Joshua Bell Quotes

My whole life, I've been watching conductors. I was 7 the first time I played with a conductor. Seeing the ones that do it well, it's an amazing thing.

Over the years, I've loved being on stage with an orchestra, waving my hands around.

He was making all kinds of sounds apparently with his mouth, and shaking his head and I thought, gosh, is he trying to stop the orchestra? Is it all wrong? It was just unbelievable.

Let me say that I've never thought to conduct because the conductor has to think to the music before the orchestra. And the orchestra comes later. For me, it's terrible.

I'm a little less hungry as an actor than I used to be. When you're a director, you're the conductor of the orchestra, and when you're an actor, you're playing the violin. There's a thrill to each of them, but as the conductor, you get the fuller sound.

In symphonic music, when you are conducting, you do the same thing. You are feeling the whole orchestra, thinking ahead so you can prepare for a change.

I admire Tom Ades: he's a brilliant conductor, and he gets just the right hard, brilliant sound from the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra for Russian music.

Through conducting, you express through your arms, through your face and even the body, what you want to tell, so the musicians of the orchestra understand.

I have a big problem with conductors who gesture a lot.

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 think this orchestra's strengths involve drama and voice.

I kind of alternate between conducting and playing and kind of juggling those things, but I don't use a baton.

Conductors' careers are made for the most part with 'Romantic' music. 'Classic' music eliminates the conductor; we do not remember him in it.

In concertos, I stand up, and I conduct with the bow when I'm not playing. During symphonies, I sit, but sometimes I stop playing to conduct. Being seated in a section allows me to feel more like we're playing chamber music, which is how I like to approach it.

We've been performing with symphonies all of our career and it sounds so wonderful when they play 'My Girl' with the large string section, I want to turn around and look.

Conducting is a natural way to participate in one's own music. Almost every 19th-century composer Mendelssohn, Mahler was conducting or playing his own music. Mozart did both.

I love conducting. What I'm tired of is music administration. I don't want that. I just want to make music.

I know that John Adams has had a very hard time directing French ensembles.

It's a physical challenge. It's a spiritual challenge. I'm studying almost every day a different symphony, not returning to any one for a week.

If people had told me that I would have the stamina to conduct 'Ring Cycles,' I would have been amazed. I still am.

A man who wants to lead the orchestra must turn his back on the crowd.

I love doing concert music.

Good conductors know when to let an orchestra lead itself. Ninety percent of what a conductor does comes in the rehearsal - the vision, the structure, the architecture.

I was different from most young conductors today.

I currently spend a lot of time thinking about orchestration and every detail of a piece.