The big difference between human happiness and sadness? Thirty-seven freakin' vibrations.

Being a conductor is kind of a hybrid profession because most fundamentally, it is being someone who is a coach, a trainer, an editor, a director.

Pop music, which I deeply admire and wish I could play better than I can, is based on expressing one mood, one feeling at a time. Classical music is by its very nature involved with different kinds of music, constantly transforming one another, which is more akin to the way our experience of life really is.

If you're alive, you have all the experience necessary to understand classical music.

I think music needs to be presented in a way so that kids can grasp songs, dances, simple music that's associated with some particular defining moment in human experience.

What happens when the music stops? Where does it go?

One of my central maxims is how a major part of what a conductor tries to do is get a large group of people to agree on where "now" actually is.