A season after he took over as music director of the Berlin Philharmonic, Simon Rattle is bringing the orchestra to America. “Today’s Berlin, Rattle has found, is a lively, slightly dangerous place in which to live. The Russian Mafia, a holdover from the Cold War era, is still in evidence in this gateway to the East. In a strange way the BPO mirrors this rough-and-tumble society, he says. ‘They tend to hire musicians that other orchestras reject as being too extreme – people who are chamber musicians rather than orchestra musicians. One of them said to me, `Simon, we’re sick of experience. What we want is talent.’ However, because the Berlin Philharmonic of 2003 is more heterogeneous in its membership than ever before in its 121-year history does not mean it has lost its distinctive character.”