DSO's Leonard Slatkin is OK after heart attack

Conductor, 65, recovering from surgery in Netherlands hospital

Lawrence B. Johnson / Special to The Detroit News

Leonard Slatkin, music director of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, was recuperating in a Netherlands hospital Tuesday after suffering a heart attack while conducting the Rotterdam Philharmonic on Sunday night.

DSO spokeswoman Elizabeth Twork said Slatkin, 65, experienced chest pains during the performance and was able to finish the concert. He was then taken to a Rotterdam hospital where he underwent surgery to have the insertion of two stents.

A stent is a man-made tube inserted into a natural passageway such as a blood vessel. It is a typical component of early surgical intervention to restore the normal functioning of the heart.

Twork said the DSO has received no word on when Slatkin might be released from the hospital, but that it was assumed he would return to his residence in Troy to complete his convalescence.

"He's fine and recovering," Twork said. "He has canceled his next conducting dates (this weekend with the Czech Philharmonic in Prague and Nov. 10 in Pittsburgh), but he has not canceled his scheduled concerts here. He wants very much to be here."

Those DSO performances are Nov. 19-21, but that would require Slatkin to be rehearsing with the orchestra by Nov. 17.

Twork said DSO management was preparing for the possible need to find a substitute conductor.

Slatkin would need to be feeling pretty vigorous to resume working. Conducting is not light duty. It's a sweaty job, as demanding physically as it is mentally.

Moreover, Slatkin is famous for the intensity of his globe-trotting professional style. He makes frequent guest appearances with orchestras across Europe.

This is Slatkin's first full season as music director of the DSO. He's scheduled to make three more appearances before the holidays -- Nov. 19-21 with guest jazz pianist Michel Camilo playing his own Piano Concerto, Nov. 27-29 with pianist Joseph Kalichstein playing Mozart, and Dec. 10-13 when Slatkin leads Holst's symphonic suite "The Planets."