How Conductors Explain Conducting

 by Janet Horvath  March 14th, 2025

When audiences are transported by a concert, they imagine that a kind of magic happens onstage attributed to the conductor. Sometimes that is true. But many other attendees wonder: what does a conductor actually do?

We’re in luck. Several conductors have shared their theories about how to conduct. Richard Strauss for example, who was not only a wonderful composer but also an exacting conductor, published these instructive Ten Golden Rules for the Album of a Young Conductor in 1927. We published them in 2015 but many of them bear repeating here:

• Remember that you are making music not to amuse yourself, but to delight your audience.

• You should not perspire when conducting. Only the audience should get warm.

(My teacher Janos Starker used to say, “Don’t be so moved. Move your audiences.”)

• Never look encouragingly at the brass except with a brief glance to give an important cue.

(Richard Wagner quipped, “Never look at the trombones…It only encourages them.” This quote is also attributed to Strauss!)

• But never let the horns and woodwinds out of your sight. If you can hear them at all, they are still too strong.

• It is not enough that you yourself should hear every word the soloist sings. You should know it by heart anyway. The audience must be able to follow without effort. If they do not understand the words, they will go to sleep.

• When you think you have reached the limits of prestissimo, double the pace.

Some conductors do accelerate to unplayable tempos. I’ve experienced it! Strauss later, in 1948, changed his mind: Today I should like to amend this. Take the tempo half as fast.

Conductor and legendary pianist Daniel Barenboim seconds that notion:

“The tempo is the suitcase. If the suitcase is too small, everything is completely wrinkled. If the tempo is too fast, everything becomes so scrambled you can’t understand it.”

Herbert von Karajan, the famed conductor of the Berlin Philharmonic added, “Quick music sounds dull unless every note is articulated.”

Renowned composer and conductor Gustav Mahler agreed, “If you think you’re boring your audience go slower not faster.”

Gustav Mahler

There are a lot of opinions on how to interpret music and there are often differences in timing and tempo. Take Beethoven’s famous opening to his Symphony No. 5. I think you’ll be surprised by the versions of the first four bars from Carlos Kleiber, Claudio Abbado, Herbert von Karajan, Pierre Boulez, Bruno Walter, and John Eliot Gardiner. Carlos Kleiber with Vienna plays in a refined style, while Pierre Boulez leads a diabolically slow opening to the 5th.

Comparing 5 conductors VERY different openings of Beethoven 5th Symphony (& why they chose that)   

Aside from being a timekeeper, what more does a conductor do? During an interview when asked this question, Sir Simon Rattle responded, “It’s one of the great fake professions…We are nothing without the orchestra…”

Sir Simon Rattle

Simon Rattle | What Does A Conductor Actually Do? 

South Korean pianist and conductor Myung Whun Chung recently elaborated,

“A conductor almost by definition is a strange animal; he is the only musician on stage that makes no sound, yet he is responsible for everyone else’s. I often would like to think of myself as just a colleague or collaborator with the other musicians, but ultimately, we must come together to be the truthful messengers of the composer we play – and make their music come alive!”

Like other professions, sometimes there’s a domineering and controlling boss. We orchestral players have been subject to heavy-handed conductors, ones we disagree with, or even incapable ones we must ignore.

We’re surprised that Herbert von Karajan, the maestro with a legendary sound, who was an autocrat, once said, “The art of conducting consists in knowing when to stop conducting to let the orchestra play.”

And this is fascinating. Simon Rattle on Karajan:

Simon Rattle on Herbert von Karajan  

Leonard Bernstein, who was the music director of the New York Philharmonic from 1957-1970 and recorded with them until the end of his life, puts it in a nutshell,

“Conducting is like making love to a hundred people at the same time.”

The wonderful thing about music-making is that each orchestra has a personality and will sound different depending on the maestro in front of them. And we can tell from the first upbeat in the music whether the leader is any good. One conductor will inspire a refined, polished sound while another will coax a more robust and aggressive quality, and everything is reflected through the different people onstage.

