority.

Volpe is accustomed to playing the heavy, and by his own admission he often enjoys it. But in an article by LESLIE BENNETTS in the February 4 issue of New York magazine, much of the responsibility for the chaos at Lincoln Center is laid at the feet of an administrator who has historically savored the role of "good cop": Lincoln Center chairman BEVERLY SILLS. Bennetts's article is something of a public-relations disaster for Sills: "Machiavellian" and "insidious" are two of the kinder adjectives used to describe her alleged behind-the-scenes manipulation. (The article was a hot item on the West Side: for days after the magazine appeared, there was not a copy to be had at any newsstand in the Lincoln Center vicinity.)

One of the renovation project's central issues is the flag lie acoustical state of the New York State Theater, which houses New York City Opera. Originally intended as a ballet house only, and designed to the specifications of GEORGE BALANCHINE for his New York City Ballet, the house has offered opera-lovers poor sound quality for as long as many of us can remember. Sills has always, insisted she, NORMAN TREIGLE, PLACIDO DOMINGO, PATRICIA BROOKS and other stars had no difficulty making `themselves heard in the early years. JULIUS RUDEL, director of NYCO from 1957 to 1979, recalls it somewhat differently. The acoustics, he says,' were a problem from the beginning. I wasn't going to move in until we could see if it could be ameliorated, at least. We had a whole array of testing with audiences, without audiences, and various types of operas -- with recitative, spoken dialogue, and so on, so we could get a grip on what was wrong. I mobilized all of my colleagues and friends in the music profession. I remember LEOPOLD STOKOWSKI climbing all over the place, trying to listen from various vantage points. When we got done with the ...