I use my hands like a sculptor, to mold and shape the sound I want, to clarify.

I am usually cooking at least four times a week if I am home. The easiest thing that I do a lot is gazpacho. It's simple and it tastes best if you let it sit over night in the refrigerator... I don't want anybody near me when I am cooking. If I am going to make a mistake, it has to be my fault.

The life of any musician really doesn't fall into a normal schedule at all. Every week there are different rehearsals, different days and nights of performances, so we don't have a particular pattern that we can follow. For a conductor, it is a little bit worse because we have to allow for traveling.

In some ways I believe music is the more convincing communicator of ideas than words. For instance, we can hear of Kordaly and Bartok and recognise them as Hungarian, but very few of us speak Hungarian, but the music itself speaks to more people.

I'll know I'm reaching the total American market when I'm asked to do a video for MTV.

We need music to restore the human spirit

People know Detroit for the cars, but the suburban areas of the city are really beautiful. It's much more inhabitable than people think. Many believe it's like Berlin at the end of World War II.