Conducting gestures vary. The stick or hand technique is essential, but every gesture, facial expression, and overall body language matters.

Here’s an illustration:

Breaking down orchestra conducting gestures to show you what they mean   

Many conductors have an affinity to certain music and a predilection for conducting those works. Our former music director Osmo Vänskä, for example, was terrific with the works of Jean Sibelius but not comfortable with French music. The Minnesota Orchestra’s complete recordings of all the Beethoven Symphonies are considered one of the best, especially of the 4th and 5th symphonies. Other wonderful interpreters include Otto Klemperer, Riccardo Chailly, with Leipzig Gewandhaus orchestra, and Carlos Kleiber. Wilhelm Furtwängler’s Beethoven No. 9 performance at the Bayreuth Festspielhaus live in 1951 is notable, and Karajan of course.

Watch this rare live video of excerpts of Beethoven Symphony No. 9 being rehearsed and performed by Herbert von Karajan and the Berliner Philharmoniker. It’s their New Year’s Eve concert of 1977 and was the first ever to be broadcast live.

Excerpts of Beethoven’s 9 rehearsal and performance by Herbert von Karajan (1977)  

Some composers inspire controversy, and Maher was certainly one of them. Gustav Mahler, the Vienna Philharmonic and Vienna Opera conductor from 1898-1901 and beyond, is quoted as saying, “A symphony must be like the world. It must contain everything.” Admired Mahler interpreters include Leonard Bernstein, who was critical in reviving Mahler’s music.

Claudio Abbado, Klaus Tennstedt, Rafael Kubelik, and Sir Simon Rattle, who says, “The Mahler virus is incurable,” are also noted Mahler interpreters. But here’s a caveat from von Karajan.

“Mahler’s music is full of dangers and traps, and one of them, which many fall into, is over sensualizing the thing until it becomes sort of …kitsch.” (‘Kitsch’— when art is considered in poor taste due to garishness or sentimentality.)

From Maestro: Encounters With Conductors of Today
Helena Matheopoulos book “Maestro” consisting of interviews with the world’s twenty-three top orchestral conductors.

Conductors tend to disagree on this subject too. One’s tasteless interpretation is another’s deep revelation.

Strauss even said so, “Must one become seventy years old to recognize that one’s greatest strength lies in creating musical kitsch?”

You might ask, can an orchestra play without a conductor? Of course we can.

I recently came across an outstanding orchestra that plays without a conductor. Now don’t get me wrong. There is a long tradition of smaller ensembles, chamber orchestras, that play without a conductor. In fact, we have one here in the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and Saint Paul—the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra. Their stellar performances often lead me to say, “they must be psychic!” as they do not only relegate themselves to so-called classical repertoire of Haydn and Mozart, but they play challenging contemporary works such as Bartók Divertimento, with aplomb and brilliance.

The Going Home Project Orchestra based in Korea plays large-scale works without a conductor including, Stravinsky Rite of Spring, an exceedingly complex work with difficult rhythms and tempo changes. Uncanny. I was flabbergasted at their brilliance as well as their impeccable ensemble. The famous bassoon opening is gorgeous, and the playing of the orchestra throughout is virtuosic.

Self-conducted Live Performance of “Le Sacre du Printemps”    

But the maestro can make magic happen onstage and then it’s inexplicable even to us. Whatever the interpretation we agree with von Karajan,

“To be involved professionally in a thing as creative as music is a great privilege and we have a duty to make in such a way that we can help bring pleasure and a sense of fulfillment to those who are not so fortunate {to be able to play music}.” From Osborne’s Conversations.

I hope this explains conducting. But if you’d like to know more, here is a delightful interview with Simon Rattle, who speaks candidly about his art.

Schubert Facts: 13 Things You Didn’t Know About the Great Composer

by Emily E. Hogstad  November 1st, 2026

Franz Schubert only lived for 31 years, but he left a massive, astonishing body of music: countless songs, symphonies, chamber works, sacred compositions, and even operas.

