Richard Todd wrote:

>Most of the conductors with whom I've talked about this tell me that they
>make no specific effort to memorize scores.  It's just that once they've
>worked with a piece enough they find themselves referring less and less
>to the score while they're conducting it and eventually find turning
>pages and so on to be more of a distraction than it's worth.

This is my approach. Over time, you simply learn the score. It sinks in.

>I'm not sure whether the public is particularly impressed when a conductor
>goes scoreless.  I know it can make an orchestra nervous.  It would be a
>rare orchestral musician who has never had to cover for a conductor's
>memory lapses and acts of fakery.

Unless of course you are playing under Lorin Maazel or Seiji Ozawa, who
have photographic memories and who not only perform sans score, they
rehearse without one too!

Kevin