All Episodes
Ask The Maestro — 186 episodes
Day 187: Trombone Stand
Day 186: What Is This?
Day 185: Plexi Screen
Day 184: What Is This?
Day 183: Biggest Heatwave Challenge
Day 182: Favorite Touring Vehicle
Day 181: Coping With Homesickness
Day 180: Baton Accident?!
Day 179: Weirdest Thing I’ve Carried?
Day 178: Strangest Meal On Tour?
Day 177: Strangest Transport To A Gig?
Day 176: Weirdest Food On Tour?
Day 175: Missed Flight To A Concert?
Day 174: Weirdest Cultural Encounter?
Day 173: Lost Passport On Tour?
Day 172: Tour Day From Hell?
Day 171: Worst Hotel On Tour?
Day 170: Musicians Crying On Stage?
Day 169: Can Orchestras Feel Mood?
Day 168: Can Conductors Read Minds?
Day 167: Weirdest Venue Ever?
Day 166: Most Unexpected Concert Moment?
Day 165: Conducting In Extreme Weather
Day 164: Impossible Acoustics?
Day 163: Why Does Violin 1 Bow First?
Day 162: How Are Orchestras Funded?
Day 161: How Do Musicians Join Orchestras?
Day 160: Are Conductors Freelance?
Day 159: A Day In Orchestra Life
Day 158: Finding Your Inner Voice
Day 157: Connecting With The Lyrics?
Day 156: Most Memorable Performance?
Day 155: How Do I Handle Uncertainty?
Day 154: Do I Work With A Team?
Day 153: Does Conducting Experience Help?
Day 152: Biggest Creative Factor?
Day 151: Perfecting An Interpretation
Day 150: The most dramatic entrance you’ve made?
Day 149: Do you conduct music you secretly disliked?
Day 148: Have you ever conducted the wrong piece in front of an audience?
Day 147: Have you ever accidentally cue'd the wrong section?
Day 146: Have you ever conducted a piece upside-down?
Day 145: Do you conduct from memory?
Day 144: Can a conductor make an audience feel suspense?
Day 143: How do string players coordinate bowing?
Day 142: How do conductors know every note in a score?
Day 141: How do brass players avoid running out of breath?
Day 140: Have you ever conducted with one hand due to injury?
Day 139: Thoughts on Eurovision 2026
Day 138: Who's the biggest diva you’ve worked with?
Day 137: What’s the weirdest thing you’ve been asked to autograph?
Day 136: Why do some instruments transpose?
Day 135: Give an example of a fugue in a John Williams soundtrack
Day 134: How do you communicate emotion to an orchestra without saying a word?
Day 133: Do conductors use different layouts?
Day 132: How do you decide which musical lines come through?
Day 131: Have you ever had an important part of a section not turn up?
Day 130: What comes first in movie music - the music or the picture?
Day 129: How can one composer write for every instrument in an orchestra?
Day 128: What is the '4' in a 3/4 time signature?
Day 127: What is the job of principal players in sections?
Day 126: Favourite time signature?
Day 125: How do orchestras tune with rock musicians?
Day 124: How do you decide on your interpretation of a piece?
Day 123: Have you considered writing a book?
Day 122: What’s the most bizarre fan gift you’ve ever received?
Day 121: Have you ever had a fan rush the stage?
Day 120: Unusual Facts – Edward Elgar
Day 119: Unusual Facts – Maurice Ravel
Day 118: Unusual Facts – Antonín Dvořák
Day 117: Unusual Facts – Gustav Mahler
Day 116: Unusual Facts – George Frideric Handel
Day 115: Unusual Facts – Hector Berlioz
Day 114: Unusual Facts – Antonio Vivaldi
Day 113: Unusual Facts – Sergei Rachmaninoff
Day 112: Unusual Facts – Johannes Brahms
Day 111: Unusual Facts – Richard Wagner
Day 110: Unusual Facts – Giuseppe Verdi
Day 109: Unusual Facts – Igor Stravinsky
Day 108: Unusual Facts – Claude Debussy
Day 107: Unusual Facts – Franz Schubert
Day 106: Unusual Facts – Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
Day 105: Unusual Facts – Johann Sebastian Bach
Day 104: Unusual Facts – Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Day 103: Unusual Facts – Edvard Grieg
Day 102: Unusual Facts – Erik Satie
Day 101: Unusual Facts – Franz Liszt
Day 100: Unusual Facts – Ludwig van Beethoven
Day 99: Have you ever gone to the wrong venue for a concert?
Day 98: Have you ever experienced a cultural or language mishap while touring?
Day 97: Have you ever been stuck in a city you didn’t know, with no hotel or transport?
Day 96: Have you ever been stranded at an airport overnight and still had to make it to a show?
Day 95: What’s an ostinato or a riff in classical music, and why do composers use them?
Day 94: What are key signatures, and why do pieces in minor keys often feel sad or emotional?
Day 93: Why do musicians make funny faces when they play?
Day 92: What does counterpoint mean, and how do all those different melodies fit together without sounding messy?
Day 91: People talk about fugues a lot, especially with Bach — what exactly is a fugue?
Day 90: I’ve noticed things like D.C. or D.S. written in music — what do those tell the musicians to do?
Day 89: I always hear people mention 4/4 or 3/4 time — what does that actually mean when we’re listening to the music?
Day 88: Sometimes music sounds unusual or mysterious — is that because of different keys or modes?