His life held unique and fascinating contradictions. A devoted circle of friends celebrated him, but he never experienced the public acclaim his peers did. He was enormously prolific, even as his music remained unheard and unpublished. He was one of the greatest composers of his generation, but only one all-Schubert concert was performed during his lifetime.

Here are 13 facts about the life and career of Franz Schubert that reveal the man behind those contradictions – and some of the most beloved music of the 19th century.

Franz Schubert

1. Schubert was the twelfth of fourteen children. He grew up close to his brother Ferdinand – who would go on to claim credit for some of Schubert’s music.

Franz Schubert was the twelfth of fourteen children born to Franz Theodor and Elisabeth Schubert. Only five of those children survived past infancy.

As a child, Franz grew especially close to his brother Ferdinand, three years his senior. Ferdinand was a musician and schoolteacher, and he helped mentor his younger brother.

Ferdinand Schubert

Ferdinand also claimed some of Franz’s works as his own, especially while searching for musical jobs. (For what it’s worth, there’s no record of Franz objecting.)

After Franz died in his apartment, Ferdinand inherited Franz’s papers, including his unpublished manuscripts. He navigated the publication and distribution of the works after Franz’s death.

We wrote about Ferdinand Schubert’s story here: https://interlude.hk/ferdinand-schubert-the-composer-who-stole-his-brothers-music/.

2. Schubert composed “Erlkönig” at 17 or 18. It became one of the most famous songs ever written for piano and voice.

Schuber

Goethe’s spooky ballad recounts the story of a father racing on horseback through the night, seeking aid for his feverish son who is hallucinating a supernatural force – the Erlking, a malevolent spirit from German folklore – following them.

The piano part gallops under a vocal line that shifts character between narrator, father, son, and the Erlking himself.

It’s a work of shocking maturity for a teenager: tightly constructed and dramatically expressive. It remains one of the most performed and analysed songs in the entire German Lied tradition.

3. Schubert never held a traditional full-time job past his mid-twenties. Instead, he relied on intermittent teaching and the generosity of friends and family.

After a brief, unenthusiastic stint teaching at his schoolmaster father’s school, Schubert essentially opted out of conventional employment and chose to spend his time composing instead.

He survived on piecework: giving intermittent piano lessons, collecting modest fees from publishers, and accepting financial help from his admiring circle of friends.

This economic precarity colored the rest of his life and career and left him with few means to do things like pay professional musicians to mount large-scale performances.

4. Schubert was so close to his friend Franz von Schober that they referred to themselves using a mashup name: “Schobert.”

Schubert’s Alfonso und Estrella  

Franz von Schober – a poet, actor, lithographer, and general dilettante – became one of the composer’s closest and most enduring friends. More than once, he offered him lodging when Schubert ran short of money.

Schober collaborated with Schubert on the 1822 opera Alfonso und Estrella, writing the libretto. They couldn’t mount a performance. (Liszt was the first to do so in 1854; the reception was cool, in part due to Schober’s uneven libretto.)

5. Schubert was only around five feet tall, making him one of the shortest of the great composers.

Franz Schubert, c. 1827

He was so petite and round-faced that his friends nicknamed him “Schwammerl” (“little mushroom”).

He also wore spectacles to help correct his intense nearsightedness. He was never seen without them – and even slept in them so that he didn’t have to struggle finding them if he woke up in the middle of the night with a musical idea.

6. He never married and had no known long-term romantic partner – but did frequent brothels.

The musical life of the 19th century was populated by composers who ran off with married women (for example, Wagner and Liszt) or had cinematic years-long love stories that culminated in happy marriages (the Schumanns).

Schubert’s biography has none of that romantic drama. Indeed, in 1815, a potential groom could not get a marriage license in Vienna without proving he could support not only himself, but a household. Schubert would have had to change lifestyles to marry completely.

We do know that he visited Viennese brothels, a common practice among unmarried men of his generation. He is believed to have contracted syphilis around 1822, when he was in his mid-20s.

