Satoshi Akima: >Boulez is a man with many enemies. That is why there is deep prejudice >against his interpretations. Yet whoever approaches his performances >(and dare I say it his music) with an open mind will find a musician of >the utmost profundity, and heartfelt sincerity. Though I don't like much his music, I have the best opinion of Boulez as a conductor. His interpretation of Mahler's 10th. (1st. movement) is great. His recordings of Strawinsky's orchestral works are hardly to be surpassed. The same can be said about his recording of Webern's works, or of his recording of "Lulu" and Debussy's "Pelleas et Melisande". I haven't heard him conducting Bruckner, but I don't have the slightest doubt that there must be very interesting issues in his interpretation. Moreover: I like him not only as a conductor of post-romantic/ XX century works: his recording of Haendel's Water Music and Royal Firework Music is very good too. Concerning the prejudices about Boulez, some people believes --taking in account his antecedents as "enfant terrible" (now he is a "grand-pere terrible") of post war music-- that he poisons everything that he does with an ideological view. That's false, or at least partial: there are so many Boulez as works he conducts. Other people says that he is too "rational": that's simply stupid; he is not more "conscious" of his own performing practice than the vast majority of conductors, but people think that he got the surname "rational" just because he married once to integral serialism. Pablo Massa [log in to unmask]