Rather than select a performance by a maestro who has won my heart in both opera and orchestral music (Abbado, Davis, Giulini, Haitink and Kleiber among them) I’m instead going with Giuseppe Patanè’s classic 1978 La forza del destino from La Scala.

Patanè, who conducted pretty much only opera, took over this starry production with scenery by Expressionist artist Renato Guttuso after Zubin Mehta withdrew due to scheduling conflicts. Honestly, though, I think Patanè did far more than just hold it together: he did full honor to Verdi.

Born into a line of Italian opera conductors and instrumentalists, he had la lirica in his DNA. He draws much better playing from the Scala orchestra than most “singer’s conductors,” and commands a rare instinct for how to pace the rollout of this sprawling tapestry. His tempi always feel “right”—and navigable by a cast that includes a prima donna and primo tenore pushing the outer limits of their capabilities.

Both Renata Scotto and Paul Plishka mentioned Patanè to me among their short-lists of conductors they knew they could trust; I think the beautiful work Caballé and Carreras do here is partly attributable to his stewardship. This run was even more electric in the theater (I saw it three times). I also caught a lot of Patanè’s Met performances in the 1970s (La Gioconda, Un ballo in maschera, Lohengrin, Cavalleria rusticana/Pagliacci) and always came away impressed by his authenticity.

Yes, he was mercurial: one of my former Met colleagues was already working there when he joined the roster and shared recollections at one point about all the “characters” from her first years working in the artistic department. When grilled about why she thought things had changed, she smiled and shrugged, “The miracle of modern medicine: without psychotropics to tamp down tantrums, life around here was lots more interesting.” And she laughed: “Performances, too.”