7. Schubert abandoned his eighth symphony in 1822, after writing just two movements. He never explained why, and the work wasn’t performed until decades after his death.

Schubert’s Symphony No. 8     

The “Unfinished Symphony” is one of classical music’s great mysteries. It consists of two complete, fully orchestrated movements – and that’s it, even though symphonies of this era have four movements. No sketches survive beyond an abandoned third-movement scherzo, and no letters explain why he stopped.

Theories as to what happened range in seriousness from “fatal illness kept him from continuing” to a simple “he just got distracted by new projects.” But nothing is confirmed.

It remained unperformed until 1865, nearly forty years after Schubert’s death. When it finally premiered in Vienna, it was admired, despite its brevity.

8. Only one public concert of Schubert’s work was given during his lifetime.

On 26 March 1828 – the first anniversary of Beethoven’s death, which may have been a deliberate scheduling choice – a concert was held in Vienna devoted entirely to Schubert’s music.

It was a modest success, well attended and warmly welcomed by a composer who badly needed the money. But it also was the only event of its kind in his lifetime, and Schubert would die less than eight months later.

In the end, any career momentum this concert might have brought Schubert was overshadowed by the arrival of sensational virtuoso violinist Niccolò Paganini in Vienna.

9. His friends often gathered to hear his new songs and chamber music; these gatherings became known as “Schubertiades.” They included food, drink, dancing, and performances by Schubert himself.

Schubertiade

Held in the homes of supportive friends and patrons, these informal evenings became the closest thing Schubert had to a regular public for his music. A rotating cast of poets, painters, singers, and civil servants all gathered regularly to hear whatever songs or piano pieces Schubert had been working on.

They weren’t stiff recitals, either; accounts describe charades, dancing, wine, and general conviviality alongside the music. It was a blend of salon and party that suited Schubert’s shy temperament much better than the concert hall ever could.

The Schubertiades were also important for the encouragement they brought him, as one of the few occasions when his talent could actually be witnessed and celebrated.

10. He was arrested in early 1820 because the Austrian secret police, alarmed by the aftermath of the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Wars, were aggressively investigating groups of young people and activists.

In 1820, Austria was deeply paranoid about tamping down revolutionary sentiment among students and intellectuals.

That March, the paranoia caught up with Schubert’s circle. His rebellious poet friend Johann Senn was arrested for his defiant conduct toward authorities. Schubert too was swept up, briefly detained, and questioned by police before being released with a reprimand. Senn fared far worse: he spent months in prison and was deported from Vienna.

The story reminds us that the same artistic, tight-knit social circle that nurtured Schubert’s music also existed under very real political surveillance – and not all of Schubert’s friends escaped it unscathed.

11. While composing songs, he set poems by his own friends, not just famous poets.

The young Schubert

Yes, Schubert set poetry by legendary masters like Goethe, Schiller, and Heine.

But his appetite for poetry was insatiable, and his inspiration endless. He also set music to poems by his poet roommate Johann Mayrhofer, Franz von Schober, and others who attended the Schubertiades.

Mayrhofer in particular is worth noting; Schubert set dozens of his poems to music over the years.

This breadth of material says something about what inspired Schubert. He didn’t need the most celebrated works by the most celebrated poets to be inspired.

12. We don’t know exactly what Schubert died of. He had syphilis, but it seems likely that another kind of infection actually killed him.

Schubert died in his brother Ferdinand’s apartment on 19 November 1828 at the age of 31, after a short but severe final illness marked by fever, weakness, and delirium.

He had been living with syphilis for roughly six years by that point, and its long-term effects (along with the side effects of the standard prescribed mercury treatments) had already taken a toll on his health.

But many modern scholars believe the immediate cause of death was something else entirely, possibly typhoid fever contracted from contaminated water or food.

13. Much of Schubert’s music was published or premiered only after his death.

Schubert’s Symphony No. 9    

In 1838, ten years after Schubert died, composer Robert Schumann visited Ferdinand Schubert in Vienna.

