They are representations of many shared hours of collaboration between us all. That’s the real nature of the relationship the orchestra and I are trying to build.

Tilson Thomas frames the conductor–orchestra bond as something earned through sustained, collective work rather than charisma or hierarchy. “Representations” suggests that performances (or recordings) are not isolated events but artifacts of accumulated rehearsal time, shared decisions, and mutual listening. The “relationship” he describes is therefore built on trust, continuity, and a common musical language—an ensemble identity that develops only through repeated collaboration. Implicitly, he resists the idea of the orchestra as a tool of the conductor; instead, he emphasizes co-authorship, where interpretive authority is distributed across the group. The quote elevates process over product, implying that the deepest artistic results are inseparable from the human and professional community that produces them.