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 conductor is the artistic leader and sometimes cultural arbiter of his or her community. It is their leadership that is looked to and should anything go wrong, they are the persons taking most of the heat.

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.

We need music to restore the human spirit

Randy Newman and I grew up together in Los Angeles. We are both products of the film studio era. Randy is one of the great songwriters of our time and one of the fun people to be with.

There's not an orchestra in the world that doesn't have weaknesses. None of us can play everything well. The repertoire is just too big.

The convergence of the Rhone and Saone. Paul Bocuse. The birthplace of cinema. Chateauneuf-du-Pape just a few miles down the road. It does not get much better than Lyon.