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

In times of totalitarian or autocratic rule, music (indeed culture in general) is often the only avenue of independent thought. It is the only way people can meet as equals, and exchange ideas. Culture then becomes primarily the voice of the oppressed and it takes over from politics as a driving force for change.

I don't believe that the entire world is constantly anti-Semitic.

In the long term, Israel's security rests on only one pillar: the Palestinians' acceptance of the country. It isn't the atom bomb that makes Israel secure.

Germany will never be a real, free thinking and free feeling friend of Israel, because it will always fall under this shadow.

I'm sure that there are many Israelis who dream of waking up one day to find the Palestinians gone. And there are many Palestinians who dream of going to bed at night and waking up the next morning to find the Israelis gone.

You can't expect someone born into a family with no music...to understand when I'm conducting the Schönberg Variations.