Michael Tilson Thomas
Michael Tilson Thomas
Michael Tilson Thomasis an American conductor, pianist and composer. He is currently music director of the San Francisco Symphony, and artistic director of the New World Symphony Orchestra...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionMusician
Date of Birth21 December 1944
CountryUnited States of America
alive way messages
Part of my big message with all this is that if you are alive, you know all you need to know about the message of classical music, because more than any other music, it is about the way life really is.
musical bells pushing
It's easier to interest a conservative audience in pushing the musical boundaries than to involve a young audience used to very noisy, assertive music in something like Schubert or Bach because the further back you go, the less bells and whistles there are.
symphony focus important
But a large symphony orchestra basically is a repertory company and it has a very enormous repertoire and it is important for the performers to be able to know how to shift focus so that they instantly become part of the sound world that a particular repertoire demands.
diversity path recognition
The whole path of American music has been so much about the recognition of stylistic diversity, and the recognition of the importance of music which was from one of the vernacular traditions.
journey thinking voyages
And what classical music does best and must always do more, is to show this kind of transformation of moods, to show a very wide psychological voyage. And I think that's something that we as classical musicians have underestimated.
mean years wonderful
Classical music is a wonderful 1200 year-old tradition that witnesses everything that it has meant and what it means right now to be human.
people trying large-groups
One of my central maxims is how a major part of what a conductor tries to do is get a large group of people to agree on where "now" actually is.
editors hybridity directors
Being a conductor is kind of a hybrid profession because most fundamentally, it is being someone who is a coach, a trainer, an editor, a director.
art people world
Part of my mission is simply that: to bring the world of the arts, particularly classical music, closer to people so they don't feel that it is something remote that they have to specially prepare themselves for, or dress up for.
powerful unique years
Classical music is an unbroken, living tradition that goes back over 1,000 years, and every one of those years has had something unique and powerful to say to us about what it's like to be alive.
play feelings wish
Pop music, which I deeply admire and wish I could play better than I can, is based on expressing one mood, one feeling at a time. Classical music is by its very nature involved with different kinds of music, constantly transforming one another, which is more akin to the way our experience of life really is.
alive needs wonder
If you're curious, if you have a capacity for wonder, if you're alive, you know all that you need to know [about music].
sadness differences vibrations
The big difference between human happiness and sadness? Thirty-seven freakin' vibrations.
alive classical-music ifs
If you're alive, you have all the experience necessary to understand classical music.