The first year I started in San Francisco, there was an American

Michael Tilson Thomas, the great conductor who carried the San Francisco Symphony into a new era, once reflected with candor: “The first year I started in San Francisco, there was an American work on every program and there's been a lot of music by living composers and gradually that was part of the process of getting the audience really to trust me.” In these words we hear the wisdom of one who understood that leadership is not the seizing of obedience, but the gentle winning of hearts. He did not demand trust by title or authority; he cultivated it, slowly, through consistency, vision, and faith in the living spirit of music.

The ancients themselves taught that trust is not granted in an instant. It is earned, like the steady building of a temple stone by stone. Did not Pericles remind the Athenians that greatness comes not by sudden decree but through years of devotion to the city’s spirit? So too did Tilson Thomas. He placed before his audiences works of American composers, voices close to their soil, voices still alive and breathing, and in so doing, he told his people: this is your music, this is your time. Gradually, like a farmer watering his fields, he saw the audience’s trust take root.

His words speak to a profound truth about art and leadership. Audiences, like nations, resist what is unfamiliar. They cling to tradition, to the known melodies of Mozart and Beethoven. But the role of a leader is not only to preserve, but to expand, to open doors to the new without discarding the old. Tilson Thomas wove the living with the eternal, balancing past masters with contemporary voices. In this balance, he guided his listeners into trust—not by abandoning them in strange lands, but by leading them with a steady hand into a future where their own composers sang alongside the immortals.

History gives us many examples of such leadership. Think of Duke Ellington, who in the Harlem Renaissance did not simply play music for his audience, but transformed them by blending jazz with symphonic form. He gave them something both familiar and daring, and in time they followed him into uncharted musical worlds. Or recall Sergei Diaghilev, who introduced audiences to Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring. At first there was outrage—riots in the theater—but in the end, the world changed. The boldness of these leaders shows us what Tilson Thomas achieved with quieter patience: the slow building of trust through daring vision.

There is also humility in his statement. He does not claim that the audience’s trust was given to him because of his genius or his authority. Instead, he speaks of a process, of gradual effort, of respect for the people he served. This humility is itself a form of wisdom. For true trust cannot be demanded; it must be cultivated like a garden, and the gardener must tend not only to the plants but to the soil, the weather, and the unseen roots below.

And so the lesson for us is clear: whether in music, in leadership, in friendship, or in love, trust is not a gift seized, but a bond woven through time. We must show consistency, courage, and patience. We must introduce the new not with arrogance, but with care, until those we guide see that our vision is for their good. Just as Tilson Thomas wove living composers into every program until the audience welcomed them as kin, so too must we weave new ideas into our lives and communities with steady hands.

Practical actions follow from this. In your work, do not fear to introduce new thoughts, but do so with consistency, showing their worth over time. In your relationships, do not demand trust, but earn it by reliability and openness. In your creativity, honor tradition but bring forth the voices of the present, so that the living spirit is never silenced by the weight of the past. Step by step, action by action, let others learn that your vision is trustworthy.

Thus Michael Tilson Thomas’s words become more than the reflection of a conductor—they become a teaching for all ages: that to lead is to weave together past and present, tradition and innovation, until those who follow not only accept your vision, but rejoice in it. Trust is the true symphony, and it is composed note by note, program by program, life by life.