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In this week's edition of Music Matters Tom Service interviews Riccardo Chailly, chief conductor of the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra and soon to be Principal Conductor and Music Director of Milan's La Scala Opera House

Riccardo Chailly was born into a musical family in Milan. At the age of 20, he became assistant conductor to Claudio Abbado at La Scala. He made his opera debut there in 1978 and has since held posts at many of the world's finest orchestras.

Chailly talks to Tom candidly about the challenges he faces in ‘going home’ to the legendary opera house as well as why he thinks opera companies give too much licence to director’s eccentricities and lose touch with the music. He tells Tom why he intends at La Scala to focus on what he believes made the opera house great in the first place – Italian opera.

Having recently completed two major and highly acclaimed recording projects with the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra – his Beethoven and Brahms symphony cycles – he talks to Tom about what he has left to do with the orchestra, what he feels he achieved with them and how he got them to totally rethink the music of both composers, despite their initial reservations.

Chailly also talks about the impact his mentor Claudio Abbado had on his career, his enduring love for Giacomo Puccini and how he believes Puccini’s music has more in common with Mahler’s symphonies than meets the eye.

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