While digging through the piles of unpublished manuscripts, he came across the score for the Symphony No. 9 in C major – a sprawling, ambitious work that had never been performed.

Schumann recognised its worth immediately and arranged for Mendelssohn – then the conductor of the storied Leipzig Gewandhaus orchestra – to premiere it.

Even in rehearsal, Schumann and Mendelssohn were delighted by what they heard, and the work has remained in the repertoire ever since.

Over the years, Schubert’s other unpublished work surfaced, too. Today, much of it – orchestral music, chamber music, Lied, piano sonatas, and so much more – remains in the repertoire, to the gratitude of musicians and music lovers everywhere.

Herbert Blomstedt (1927–2026) Obituary: Farewell, Legend

 by Jude Leng  November 5th, 2026

The death of Swedish-American conductor Herbert Blomstedt, at the age of 99, marks the passing of one of the last great conductors whose careers reached back to the musical world of the mid-20th century. For more than seven decades, Blomstedt stood before some of the world’s finest orchestras, offering interpretations of extraordinary integrity and conviction. The sheer longevity of his career remains one of the most remarkable phenomena in contemporary musical life, while the uncompromising musicality that Blomstedt brought to his performances is yet another part of his legend.

Blomstedt died on 4 November at his home in Gothenburg, just eight months short of his hundredth birthday. Until his final months, he remained an active presence on the international concert platform. On 15 May 2026, Blomstedt conducted his final concert in San Francisco with the San Francisco Symphony, coincidentally performing Mahler’s Ninth Symphony, a work about farewell in the face of death. The concert was interrupted by Blomstedt’s frail health: during the third movement, Blomstedt slumped farther and farther to his right, prompting his attendants to rush onto the stage. Blomstedt, however, insisted on resuming and completing the performance despite his serious health difficulties, and he subsequently cancelled the remaining two performances in the series.

Herbert Blomstedt in Gothenburg, May 2015 © Eskil Malmberg / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0

Blomstedt’s last appearance in London, on 21 November 2024, was also a performance of Mahler’s Ninth, this time with the Philharmonia, which I had the honour of attending. By then, Blomstedt had already suffered serious falls in 2022 and 2023, and had to conduct from a piano bench. It was, nevertheless, a performance of incredible magic and musicality. There were undoubtedly compromises imposed by age, but the expressive power was never diminished; on the contrary, it seemed honed to its most vivid form (with no dragging of tempi at all!), culminating in a most nobly Olympian final movement. At the general rehearsal, Blomstedt concluded by saying something to the effect that the body will age and die, but the “spirit” lives on. The performance that very evening was indeed a perfect reflection of his words.   

Daniel Barenboim once said that Wilhelm Furtwängler was a philosopher in rehearsal and a poet in performance. I believe the same applies to Blomstedt, who, well into his tenth decade, continued to discover and refine his musical understanding, remaining an ageless poet. Furtwängler himself was, indeed, an idol of Blomstedt’s, from whom the latter drew inspiration by listening to his rehearsals and concerts. He even obtained Furtwängler’s autograph when the conductor performed in Gothenburg while he was still a boy. Of course, it is difficult to discern obvious links between the conducting styles of the two, but what they perhaps shared was the magical musicality they were able to draw from their orchestras, something that belongs only to great conductors.

Born Herbert Thorson Blomstedt on 11 July 1927 in Springfield, Massachusetts, to Swedish parents, he spent his childhood in Sweden and Finland. His parents were Seventh-day Adventists, and their religious convictions profoundly shaped the young Herbert’s upbringing. Music was central to family life, and he learned the piano, violin and organ before developing an increasingly powerful attraction to orchestral music. The values of discipline, modesty and service, instilled in him from childhood, would remain inseparable from his musical outlook.

