Simon Rattle: The 12 composers who made me

15 September 2017

Sir Simon Rattle has spent his career championing classical musicians and inspiring young performers. With his inaugural season as Music Director of the London Symphony Orchestra now under way, the world-renowned conductor reveals the composers who shaped and inspired him.

Simon Rattle leading the Berlin Philharmonic in Schumann Symphonies at Carnegie Hall, 5 October 2014. (Photo by Hiroyuki Ito/Getty Images)

1. Thomas Adès

Simon Rattle on Thomas Adès

Image: Rattle invites Adès onstage after the Berlin Philharmonic performs Asyla in 2002.

Sometimes players said "But, this isn’t playable!" and I would agree with them; Tom would say "I think you’ll find you’ll be able to do it." And he was always right.
Simon Rattle

Simon Rattle once again conducted Thomas Adès' Asyla, in his first performance as the Music Director of the LSO on Thursday 14 September, which was broadcast live on Radio 3.

Additionally, Thomas Adès himself will curate an evening of music during this season; the concert will be held on Monday 18 September and details can be found at the LSO's website.

This is Rattle: Opening Concert
Sir Simon Rattle conducts his inaugural concert as Music Director of the London Symphony Orchestra.

2. Joseph Haydn

Simon Rattle on Joseph Haydn

Image: Haydn illustrated in comic form for BBC series The Birth of British Music (2009).

If I had one composer to invite to dinner it would be Haydn. I can never get him on his mobile, but I wish I could. I think he’d be the best company: the most intelligent, the most generous, and certainly the funniest of any composer.
Simon Rattle

3. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

Simon Rattle on Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

Portrait of Mozart (1756 -1791). Photo By DEA / A. DAGLI ORTI/De Agostini/Getty Images

The whole point about Mozart is he’s so quicksilver. I think at dinner with Mozart you’d hardly be able to keep up with his train of thought.
Simon Rattle

4. Robert Schumann

Simon Rattle on Robert Schumann

Robert Schumann, German composer and music critic (1810 – 1856).

He was a manic-depressive, and he could only write when he was manic… he actually wrote faster than Mozart, because in the depressive periods he couldn’t do anything at all; it came rushing out of him.
Simon Rattle

5. Giacomo Puccini

Simon Rattle on Giacomo Puccini

Placido Domingo helped Rattle prepare his first Puccini opera. (Image: BBC 1982)

I felt like a fool... I'd loved a number of the pieces for years, and I'd always listened to them with huge pleasure, and sometimes guilty pleasure because people are very… ‘high-nosed’ about it.
Simon Rattle

6. Claude Debussy

Simon Rattle on Claude Debussy

Claude Debussy (1862 - 1918). Photo by ullstein bild via Getty Images

I've always loved French music. My parents adored it, my father played it on the piano. I was a percussionist so of course this music with all its colouration was absolute food and drink to me.
Simon Rattle

7. Pierre Boulez

Simon Rattle on Pierre Boulez

Boulez pictured in 1973 while he was Chief Conductor of the BBC Symphony Orchestra.

Pierre was always one of my heroes. I think there’s a whole generation for whom he’s an incredible hero; he taught us how much great music there was that we simply didn’t know.
Simon Rattle

8. Anton Bruckner

Simon Rattle on Anton Bruckner

Rudolf Schwarz (right) sparked Rattle's love for Bruckner (left). Images via Getty

Despite all the amazing plain-speaking simplicity of Bruckner’s faith, there’s also an enormous amount of pain behind it.
Simon Rattle

9. Igor Stravinsky

Simon Rattle on Igor Stravinsky

Image: Stravinsky in rehearsal with the BBC Symphony Orchestra at Maida Vale in 1958.

Nobody had written rhythms like that. In fact when Stravinsky first wrote it you can see he wrote no bar lines because he had absolutely no idea how he was going to notate what he had in his head.
Simon Rattle on The Rite of Spring

10. Jean Sibelius

Simon Rattle on Jean Sibelius

Image: Jean Sibelius at the piano in his home, Helsinki, Finland, 1938.

I think he would have loved to have been more in the general flow of things, but he realised “I am some kind of Nordic sprite from the forests - I’m going to tell you simply something else.”
Simon Rattle

11. Gustav Mahler

Simon Rattle on Gustav Mahler

Image: Gustav Mahler (1860 – 1911).

Mahler has stayed with me through my whole life. It’s almost like a family member. I just hope sometimes we can do him justice.
Simon Rattle

12. Johannes Brahms

Simon Rattle on Johannes Brahms

Also featuring footage of Rattle rehearsing Brahms' 1st Symphony with the CBSO in 2014.

As I get older the music becomes more and more important to me, and of course it’s wonderful music to conduct at any age, but it’s not bad to have some years of experience behind you to realise that, sometimes, more can be less.
Simon Rattle

Simon Rattle's arrival as Music Director of the London Symphony Orchestra is celebrated with a season of concerts and events called This is Rattle, running from 14-24 September in London. Details can be found at the LSO website.

These videos were first published on 10 February 2015. They were created as companion pieces for director Andy King-Dabbs' BBC Two documentary Simon Rattle: The Making of a Maestro, which will also be shown as part of This is Rattle on Thu 21 Sep.

A selection of pieces by the composers featured can be found via BBC Playlister.

Simon Rattle's inspiring words to the next generation of musicians
The young orchestra squeezed in one final rehearsal in front of a Barbican audience.
'A conductor at the very peak of his powers'
The Barbican chief tells the story of Britain’s leading conductor

Simon Rattle on Front Row
In Jan 2017, the conductor discussed his plans for the LSO going forward.
Proms 2017: Gurrelieder
Simon Rattle and the LSO bring Schoenberg's colossal Gurrelieder to the Royal Albert Hall
Rattle at Radio 3
Penny Gore presents a week of concerts featuring Sir Simon Rattle conducting the Berlin Philharmonic.