Zubin Mehta in conversation with Stanley Dodds (28 min.)

Zubin Mehta made his debut with the Berliner Philharmoniker in 1961 and has performed with the orchestra almost every season since. In 2019, he was made an honorary member. When he conducted Olivier Messiaen’s Et exspecto resurrectionem mortuorum and Anton Bruckner’s Ninth Symphony in April 2021, he was approaching his 60th anniversary. In conversation with Philharmoniker violinist Stanley Dodds, the conductor looks back on their long time together, which spans several generations of orchestra members. Anton Bruckner’s music has been particularly close to Mehta’s heart since his student years in Vienna. In this interview, he recalls his encounter with Bruno Walter, who studied the score of the Ninth Symphony with him at the piano. He also describes the idiosyncratic formal structure of the work and speaks of the “heartbreaking” effect of the Adagio with which the unfinished symphony concludes.