60 Quotes by James Levine

The more I work on his pieces, I find that their fundamental life energy is irresistible, and it increases. It's such marvelous music, with such personality, thought and care and detail. We have a number of very marvelous composers, but to see Elliott at this age so enthusiastic, wanting to do it and being able to do it, is amazing.

It's just that, when the orchestra look at me, I want them to see a completely involved person who reflects what we rehearsed, and whose function is to make it possible for them to do it.

You try on purpose to get players with different qualities which will rub off on one another.

They've really got to recognize that all of us bring some of our family issues to work and our work home.

The invisible dilemma is that men face the very real problem that they don't feel comfortable bringing these issues up and they tend not to be acknowledged at work.

If you factor in not just who's doing what at home, but how much more time working fathers are spending on work outside the home, on average they spend two hours more per day outside the home.

I really recommend the following. Before you're going to hear a piece, any piece, for the first time, don't do anything. Just go an hour early and read the program notes. Then you have some idea about how long it is, the instrumentation, what the idea of it is, the pure general shell. Then, when the piece is played, don't fight with it. Listen to it. And if you find anything that fascinates you, then here's the important thing: Go hear it again, soon.

It has to be able to play at the maximum expression and communication in every style, and the only way you can do that is - like Verdi said - working with a file, every day, little by little, until the orchestra's collective qualities emerge.

I'd rather they come an hour before and read the program notes, so that they have some slight introduction to what they're going to hear. Then I recommend the most important thing of all. Listen, don't fight.