I think touring is an important part of the life of an orchestra. Not only sharing with other audiences, but bringing that sense of family that you get back home. The sense of growing deeper into the music, of making it all sound like chamber music - that comes from being together on tour.
AWe musicians can influence, and are responsible to influence, human hearts when we perform. We have to touch them.
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.
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.
When the oldest surviving record company goes all in on a conductor, everyone notices.
Birmingham did a truly remarkable thing in building Symphony Hall, which is the finest concert hall in the U.K. and one of the best in the world. The city has supported music without putting on the brakes.
The Soviet Union had only one party. You couldn't express yourself freely; you couldn't admit belief in God. And yet this terrible regime understood that human beings have to express themselves, through music, even at a bad level. All kids studied music automatically, just as they did maths or languages or sport.
I see, in this life, the hardship many suffer. I see the joy that music can give. How we deal with all this is part of a preparation for the next life.
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.
I simply love Wagner's music. That actually started very early. He was the first composer I was exposed very much to because my parents introduced me to Wagner's music very early.
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.
Wagner always opens you a second breath, and then you go on, and you are absolutely into his musical world, and you can't stop, and you can listen for four hours, five hours, six hours, and then you are like in his mystical hands of his music. He's such a great poet of music.
To play opera, to play Wagner, it's a great joy.
I feel too young in 2018 to take over the Berlin Philharmonic as the successor to Simon Rattle.
When I was younger, I wanted very much to play football.
Anyone who loves football can also be involved in music; the two aren't mutually exclusive.
I believe we have a physical body and a soul. It doesn't matter what religion you are, whether or not you believe in God. I think people believe that there is a soul and a body.
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 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.
As for my relationship to Beethoven, I admire people who can say what they really think. It's as though he's saying, 'That's how I feel about the world, and I don't care what people may say.' His music is pure and honest. Beethoven never pretends to be anybody else.
