Best Classical Music Conductor

Still living and working is Yuri Temirkanov. My other favorite is Charles Dutoit. For historic my favorites are Karajan and Bernstein. I am ususally comfortable buying a recording of theirs I have no knowledge of sight unseen (or it that hearing unheard ??)

Temirkanov is very musically and emotionally gifted. He is the only living conductor who conducts with complete artistic freedom (much like Bernstein did, but a different style.) Dutoit is very consistantly good recording to recording. (So was Karajan.)

My favorite conductor you probably have never heard of is Benjanmin (Ben) Zander.

Ben Zander is a professor at a school for gifted young musicians that is connected with the New England Conservatory in Boston. His orchestra is the Boston Philharmonic (BP) made up of pros, NEC students and others. It was formed about 20 years ago. Ben was hired back then to conduct the local Boston Civic Orchestra. When the board of directors found his style too off-the-wall for them, they fired him. The entire orchestra quit in protest; formed the Philharmonic; and the rest is history. His landmark recording is the Rite of Spring with the BP. We are use to the small blurbs in the Penguin guide to classical music. The original Penguin review of Ben's Rite is a page an a half!! The Mahler 9th recording has a third CD with Ben giving a discussion of the piece along with a map of his orchestra setup. Was a grammy nominee. If you search "Zander" in Towerrecords.com or Amazon.com you can find some of them. If you cannot find recordings such as the Rite of Spring you can get them from the Boston Philharmonic directly. Web site is .org -- I use to live near Boston and had the pleasure of hearing him live which is even better.

Ben Zander is a Cellist by training. As a boy in Britain he studied with Benjamin Britten. Ben's students include Yo Yo Ma.

I also agree with the Klieber nomination. I agree that there are too few recordings by Klieber out there. Rattle was amazing by putting the City of Birmingham on the map. I believe Rattle was just hired by Berlin to replace Abaddo who is also quite good. As far as what instruments they play there are a lot of pianists also; Bernstein, Wolfgang Sawal... how ever you spell it in Philadelphia. I have a Bach laser disc where Karajan plays the harpsichord; Daniel Barenboim also. Yes that was Zander on 60 minutes. He give a talk before every perforance of the Boston Philharmonic very much like what is on the Mahler 9th CD. He loves to prepare the audience so they get the most out of the concert. Ben's concerts are one thing I miss after I moved south.

I will also nominate Marin Alsop, music director of the Colorado Symphony, especially since there are so few female conductors at this level.

The story I heard was some millionaire guy who leaned the one Malher symphony by heart and since he had the cash, was able to hire his own orchestra to perform it?? Don't know the truth of it. I will try to get his name. I will be listening to Temirkanov live in Baltimore tonight and I know some of the orchestra. Brahms 4th and Beethoven Piano No.5 Emperor/John Lill.

Ten years ago when I still lived near Boston, the Rhode Island Philharmonic was looking for a new music director. One of my best friends is on their Board of Directors. She invited me as her guest to every one of the "Audition" concerts that year, to get my opinion of the candidates; one being Marin. I had the pleasure of meeting her at the reception after the concert. She was one of the top two picks. The other person was hired, and Asian conductor who is now back in China as music director of the Bejing Symphony. At the time the RI Philharmonic would have been one of two or three orchestras Marin was involved with, and I believe the Board wanted someone who would move to Rhode Island and take part in the community. It not for that; if it was based solely on talent, she would have won. ------- Temirkanov and John Lill were fabulous. Lill is British; was Tchaikovsky competition winner in 1970. He usually stays in Europe, so I was not very familiar with him. His bio said he was recently performing in St. Petersburg, so Yuri must have invited him to come to Baltimore.

I believe Jansons is in Pittsburg. So was Tilson Thomas and Andre Previn, so this is a good group.