Day 87: Why is a tuning fork shaped the way it is, and how was the standard pitch (A440) chosen
Day 86: Which composer had the most children?
Day 85: What piece of classical music has the biggest orchestra in it (like Mahler or Strauss works)?
Day 84: Who was the youngest famous conductor or prodigy (like Stokowski started young)?
Day 83: What is the “concertmaster” and how did that role start?
Day 82: Why does the conductor’s score look different than individual parts?
Day 81: Who was the first famous female conductor?
Day 80: Which composition is the longest (by duration) or has the most musicians on stage?
Day 79: Why do orchestras wear formal dress (tails/tuxedos), and is it still required
Day 78: What do Op. (opus) numbers or K. (Köchel) numbers mean in a title?
Day 76: How do cartoons or non-classical art (like “Fantasia” with Leopold Stokowski) influence how people see conductors?
Day 75: What do you think about pop/contemporary music – do any artists inspire you?
Day 74: What are the steps to be a conductor?
Day 73: Which composer or musical piece is your absolute favorite to conduct, and why?
Day 72: How do conductors communicate with section leaders or the concertmaster (first violin) in rehearsal?
Day 71: How do you prepare for a rehearsal or a concert? How many hours/days before do you study the score?
Day 70: What happens during an orchestra rehearsal? What do conductors do in rehearsals?
Day 69: How do you conduct a piece that has no strict beat, like a free-form introduction?
Day 68: What is a fermata (hold) or a caesura (pause) in music, and how does a conductor signal it?
Day 67: What's your favorite instrument to ignore?
Day 66: What is the point of melodic minor scales?
Day 65: What’s your opinion on tuning apps for orchestra playing? The apps D seems too high for my hearing and the G seems too low. Is it true that orchestra players should use the app tuning?
Day 64: So your first/only instrument is the piano, how about a very short tutorial and show us what you can do?
Day 63: How do you deal with nerves?
Day 62: How do you deal with the acoustics in a room?
Day 61: What is the layout of the orchestra?
Day 60: What is one of your favourite pieces to conduct?
Day 59: Is there any point in faith?
Day 58: Show me some unusual things about an orchestra.
Day 57: If you weren’t a conductor, what career would you choose?
Day 56: Do you have a lucky charm?
Day 55: Why do orchestras play on a specific layout?
Day 54: Who invented the piano?
Day 53: Do you watch any other conductor and learn from them?
Day 52: What instruments do you play and how does it help you conduct?
Day 51: Can an orchestra play without a conductor?
Day 50: What does a conductor do during a cadenza?
Day 49: Why are musical terms in Italian?
Day 48: Why is sheet music written on 5 lines?
Day 47: How do you get the players to stop playing at the end of a music?
Day 46: What do you do when things go wrong?
Day 45: How do you deal with mistakes during live performance?
Day 44: Why do all orchestras tune to a equals 440 hz?
Day 43: Why do orchestras tune to an a and why is it usually the oboe that provides the A?
Day 42: What was so special about the conductor Toscanini?
Day 41: What is the history of the baton?
Day 40: How do you give a cue to a single instrument when it’s their turn to play?
Day 39: How do you conduct unusual beat patterns like 7/8, 5/4, or 12/8?
Day 38: How do you signal to an orchestra about speed changes like accelerandos and ritenutos?
Day 37: How do musicians keep the pulse if they're playing syncopated rhythms or off-beats?
Day 36: What's the difference between a choir conductor and an orchestra conductor?
Day 35: Who was the first-ever conductor?
Day 34: Do you need to learn every instrument to be able to be a conductor?
Day 33: What piece of classical music inspired you when you were younger?
Day 32: What's the biggest mistake does the audience make about conductors?
Day 31: Have you ever had a performance go off-script?
Day 30: How do you show dynamics?
Day 29: How do you balance conductingn your family life with conducting on stage?
Day 28: How do you transport your baton?
Day 27: What do I carry with me in my conductor's pocket?
Day 26: Has conducting made you change the way you listen to music?
Day 25: How do you hold a baton?
Day 24: What do you do to get into the correct headspace?
Day 23: What are the beat patterns?
Day 22: What is one piece of advice that you would give to an aspiring conductor?
Day 21: Do you play any other instrument apart from piano?
Day 20: How much time do you have before a concert?
Day 19: How do you tune a piano?
Day 18: What do you do if a violin string breaks in a concert?
Day 17: Do you have a requirements, like a rider for your dressing room?
Day 16: Who chooses the music for a concert, and who chooses the order?
Day 15: What do you do whilst an orchestra is tuning on stage and you're not yet on stage?
Day 14: Did you ever want to do anything else other than music when you were younger?
Day 13: What inspired you to be a conductor?
Day 12: What is it like backstage, at a concert hall?
Day 11: Your baton doesn't really make any music. Do you play a real instrument?
Day 10: How does some conductors memorize whole pieces, and do you have to do that?
Day 9: Has anything ever happened to you that is embarassing during rehearsal?
Day 8: Why do some conductors tap the baton with their stick to set the tempo?
Day 7: What is your pre-concert ritual?
Day 6: Can you conduct without using a baton?
Day 5: What are conductors’ dressing room like?
Day 4: What does it mean when a conductor draws circles or does unusual shapes?
Day 3: Why do conductors count beats before the orchestra starts playing?
Day 2: If the musicians have a part already, why do they need a conductor?
Day 1: What does a conductor actually do when he waves his arms about?