Musician

I think - I'm always interested in reaching people in different ways, not by - not by just standing on a - randomly on a subway platform.

I think - I'm always interested in reaching people in different ways, not by - not by just standing on a - randomly on a subway platform.

It's endless, the amount of things that music touches on that can help kids grow that are very, very practical.

We live in the least ugly time in history.

I write arrangements. I'm sort of a wannabe composer.

Music teaches people to work together, which is maybe one of the most important skills.

I love the outdoor festival feeling.

I know how to deal with jet lag, and I know just how much rest I need and when I need to take naps. When you walk on stage, you need your brain working at its highest and most fully-functioning, so it's not always easy, but I sort of figure it out.

It's been very exciting for me to start directing and conducting, exploring the symphonic repertoire, which I've always loved.

I don't want to portray myself as a daredevil. I'm not at all.

If I read every comment on my YouTube videos, I'd go crazy with people that are saying negative things.

In art and music, particularly in the 20th century, there was a big period there where for something to be called profound you had to not be able to understand it.

I've always been accused of moving around too much when I play concertos. Sometimes, conductors ask me which of us is leading.

I mean, the great secret is that an orchestra can actually play without a conductor at all. Of course, a great conductor will have a concept and will help them play together and unify them.

Good conductors know when to let an orchestra lead itself. Ninety percent of what a conductor does comes in the rehearsal - the vision, the structure, the architecture.

For me, music has been, in a sense, my religion, and it is what brings me closest to God or truth or whatever you want to call it.

Anyone who knows classical music and loves classical music has heard the Beethoven Seventh hundreds of times probably in their life.

As far as I'm concerned, the stakes are always very high. Whether it's playing at the White House or playing for a group in my own house - you know, one of those soirees I play in. Once I start playing, the stakes are somehow higher, in a way, than any of the context.

Over the years, I've seen how being a soloist and having a family can really work.

When Beethoven's Seventh Symphony was premiered, after the second movement, they clapped so much that they had the repeat the second movement and do it again.