In 1945, Blomstedt entered the Royal College of Music in Stockholm, where he began studying conducting. His education continued under a broad range of influential figures, including periods of study with John Cage at Darmstadt, Igor Markevitch in Salzburg, Jean Morel at Juilliard and Leonard Bernstein at Tanglewood in 1953, the year in which Blomstedt won the Koussevitzky Conducting Prize. His formal conducting debut came in 1954 with the Stockholm Philharmonic, leading directly to his first professional appointment with the Norrköping Symphony Orchestra in Sweden.

After eight years in Norrköping, Blomstedt’s career grew steadily, and he subsequently served as chief conductor or music director of the Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra (1962–1968), the Danish Radio Symphony Orchestra (1967–1977) and the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra (1977–1982), with most of which he maintained lifelong associations as conductor laureate. His Nordic years established him as one of the most notable interpreters of Nielsen and Sibelius, while his interests also extended to the neglected Swedish symphonist Franz Berwald.

Herbert Blomstedt in 1967 © Johan Brun / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0

A major turning point in his career came in 1975, when the Staatskapelle Dresden, the oldest surviving orchestra in the world, and the Saxon State Opera invited him to become their new chief conductor, following several years during which the orchestra had been without a chief conductor. Blomstedt’s affinity for Austro-German music was further deepened during this period. Over his ten-year tenure, Blomstedt recorded complete cycles of Beethoven’s and Schubert’s symphonies with the orchestra, and helped lift it out of the low ebb that had followed Kurt Sanderling’s departure.

Blomstedt displayed a different side of his artistry during his subsequent tenure with the San Francisco Symphony, where his career reached new heights of international recognition. Having signed with Decca Classics in the late 1980s, Blomstedt and the SFSO recorded a wide range of repertoire for the label, becoming benchmark artists of the digital era and winning three Grammy Awards, a Gramophone Award and a Grand Prix du Disque. There are admirable recordings of Austro-German composers such as Brahms, Mendelssohn and Bruckner, as well as Nordic composers including Berwald, Sibelius and Nielsen, whose works Blomstedt retained at the core of his repertoire in later years. But perhaps most astonishing are the spectacular performances of Hindemith and Bartók, which reveal Blomstedt in his prime, bringing out extraordinary balance and colour. Some of these recordings remain reference recordings for collectors today.

After leaving San Francisco in 1995, Blomstedt returned to Germany as chief conductor of the NDR Symphony Orchestra in Hamburg, before assuming one of the most historically significant positions in European musical life: Gewandhauskapellmeister of the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, the world’s oldest civic orchestra, a post he held from 1998 until 2005. Perhaps there was a certain quality in Blomstedt that fostered his affinity with eastern Germany. During his seven-year tenure, Blomstedt expanded the orchestra’s repertoire and refined its unique sound: his love of Hindemith and Nordic repertoire continued here. But, of course, the traditions of Leipzig were not forgotten, particularly his admiration for Bach and Mendelssohn, and the significance of conducting the orchestra with which Mendelssohn himself had once worked. It was under Blomstedt that the Mendelssohn-Festtage became established as a regular fixture in Leipzig’s musical calendar.

Herbert Blomstedt at the Leipzig Gewandhaus, December 2015 © Alexander Böhm / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0

After 2005, at the age of 78, Blomstedt decided not to take on any further chief conductorships. The Bamberg Symphony, an orchestra with which he had worked frequently, appointed him honorary conductor in 2006. Perhaps Blomstedt himself would not have imagined that his career would continue for another twenty years. He first conducted the Vienna Philharmonic on 26 January 2011, aged 83, during Salzburg’s Mozartwoche festival, stepping in at short notice to replace Nikolaus Harnoncourt, who was actually two years his junior, and becoming the oldest debutant in the orchestra’s history at the time. What began as a last-minute substitution developed into a celebrated artistic partnership, culminating in his appointment as an honorary member in 2019.

