Daniel Barenboim
Daniel Barenboim
Daniel Barenboim, KBEis a pianist and conductor who is a citizen of Argentina, Israel, Palestine and Spain. He is general music director of the Berlin State Opera, and the Staatskapelle Berlin; he previously served as Music Director of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the Orchestre de Paris and La Scala in Milan. Barenboim is known for his work with the West–Eastern Divan Orchestra, a Seville-based orchestra of young Arab and Israeli musicians, and as a resolute critic of the Israeli occupation...
NationalityArgentinian
ProfessionPianist
Date of Birth15 November 1942
CityBuenos Aires, Argentina
The French Revolution gave us three... powerful ideas, or concepts - liberty, equality and fraternity. But these ideas... are not only right in themselves, but they are so because they come in the proper order. You cannot have equality without liberty, and you certainly cannot have fraternity without equality. The importance of this I learnt from music, because music evolves in time, and therefore the order inevitably determines the content.
Beethoven's music tends to move from chaos to order, as if order were an imperative of human existence.
It is always interesting and sometimes even important to have intimate knowledge of a composer's life, but it is not essential in order to understand the composer's works.
When you love somebody and they die young and you are young, too, it is very hard.
The Barenboim Foundation has nothing to do with politics.
There are wonderful restaurants in London. I love Indian food and I like Arab food, and I go very often to the Arab restaurant Noura.
When I came here, I had the feeling that I had in front of me a most wonderful high quality piece of antique furniture. It was full of dust and needed repair and polishing. I think we have removed the dust and made the repairs.
To have real knowledge, one must understand the essence of things and not only their manifestations.
Now the first step has to be taken, the step towards democracy. This step is full of risks, and requires trust on all sides. We don't know where it will lead. But if we just stand still, we will have no chance of escaping the violence.
The Steinway piano is such an incomparable instrument. Due to its virtues, I am able to express all my musical feelings.
In the beginning, there was silence. And out of the silence came the sound. The sound is not here.
The tempo is the suitcase. If the suitcase is too small, everything is completely wrinkled. If the tempo is too fast, everything becomes so scrambled you can't understand it.
You can't expect someone born into a family with no music... to understand when I'm conducting the Schoenberg Variations.
I love conducting. What I'm tired of is music administration. I don't want that. I just want to make music.