Ernest Ansermet conducts Beethoven and Pierre Monteux conducts Dukas

In their twilight years, Ansermet and Monteux set their orchestras on fire. The Art of the Great.

On the one side, we have the mathematician, keen on theory, who came late to music and who writes erudite articles and long books (Les Fondements de la musique dans la conscience humaine); on the other side, the musician who started his career as a violinist at the Folies Bergères and whose bushy moustache is his trademark: he is debonair. Ernest Ansermet and Pierre Monteux have nothing in common, it seems. In fact, they have a great deal in common!