Creativity Quote by Michael Tilson Thomas

Tilson Thomas isn’t talking about “selling” a piece so much as building an electrical circuit: conviction has to travel conductor to orchestra to audience, or the whole thing stays inert. The key phrase is “if I can be convinced” - a quiet rejection of the maestro-as-tyrant myth. He frames authority as conditional, earned in real time. That vulnerability is strategic: by admitting he needs persuading, he invites the musicians into a shared responsibility for meaning, not just execution.

Then comes the telling repetition of “convinced.” In rehearsal culture, “understanding” can be intellectual and still produce a polite, bloodless performance. “Convinced” implies buy-in at the gut level, the point where a phrase, tempo, or color feels inevitable. That’s why he reaches for “the big sweep of that communication.” He’s describing narrative scale - not the bar-to-bar mechanics but the long arc that makes a symphony read like a sentence instead of a dictionary. “Communication” is the most democratic word here: it treats the score not as sacred text to be preserved, but as a message to be transmitted.

Context matters. Tilson Thomas came up as American orchestras were renegotiating their identity: less European priesthood, more civic institution, more audience-facing storytelling. His syntax even mimics the process - a long, breathy chain of clauses that feels like a rehearsal room thought becoming collective. The subtext is pragmatic idealism: when the ensemble believes, the audience doesn’t need program notes or prestige to “get it.” They’ll feel the throughline. That’s the promise - and the pressure - of live performance.