James Levine Quotes

I think it's a very important collaboration between the conductor and the orchestra - especially when the conductor is one more member of the orchestra in the way that you are leading, but also respecting, feeling and building the same way for all the players to understand the music.

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.

A conductor can't be too arrogant with an orchestra and try to impose himself too much.

I always imagined that to bring an orchestra to play together is not enough for a conductor.

There's nothing worse than working with an orchestra who looks down on working with a conductor who doesn't want to conduct for you. You need to be with an orchestra that can follow you and respect you.

For me, the conductor is a person who interprets along with me, and we interpret things together.

You have a great result if the orchestra trusts the conductor, and the conductor trusts the orchestra.

Working with Michael Chiklis is a lesson in professionalism and staying focused. That's what Chiklis brings all day long.

I don't control it at all. It's all up to the musicians in the group. They control it. They make all the cues, and they tell me what they want, and then I act like a mirroring device so that everyone can see what the cues are.

I focus only on the work with my team-mates with Dortmund and Gabon.

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.

It's been a thrilling journey - I have had to really learn that an orchestra is an entity - it's a creature. I have been calling it the dragon and the conductor is the dragon tamer. And you just have to... ride and don't let go and you will be fine.

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.

So many times, I've seen conductors that, every time they have a thought, they stop the orchestra and say it, and I can see the orchestra rolling their eyes and saying, 'Oh, God, he stopped again.' So there's a technique to rehearsing.

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.

The director is a bit analogous to the conductor of a symphony orchestra. It's a collaborative adventure.

I'm having a blast being the music director at the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields. It certainly is challenging for me, but I love challenges.

On the other hand, when I give it closer thought, I realize I'm not enough of a dictator to conduct an orchestra because it requires a pretty awful person. When you read these biographies of famous conductors, they are all awful people who fail in their private relationships.

It is hard to get things done if you spend all of your time with the choir as opposed to the rest of the congregation.

I just focus on what the team needs me to do to win.

All my coaching life, I am the same, always on the touchline, the same way. I am in the game all the time. I am focused.

You put your personal stuff away and concentrate on the team and help out.

I don't care what you do in life. To say that that year I was the absolute best, especially when you're in a team sport - and I have more of a personality that I wished I would've played an individual sport - to win a championship, to get 60 people and focused in one direction and do it over a seven-month period is phenomenal.

The only thing that interests me is my team.

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.