Tuning in…
Tuning in…
Castaway
2 appearances
A composer and conductor who won four Oscars for film scores and later became principal conductor of the London Symphony Orchestra.
On the island
Eight records
Symphony No. 40 in G minor, K. 550
Carlo Maria Giulini conducting the New Philharmonia Orchestra
I think Mozart is the musical equivalent of Shakespeare, meaning it's the cornerstone, and I couldn't do without it… as a conductor I would choose a symphony and this I think is in many ways the perfect piece.
String Quintet in G minor, K. 516 (slow movement)
Amadeus String Quartet with Cecil Aronowitz
You can't be on a desert island without chamber music. Besides which the chances are you can always get four more people marooned, but not a whole orchestra.
Piano Concerto No. 24 in C minor, K. 491 (third movement)
This is one of the concertos that of course is quite feasible to do from the keyboard… the performance we're about to hear is infinitely better because it's by my favourite pianist, Solomon.
It is, I think, the perfect piece. It's the most perfectly constructed piece of symphonic writing I know and I would hate to have to do without it.
Symphony No. 5 in C minor, Op. 67 (first movement)
Karl Böhm conducting the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra
It is, I think, the perfect piece. It's the most perfectly constructed piece of symphonic writing I know and I would hate to have to do without it.
Symphony No. 4 in E minor, Op. 98 (last movement, closing passage)
Herbert von Karajan conducting the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra
I couldn't very well live for the rest of my life without hearing a Brahms symphony… each Brahm symphony, I think the best one is always the one I've just heard.
Leonard Bernstein conducting the New York Philharmonic
I think it's time for me to indulge myself in some very glamorous orchestral sounds.
In my own opinion, I think the greatest living composer is Benjamin Britten… the War Requiem, which I think is the most admirable piece in my memory.
Violin Concerto in D major, Op. 61: II. Larghetto
Anne-Sophie Mutter, Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by Herbert von Karajan
The first one is the Beethoven Violin Concerto, which has a second movement of such unsurpassable serenity that it always, no matter what else is going on in anyone's life, it will give you a different perspective. And this particular performance is by Anna-Zophi Motte, who is... well, I don't know anyone that plays the violin any better than this.
Symphony No. 5 in D major: III. Romanza
London Symphony Orchestra, conducted by André Previn
I've always had a a great predilection for British music, and and that was apparent very early on in my life here. And I recorded all nine of the of the Vaughan Williams symphonies. And the fifth is the most touching for me and the most typical, and the slow movement I find really ravishing in the in the LSO knows just out of play.
Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune
London Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Pierre Monteux
It's a piece that if you study it very carefully. There really isn't a single solitary extraneous note in it. There's nothing that's put in just for sound, just for show. It's a it's a perfect piece. On this record it's it's conducted by a man who uh turned out to be my my conducting teacher, Pierre Monteur.
Symphony No. 4 in E minor, Op. 98: I. Allegro non troppo
Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by Herbert von Karajan
It's a perfect piece. The Brahmsforth is the most remarkable structure. It is heartbreakingly beautiful, and it is also perfectly engineered piece. It is one of the great pieces of all time.
Franz Bartolomey, Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by André Previn
The next record is something that that I've conducted, but I really chose it for A combination of the the playing of the orchestra, the the playing of the cello soloist, who is Franz Bartolomay, who is the the principal cello of the Viana Philharmonic, and the piece, Richard Strauss's Don Quixote... And it is a piece that I find quintessential Strauss.
Symphony No. 40 in G minor, K. 550: I. Molto allegroFavourite
Columbia Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Bruno Walter
Mozart's G minor Symphony, number 40, and this is conducted by uh a man who for Mozart was my idol, Bruno Walter. And he most certainly would not, even if he'd had access in those days to the old instruments, he wouldn't have bothered, because he wanted it to be as beautiful as possible at all times, because he thought that Mozart, who was an angel, would have deserved that.
Peter Grimes: Four Sea Interludes, Op. 33a - Dawn
Orchestra of the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, conducted by Benjamin Britten
It's a stunning piece of work and uh Uh very, very dramatically moving and and emotionally touching. And uh my admiration of it never diminishes.
String Quartet No. 14 in C-sharp minor, Op. 131: I. Adagio ma non troppo e molto espressivo
As you know, I'm a participant in a great deal of chamber music every year, and I find that a complete necessity for my well-being. And this is a string quartet, which is of course the kind of chamber music that I cannot take part in, but it is the greatest part of chamber music, and for me at least, the greatest string quartet ever written is the Beethoven Opus 131 and number 14 in the C sharp minor.
In conversation
Presenter asks
1:07Could you reconcile yourself to indefinite loneliness?