Why was Blomstedt loved by so many orchestras? Authority, of course, comes from age and experience, but it was his unique humility and wealth of knowledge that made Blomstedt such an adored figure. Conducting mostly without a baton in his later years, Blomstedt was not a conductor who marked every beat clearly; rather, his magical hands shaped poetry with wonderful directness and genuineness. By contrast, films of his earlier, baton-wielding years reveal a certain sharpness and power. Particularly in his later years, Blomstedt’s conducting technique was economical but effective, and, of course, worked best with orchestras that knew him well. Yet there was never any wallowing, despite his frail health in the final years. Blomstedt knew too well how to shape phrases according to the natural flow of breath, and his musical pulse retained an inner vigour.

There was much modesty in Blomstedt’s character, but also a determination born of his firm beliefs. A devout Seventh-day Adventist, Blomstedt always refused to rehearse on Friday evenings or Saturdays, the Sabbath in Seventh-day Adventism, while remaining open to concert performances on those days. And Blomstedt only conducted works that he absolutely loved, which, according to Esa-Pekka Salonen, was the secret that kept him vigorous.

Bruckner, in particular, occupied a special place in Blomstedt’s artistic life. A natural Brucknerian, Blomstedt devoted a large proportion of his career to conducting Bruckner, which was not unusual for conductors of his generation. His interpretations of Bruckner continued to evolve over time, but always possessed a wisdom, patience, command and spiritual conviction rarely encountered among conductors, as well as an inner vitality that made even the most expansive passages purposeful.

Herbert Blomstedt, Bruckner’s Ninth, Elbphilharmonie © Gerda Arendt / Wikimedia Commons, CC0

In his later years, Blomstedt generally focused on the works that interested him most, particularly Bruckner and, of course, Beethoven, Brahms, Mendelssohn, Sibelius and others. What made his interpretations so admirable—and probably why Blomstedt remained a figure beloved by orchestras and audiences alike—was that they always offered new discoveries and insights that could scarcely be found elsewhere. But there was new repertoire, too. Blomstedt came rather late to the Second Symphony of his fellow Swede Wilhelm Stenhammar, taking it up in his late eighties, around 2013, and subsequently making a recording of the Symphony No. 2 and the Serenade for Orchestra, Op. 31, with the Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra.

Vigour lay at the very heart of Blomstedt’s artistry and, indeed, his personality. I once heard someone close to him say that “music kept him alive”, and perhaps it is most fitting to conclude with Blomstedt’s own words to CBS News Sunday Morning in 2025: “Without work, I don’t live. If I just twiddle my thumbs, that is not living.” May he live forever through the music he leaves behind.

The Great Unknown: Count Wassenaer

 by Maureen Buja  November 1st, 2026

Sometimes, being too modest can work against you. In the case of Count Unico Wilhelm van Wassenaer (1692–1766), his refusal to put his name on his six Concerti armonici, published in 1740, has led to centuries of confusion about who composed them.

The works are for string and basso continuo and have been so popular that they have very rarely been out of print.

Title page of the VI Concerti armonici, 1740

The Concerti were first printed in The Hague by the Italian violinist Carlo Ricciotti (1681–1756), dedicated to Count Willem van Bentinck (1704–74), a distinguished Anglo-Dutch musical amateur. Ricciotti directed a French opera company in The Hague. Ricciotti and Bentinck were also part of a musical society that included the composer of the Concerti.

Because the dedication is confusing, scholars have assumed the original author was the publisher, Ricciotti. Over the following decades, other composers, including Handel, J. A. Birkenstock, Fortunato Chelleri, and Willem de Fesch, were proposed. Still, the most popular choice was the Italian Baroque master Giovanni Battista Pergolesi (1710–1736). The amount of music [mis] attributed to Pergolesi would be a problem for musicologists for centuries.

Domenico Antonio Vaccaro: Giovanni Battista Pergolesi (Museo Storico Musicale del Conservatorio Di Musica San Pietro A Majella)

The elements that made Pergolesi seem like the perfect composer were that the music, though published in the Netherlands, was Roman in style, with four violins (rather than the Vivaldian/Venetian style of three violins), and that its texture matched the Italian style of Corelli and Locatelli. In addition, the music quoted the Roman composer Palestrina.

