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In perfect harmony

Henrietta Bredin

Wednesday, 3rd December 2008

Henrietta Bredin talks to the conductor Brad Cohen, who mentored Alex James in Maestro

It is worth remembering that the BBC, despite its recent, excessively well-aired problems, gives us a great many stimulating, well-made programmes, on both radio and television. Rather surprisingly, given its format and the yawning, ever-present potential for dumbed-down disaster, the BBC2 Maestro series, aired in August/September this year, turned out to be all of those things.

How could this be? A talent contest for ‘celebrities’, in which they were required, with no previous experience, to conduct a full symphony orchestra? It could hardly fail to trivialise a skill which takes years to acquire and which even musicians find hard to analyse or describe. What actually happened was fascinatingly revealing. Although the major failure of the series was a lack of focus on the learning process and the different ways in which the contestants worked their way towards interpreting the music, what emerged with great clarity was exactly how difficult and subtle a business conducting is. And the contestants all learnt a phenomenal amount in a ludicrously short space of time, sharing an admirably high seriousness of intent and a determination to do their damnedest with a wildly daunting challenge.

The Spectator’s own Alex James was one of those contestants and, by coincidence, his mentor (each participant was guided by an expert teacher) was Brad Cohen, a conductor I have worked with and known for a number of years. What was the whole experience like from the professional’s point of view? And what, I wondered, when he was first approached, made him give due consideration to the proposal rather than responding with an immediate, ‘Thanks but no thanks’?

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