I am quite amazed by Gunther Schuller's biographical life as an orchestral and jazz hornist, a composer, the president of New England Conservatory, a conductor... the list seems quite endless.

Although his book, The Compleat Conductor, is not one that I would recommend to everyone, it certainly brings up a number of points that seem quite relevant to music education.

Throughout the book, Schuller suggests that audiences over-glorify conductors for their miraculous, unattainable talents, while performers are underwhelmed by what they consider to be "beating time."  Instead he believes that it takes an incredible amount of specific musical and social skills to be a great conductor.

Pertaining more to masterworks, Schuller suggests that a conductor shouldn't focus on "interpreting" the music, but rather "realizing" the music.  The quality of the music should speak for itself.  This reminds me that I need to spend time searching for quality music for my ensembles.  It is rather easy to become sucked into the vortex of "educational" music which usually fails to engage students musically.

Most of us educators at some point have probably heard some variation of the phrase "Say more with less."  Schuller puts forth a simple definition of conducting: yielding the maximum of accurate acoustical results, with the most appropriate minimum of conductorial gestures.  All of our physical gestures amount to nothing if they "represent an insufficient (intellectual) knowledge of the score and an inadequate (emotional) feeling for the music."