Conductor Quotations

The conductor must breathe life into the score. It is you and you alone who must expose it to the understanding, reveal the hidden jewel to the sun at the most flattering angles.

I conceived of an instrument that would create sound without using any mechanical energy, like the conductor of an orchestra. The orchestra plays mechanically, using mechanical energy; the conductor just moves his hands, and his movements have an effect on the music artistry.

There were so many specific things from high school jazz band that I remembered: the conductor searching out people who were out of tune, or stopping and starting me for hours in front of the band as they watched.

There are two types of conductors. One is the good conductor who can do passionate music but also listen to the singers and do the orchestra. And then there are great conductors, who have their own opinion on the music, who are ruling everything - and not listening much to the singers, but the orchestra play amazingly.

Born a slave, Harriet Tubman was determined not to remain one. She escaped from her owners in Maryland on the Underground Railroad in 1849 and then fearlessly returned thirteen times to help guide family members and others to freedom as the most famous conductor of the Underground Railroad.

The awful thing about a conductor becoming geriatric is that you seem to become more desirable, not less.

From time to time, the Vienna Philharmonic could play without a conductor because they are so good.

Young conductors who are confident enough, they very often have success.

Conductors don't suffer, they are part of the performance.

In truth, I became a conductor because deep down I wanted to conduct Brahms's four symphonies and Richard Strauss's tone poems.

I played with the best conductors of the world.

In America, they have this nauseating habit of calling the conductor 'maestro'. I always slightly gag when the cor anglais player goes, 'Maestro, can I discuss bar 19 with you?'

It seems always to have been difficult to have been a New York Philharmonic conductor because of the nature of New York. We are in direct competition with the great orchestras in the world who come to play in our hall or in Carnegie, and we are constantly compared. I think that 's a good thing.

If you ever go to a music session, you'll notice that the musicians can sit down and start playing right away, and everyone knows what to do. Of course they're reading it, but the conductor can tweak little things, and you can take that back to directing motion pictures.

Wherever there’s a conductor, you’re sure to find a dead composer!

What we need to know is the complete package. We need to know that our next conductor is not only a top-notch professional musician, but also someone who has a good sense for concert programming, for understanding and working with the strengths and limitations of this orchestra, and all of that.

Maestro Behr was a dynamic conductor who worked so well with soloists, the chorus and the musicians of the orchestra, all of whom respected him greatly. He will be deeply missed.

Leonard Bernstein was a true American hero, ... He could do anything. He was a composer, a conductor and a concert pianist.

Many New Yorkers, rightly or wrongly, feel that the union's case is not as strong as it might be because they don't have very good pensions themselves. It's not something like the safety issue or the conductor issue or the token clerk issue, where the union has significant common ground with the transit riding public.

One of the principal differences between the work that I have done at other places, either as a guest conductor or as a music director, and that of St. Louis is that I feel the biggest potential we have here is that we play the music with the type of emotional understanding that few other orchestras match. So while we're trying to come as close to technical perfection as human beings can, what we're really working on is trying to get the raison d'etre , the reason for being, of that music.

I would often take this bus and go to a nearby village where I had hordes of animal friends. I was hardly around four or five years old then. The conductor was so used to seeing me hop on to the bus and get down at the same place, that he never asked any questions. The strangest part is, he never asked for a ticket either!

China needs to approach the currency exchange rate from the perspective of China's economic interests first and foremost, ... We will not listen to someone else's conductor when doing what we need to do.

I was an assistant conductor at the Metropolitan. It was my first trip to America. During that winter, Austria was swallowed up by the Nazis.

Composers are not all good conductors.

The conductor has the advantage of not seeing the audience.

When she said she would no longer be our conductor we were lost.

The orchestra confides in me about their music director or their conductor, and I've never seen a conductor that's been liked by everyone.

What appeals to me about an American music directorship is the involvement of the conductor with the orchestra and the community. I think that's a fantastic thing. In Europe, being principal conductor means merely that you're the person who does most of the concerts. For me, that simply isn't enough.

Originally, the part was an architect, but when they found out I was a pianist, they changed it to a world-renowned conductor and pianist.

A conductor can do wild things which can feel forced, but if you're directing from within the orchestra, you can't do that, things have to feel natural.

It's a great celebration. It's our 15th anniversary and we are joining the rest of the world in celebrating Mozart's 250th anniversary. It is also a somewhat bittersweet celebration as it represents my 15th season as director and conductor and my last season with the festival.

It presents a challenge in itself. You can't see the conductor so you're on your own. It's been a challenge for us and the orchestra.

It's different for people who have not seen a symphony conductor conduct from a chair. I feel very connected to the orchestra in a way that a conductor sometimes does not feel. I think it's more visceral.

I mean, the great secret is that an orchestra can actually play without a conductor at all. Of course, a great conductor will have a concept and will help them play together and unify them.

Being a director or a conductor is a balance of many things. And to do it right is a very difficult tightrope to walk. I've come to the conclusion that there's really no way to be one hundred percent popular as conductor.

Being a cover conductor is really like being an assistant conductor because I'm there as the orchestra rehearses with the (full-time) conductor. I'm there following along (on the score) and watching. It's just incredible to be around one of the best orchestras in the world.

I was the most famous conductor on the Underground Railroad.

Somehow, conductor as this superhuman conduit between the masters and the masterpieces and the immortals.

I don't like to hurry. I'm not a conductor of the fast, fiery romantic type. I prefer Bruckner, with the sincerity of his musical language and the huge time spans in which his ideas develop, to Mahler, with his hysteria and self-indulgence.

I do basically what a conductor does with a baton, except I also play along with the orchestra. So I have to juggle the roles of playing the concertmaster; sometimes I drop the violin and wave my arms.

I believe that every human being endowed with intelligence, memory, and strength of character bears within him a little of thc supernatural as well. The highest purpose of the conductor is to release this superhuman potential in every one of his musicians.

The end result of my personal story is that I became a really good drummer, and I know myself well enough to know that I wouldn't have without this really tough conductor and this really cutthroat hostile environment I was in.

The great secret is that an orchestra can actually play without a conductor at all. Of course, a great conductor will have a concept and will help them play together and unify them. But there are conductors that actually inhibit the players from playing with each other properly.

The Earth will control these sounds just as a conductor controls an orchestra by moving a baton.

The conductor said that I won precisely because I made this mistake and managed to continue playing.

Zeal, the blind conductor of the will.

When I am with composers, I say I am a conductor. When I am with conductors, I say I am a composer.

It's on 24 hours a day, it's the gateway and it's the main conductor of information, ... It's really a center for all the information and will make it a lot easier.