ANDRIS NELSONS

AWe musicians can influence, and are responsible to influence, human hearts when we perform. We have to touch them.

The excitement you can get in classical concert is as big, in a different sense, as you can get when you go to the ice hockey or baseball game.

It might be expensive to make music lessons available. But it's even more costly to deal with human beings who have half their intellect and spirit left undeveloped.

It's so important which musicians we choose for being in the orchestra.

All composers who came after were influenced by Beethoven, even during his lifetime, both by his personality and by his music. He was a father figure for generations.

I'm sure the atmosphere at Tanglewood and the space there and nature - I think it absolutely fits Wagner's music.

I'm very proud of the Boston Symphony Orchestra.

When you have a great car, you want people to see the car.

I think it's very important to be part of the Boston society and the people who live in Boston.

If we want to share the message of the composers, to give good things back to humanity, we have to dig deep while we can.

The task is to influence and create a reaction in the audience. In my opinion, any reaction of a human being in the audience, I think this is great. It means we touched the person's soul.

For me, the main goal is loving music and experiencing the great music-making with the orchestra, which is the great reason why I conduct, and that is the main goal.

I'm European, and my roots are in Europe. But Boston is one of the most, in a way, European American cities. And I think I'll find a lot of similarities, historically and architecturally and tradition-wise.

I think 'Rheingold' has symbolic meaning of what happens in the world when you're running after the Rhine gold, after the gold. It doesn't end very well. It's kind of a reminder of the values of life, and I think 'The Ring,' in a way, is kind of a prediction of Wagner of what would happen in the world.

Some people will always gossip.

You don't have to make a grand, exaggerated sound to sing opera.

I always see Beethoven as having been influenced by Haydn. Yet he started a revolution - not just to be different, but also because he lived in a revolutionary era.

I feel too young in 2018 to take over the Berlin Philharmonic as the successor to Simon Rattle.

Shostakovich was one of the great symphonists of all time, and maybe the last great symphonist.

Though involvement in music and the arts can't cure all the ills of society, I do believe that the inspiration they provide has the potential to help us reflect, at times, on the better angels of our natures.

The two most important things is, one, the music in my life, and the family. It's somehow connected because music is about human beings, about love, about hate, about everything that happens in life.

All of us in the field must remain constantly vigilant and fight against all types of inappropriate and hurtful behavior and continue the essential work of creating a fair and safe work environment for all classical musicians.

You must take care of your family, respect the music, and work intensely. Health and family come first, and then you can make much better music.

You could almost write an opera about the selection of music directors for orchestras. The intrigues are really interesting, and then, at the end, the results are completely unexpected.

When the oldest surviving record company goes all in on a conductor, everyone notices.