Rattle Inks Berlin Orchestra Deal

BERLIN (AP) - Conductor Sir Simon Rattle signed a 10-year contract with the Berlin Philharmonic on Wednesday after the cash-strapped city reassured the British star about the funding and independence of the orchestra.

The signing, postponed for a week because of the terrorist attacks in the United States, comes a day after star conductor Daniel Barenboim agreed to stay on as artistic director of Berlin's venerable Staatsoper opera house.

"Many thanks to the city of Berlin and to those politicians who worked so hard to make this possible and to my last three illustrious forbears,'' Rattle said. "I feel like a small person sitting on their shoulders.''

Rattle will start in Berlin next year, replacing retiring conductor Claudio Abbado, who took over the orchestra - long considered one of the world's best - in 1989 after Herbert von Karajan died.