Well, I suppose I could. I have never been terribly gregarious. I love to be with friends, but I don't need a city kind of life. Of course there's quite a difference between a city and being marooned, isn't there? But I suppose I could cope with it. I'm terribly optimistic about things, and I think that would not leave me.
Presenter asks
1:27What would you be happiest to have got away from?
Well, I know this may sound like a joke, but I would be happiest to get away from the telephone, which I think interrupts work, leisure, rest, whatever.
Presenter asks
5:14Were you born in the United States?
No, I was born in Germany, in Berlin, and went over to the United States in about 1939.
Presenter asks
5:56When did you decide that music was to be your career?
The keepsakes
The book
Anton Chekhov
the complete short stories about Chekhov, that would be nice to have. That's a lot to read and it never fails to be moving.
I don't think I ever had any choice about it. I was stuck in the conservatory at a very early age and didn't see fresh air for about ten years, you know, so it never occurred to me to be anything else.
Presenter asks
15:30Do you find the musical scene more exciting here [in London] than it is in America?
Well, I find London the most stimulating city in the world, as a musician, so much so that I'm planning on moving here permanently. Are you? Yes, it'll take me a few years to get sorted out, but then I will.
Presenter asks
15:42What is your musical ambition? If the telephone were to ring now with an offer, what would you like it to be?
Ah, totally selfish, you mean. Well, that's very simple. I would like to be offered the conductor-in-chief of the London Symphony.
Presenter asks
0:53Is that to suggest, Andre, that you didn't enjoy your celebrity status?
Oh, I enjoyed it a great deal, but uh uh I'm not sure that I like the emphasis on the word just in as in just a musician. ... But I am pleased to be involved in music that is music for its own sake and not for the peripheral glamour of who's doing it.
Presenter asks
2:27Did you accept then that that kind of attention [from the press] came with the territory, or was it always a miserable business?
And I thought it was very tough. on Mia, who was then married to me, and our babies. And uh I we tried our best to uh play it down, and I had fun once throwing a camera into a swimming pool. But I'm not really given to those things and they don't come naturally to me.
Presenter asks
5:54When was the first time, do you remember, that you actually stood up, you know, very early on, I'm sure, in front of an orchestra and conducted it?
It was studio musicians in Hollywood who were sick of playing studio music and they got together as an ad hoc orchestra and they would ask anybody who wanted to or who could conduct to do that and I remember doing that when I was about eighteen.
Presenter asks
12:02How did the family get out [of Germany]?
It's one of those stories that that it it sounds like a film, but evidently my father was in his office and his secretary, quite white faced, came in and said there was an S S man waiting to see him. ... And the man came in and said, Do you remember me? and my father in all honesty said no. And he said, Well, you defended me many years ago on a case, and he said, And I'm going to do you a favor. Leave. Now, tonight. ... We left that night on the pretext of getting a weekend in Paris ... My parents left absolutely everything house, library, paintings, uh money, silver, whatever.
Presenter asks
21:06How difficult was it to throw off that Hollywood reputation when you began to try and create your classical one?
It didn't last too long because after a while even unimaginative critics get tired of criticizing you for the same reason, which is reasons they didn't like you for what you did years before. And I remember once I got a bad review because the man simply hadn't liked the concert that night, instead of hadn't liked it because of what I used to do. And I thought, well, now that I'm getting bad reviews on my own, I'm going to be a success.
“I would be happiest to get away from the telephone, which I think interrupts work, leisure, rest, whatever.”
“I don't think I ever had any choice about it. I was stuck in the conservatory at a very early age and didn't see fresh air for about ten years, you know, so it never occurred to me to be anything else.”
“In the United States… anyone who's ever flown over Hollywood in an airplane is looked at with alarm and suspicion. But here [in Britain]… one is judged whether concerts or records only by what that particular concert or record has within it and not on how one spends or misspends one's youth.”
“I find London the most stimulating city in the world, as a musician, so much so that I'm planning on moving here permanently.”
“I would like to be offered the conductor-in-chief of the London Symphony.”
“Well, I think it's much nicer now that there is a great part of audiences that don't know anything about my kids, don't know anything about my former marriages, and they're just taking me for what I do now, and that is a very happy circumstance.”
“Well, I don't think you can do good work as an artist if the work doesn't worry you, if the work doesn't really actually frighten you. And I got to the point with film music where it didn't really scare me,'cause I knew I could do it well enough to get by. And I didn't like that. I think that when you when you are working with something as remarkable as music, I think the music has to frighten you.”
“It is continually astonishing to me the amount of geographical boundary that that exists with music, you know, where people know very well certain kinds of localized music and nothing of the other.”