A listener heard the same piece performed a few weeks apart by different conductors, both excellent performances, but very different. He said: It was the first time I realized the enormous difference a conductor can make to the sound and the style of the music.”
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But a conductor does far more than set tempo and make decisions. Sure, the music says loud and soft, but how loud is loud? How fast is fast? Who should be loudest at any given point? Does the first violin have the melody or the flute, and in what balance? If there is an accelerando or ritard (speeding up or slowing down), how much? How short should the short notes be, how heavy the accented notes? There are hundreds of details that are written on the page but those markings are only an approximation, a shorthand.
But there is much more than that, and it all has to do with the quality of the sound, the shape of the music. Which note in a measure is the most important, or all they all the same? Which measure in a four-measure phrase is the most important? How smooth should the players player, or how dramatic? Where’s the climax?
Consider how 10 different actors would read a passage from a play or story. 10 different people reciting Shakespeare, or the Gettysburg Address. They’d all sound different. That’s what a conductor needs to decide, for 80 people.
What does a conductor do, anyway?
Here is some of his thinking:
Gary Weidenaar says