Feb. 26 (Bloomberg) -- London. I settled down in front of my computer this morning with a cup of coffee, and rubbed my hands in anticipation. A controversial event was about to be streamed live on the Internet at 9 a.m. U.K. time.

The New York Philharmonic under its music director Lorin Maazel was visiting Pyongyang, North Korea. It would be playing a concert of Wagner, Dvorak and Gershwin.

Since I wasn't around in Nazi days when fine orchestras delighted tyrants, I sat down with anticipation. The concert has provoked considerable nausea. Terry Teachout of the Wall Street Journal and Norman Lebrecht of Bloomberg News have both expressed dismay that an orchestra would entertain the elite of a country that abuses and starves its citizens.

This would be no ordinary concert. A podcast on the orchestra's Web site had promised a live streaming on the public broadcasting channel http://www.thirteen.org and I had verified it the day before.

On this site, Maazel had defended the event: ``Music is a powerful language in which those of us who are humane and intelligent can speak to each other in defiance of political and cultural boundaries,'' he wrote.

It was probably the first time that North Korea's leader had ever been called ``humane'' outside his circle of apparatchiks.

Orwellian Figure

With an Orwellian figure such as Kim Jong-Il behind the event, it was surprising that things did not run smoothly. The advertised streaming did not take place. Eerily, there was not a word about a change of program on the Web site.

At another site http://www.arte.tv, the concert was not available in the U.K. for copyright reasons.

After a long scrabble around the Internet, a colleague found the concert at http://www.medici.tv.

The sound was choppy and the picture grainy. A large notice which said ``for contractual reasons the concert will be available on Friday February 29'' blocked the center of the screen.

There were many visual and aural lapses. Curiously, every time the presenter spoke English, the interference increased and made what he said unintelligible.

The hall seemed to be a large, intimidating space, plainly decorated in white. A North Korean and an American flag were at either side of the stage. I couldn't see whether Kim Jong-Il was present.

Fresh Gershwin

I caught the end of Gershwin's ``An American in Paris.'' As far as I could tell under the circumstances, it sounded surprisingly fresh. While the concert came at the end of a grueling Far East tour for the orchestra that began Feb. 11, the brass sounded snappy and the strings smooth.

There were encores by Bizet and Bernstein, and then a long dull piece which seemed to be an arrangement of Korean folk music. (The presenter's identification was obscured by interference). The well-dressed and well-fed audience gave the concert a standing ovation.

A critique of the musical merits of the concert was hardly the point here, however. This was a political event dressed up as a cultural one.

There were interviews with Maazel afterwards. ``Will the concert make a difference?'' asked one U.S. journalist. ``Time will tell,'' replied the conductor, looking very pleased with himself.

If it makes as much difference as the 1956 visit of the Boston Symphony to the Soviet Union, or the New York Philharmonic's own visit there in 1959, then that is precisely no difference at all.

Maazel once subsidized his own dismal vanity-project opera ``1984'' to be put on at the Royal Opera House in London. His vanity has now led him to be used as a propaganda pawn by North Korea.

For more information on the New York Philharmonic and its Asian tour, go to http://nyphil.org. The tour is sponsored by Credit Suisse Group.

(Warwick Thompson is a critic for Bloomberg News. The opinions expressed are his own.)

To contact the writer of this column: Warwick Thompson, in London, at warwicktho@aol.com.

Last Updated: February 26, 2008 08:18 EST