Pergolesi’s identification as the author was so complete that the Concerti were published as part of his complete works. Because it was given authority as part of the complete works, the Concerti remained popular through the 19th century, and Igor Stravinsky used one movement for his neo-classical ballet, Pulcinella. Declaring Pulcinella as being ‘after Pergolesi’, Stravinsky used the third movement from the Concerto No. 2 as his ‘Tarantella’. 

After all this misdirection, who composed this beloved set of Concerti? It took nearly 240 years to discover that the composer was not Pergolesi (or any other likely suspect) but Count Unico Wilhelm van Wassenaer (1692–1766). It is thought that he hid his identity not because he was a nobody, but because he was someone. His grandfather was Jacob van Wassenaer Obdam, supreme commander of the Dutch fleet in the Second Anglo-Dutch War, and his father was a general who served under Marlborough in the War of the Spanish Succession.

Georg Desmarées: Unico Wilhelm van Wassenaer Obdam, 1745

Unico studied law and worked in government, serving in diplomatic, military, and business posts. When he was young, he took the obligatory Grand Tour, visiting Germany, France, and perhaps Italy from 1717 to 1718. His musical skills were recognised even as he served as a member of the Dutch Admiralty and a Director of the East India Company.  

In 1979, Dutch musicologist Albert Dunning spoke with colleagues in art history who told him about music manuscripts they had recently seen. Following their lead, Dunning examined these musical manuscripts at Twickel Castle in the Netherlands, the seat of the van Wassenaer family. What he discovered was not only a manuscript of the concerti but also a handwritten preface by Unico that proved his authorship and told how the works came to be published. Finally, a definitive identification of the composer!

Wassenaer wrote in his preface:

These concertos were composed at different times between 1725 and 1740. When they were ready, I took them along to the musical gathering organised in The Hague by Mr Bentinck, myself and some foreign gentlemen. Ricciotti played the first violin. Afterwards I allowed him to make a copy of the concertos. When all six were ready, he asked permission to have them engraved. Upon my refusal he enlisted the aid of Mr Bentinck, to whose strong representations I finally acquiesced, on condition that my name did not appear anywhere on the copy and that he put his name to it, as he did. Mr Bentinck wanted to dedicate them to me; I refused absolutely, after which he told Ricciotti to dedicate them to him. In this way these concertos were published against my wishes. Some of them are tolerable, some middling, others wretched. Had they not been published, I would perhaps have corrected their mistakes, but other business has left me no leisure to amuse myself with them, and I would have caused their editor offence.

It’s not really certain why Wassenaer fought identification with the works. Perhaps a gentleman of his standing wouldn’t associate with a commercial enterprise, or he knew the works could have used some correction. In any case, Ricciotti and Wassenaer’s performance at their musical society convinced Ricciotti to print the works.   

Dunning brought out his new edition of the Concerti in 2003, based on the newly found manuscript, and this has brought renewed interest in these works, which were misidentified for so long. Wassenaer emerges as a composer who incorporated the new styles and techniques of his time into his music. The pieces blend early- and late-Baroque idioms, and, in some ways, look forward to the new Galant style. The string instruments are expertly handled. Although the first and second violins get most of the action, Wassenaer doesn’t shy away from true 7-part writing (4 violins, viola, cello, and bass), with each voice having its own authority. He includes fugues, canons, and even quotations from one of the most distinguished Roman composers, Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina, in both the 3rd and 5th concerti. The 5th Concerto also has an unusual movement done with muted strings.

As an example of a movement that blends Baroque and Galant style, consider the third movement of Concerto No. 4.

In the first Concerto, Unico includes a cello obbligato part, highlighting its dark, rich sound.

The Concerti weren’t Wassenaer’s only works; some recorder sonatas were (re)discovered and published in the 1990s, and they also serve to reinforce Wassenaer’s unique voice.

The rediscovery of the authorship of a loved piece of music 239 years later is astonishing enough. Discovering a statement about the composer’s participation in Amsterdam’s musical life was another treat, giving us a unique view into the life of an 18th-century diplomat.