You get more nervous in front of a lot of people. That’s why, when you play a concerto, you play with a small orchestra, in some place where you don’t feel that it is as important as Carnegie Hall.
I’m now doing three things: concerts, conducting, and teaching, and they each support each other. I learn to see things from different perspectives and listen with different ears. The most important thing that you need to do is really listen.
I look at raising funds for The Perlman Music Program as a challenge and as a way to provide opportunities for people who care about the future of classical music.
In Paris they have special wheelchairs that go through every doorway. They don’t change the doorways, they change the wheelchairs. To hell with the people! If someone weighs a couple more pounds, that’s it!
I don’t feel that the conductor has real power. The orchestra has the power, and every member of it knows instantaneously if you’re just beating time.
This young wine may have a lot of tannins now, but in five or 10 years it is going to be spectacular, despite the fact that right now it tastes like crude oil. You know this is how it is supposed to taste at this stage of development.
Another thing that I don’t like to do is show too much how it goes. I do it once in a blue moon. Sometimes there are lessons when I don’t pick up a violin at all.