(about 70) to the orchestra; there were also objections to his demanding exhaustive rehearsals and engaging several black artists. Many recordings made by Kubelík in Chicago for Mercury Records are available on CD, and have received critical praise. Kubeliki's landmark recording of Pictures at an Exhibition with the CSO on Mercury led New York Times music critic Howard Taubman to observe that listening to it was like "being in the living presence of the orchestra," and Mercury began releasing their classical recordings under the "Living Presence" series name. After leaving Chicago, Kubelík toured the US with the Concertgebouw Orchestra, and, in the words of Lionel Salter in the Grove Dictionary, "had a brilliant success with Janáček's Kát'a Kabanová at Sadler's Wells in London in 1954". Kubelík became musical director of The Royal Opera, Covent Garden, from 1955 to 1958. Among his achievements there was, in 1957, the first practically complete production in any opera house of Berlioz's Les Troyens. Although Covent Garden sought to renew his contract, he chose to leave, partly because of a campaign by Sir Thomas Beecham against the engagement of foreign artists at Covent Garden. In 1961 Kubelík accepted the position of music director of the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra (BRSO) in Munich. He remained with the BRSO until 1979, when he retired. Salter considers this 18-year association the high point of Kubelík's career, both artistically and professionally. In 1961 Ludmilla Kubelík died after a car crash. Also in 1961, he premiered the concerto performance version of Schoenberg's Jakobsleiter-Fragment in Vienna, with the Cologne Radio Symphony Orchestra and choir. In 1963 Kubelík married the Australian soprano Elsie Morison (1924–2016). In 1967 he became a Swiss citizen, and began an association with the Lucerne Festival, in addition to his work with the BRSO. In 1971, Göran Gentele, the new general manager of the Metropolitan Opera, New York, asked Kubelík to accept the position of music director. Kubelík accepted partly because of his strong artistic relationship with Gentele. The first production he conducted as the Met's music director was Les Troyens. The death of Gentele in a road accident in 1972 undermined Kubelík's reasons for working at the opera house. He had prior conducting commitments away from the Met in his first season there, which diverted his attention. He resigned from the Met in 1974, after only six months in the post. In his post-Czechoslovakian career, Kubelík worked