John Mauceri. 2019. For the Love of Music. A conductor’s guide to the art of listening New York: Alfred A. Knopf. 210 pp.

John Mauceri was a student of Leonard Bernstein, whose memorable assessment of the power of classical music is that it leaves the listener thinking that there is something right in the world. Not just of stories from a career in conducting (as sometimes seems the case), still lots to learn and enjoy. For example the nicest short and natural description of sonata form. And I didn’t know that despite all that has been written about the gulf between Brahms and Wagner, when Wagner died Brahms paid homage by using a melody sung by Sieglinde in The Ring in the third movement of his third symphony.