But the ear, let us not forget, starts operating on the forty-fifth day of the pregnancy of a woman. Seven and a half months advance over the eye...(but) what do we do in our society, in our civilisation, to continue this process?

Music means different things to different people and sometimes even different things to the same person at different moments of his life.

Anti-Semitism has no historical, political and certainly no philosophical origins. Anti-Semitism is a disease.

I love conducting. What I'm tired of is music administration. I don't want that. I just want to make music.

And in English you have this wonderful difference between listening and hearing, and that you can hear without listening, and you can listen and not hear.

The Germans are prisoners of their past.

The ear plays the role of the guide in the museum in the concert I'm taking now. We don't have an oral guide, we have to provide it ourselves. One reason why active listening is absolutely essential.