Clive Gillinson

Executive and Artistic Director, Carnegie Hall

If we think purely in terms of service, then you start doing making the right decisions.

Summary

As the longtime head of Carnegie Hall, Clive Gillinson is no stranger to problem solving on the fly. From his time at the helm of the London Symphony Orchestra to his current position, he has overseen thousands of performances, each accompanied by a unique set of challenges. Along the way, he has built a reputation as a visionary manager, vaulting his performance halls to even greater heights. Recently, the coronavirus pandemic posed perhaps the greatest challenge in Clive’s career, in the form of the longest closure in Carnegie Hall’s history. But under Clive’s careful leadership, Carnegie Hall has weathered the storm, reopening last fall to full venues and critically acclaimed performances.

For this episode of “Leadership Matters,” Clive joins Alan to discuss some of these challenges and the lessons in leadership Clive has learned over the course of his impressive career. Much of it comes from learning on the job; originally trained as a cellist, Clive did not anticipate he would make a name for himself as a manager. From learning to empower his team to prioritizing impact to ground an institution, in many respects, his journey has been both personal and professional. While a musician through and through, the advice he shares is applicable to leaders looking to make a difference in any industry.

Mentions & Resources in this Episode

• Rafael Kubelík

• National Youth Orchestra of the United States

• Thinking, Fast and Slow, by Daniel Kahneman

• Mstislav Rostropovich

• Upcoming events at Carnegie Hall

Guest Bio

Clive Gillinson became Executive and Artistic Director of Carnegie Hall in July 2005, having been appointed the previous season. He is responsible for developing the artistic concepts for Carnegie Hall presentations in its three halls — the celebrated Stern Auditorium/Perelman Stage, innovative Zankel Hall, and intimate Weill Recital Hall — representing approximately 170 performances each season, ranging from orchestral concerts, chamber music, solo recitals, to jazz, world, and popular music. He also oversees the management of all aspects of the world-renowned venue, including strategic and artistic planning, resource development, education, finance, and administration and operations for the Weill Music Institute which taps the resources of Carnegie Hall to bring music education and community programs to roughly 600,000 people in the New York City metropolitan region, across the United States, and around the world each season.

Clive Gillinson was born in Bangalore, India, in 1946; his mother was a professional cellist and his father, a businessman, also wrote and painted. Mr. Gillinson began studying the cello at the age of eleven and played in the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain. He went to London University to study mathematics, but realizing that he wanted to make music his life, entered the Royal Academy of Music, where he gained a Recital Diploma and won the top cello prize. After attending the Royal Academy of Music, Mr. Gillinson became a member of the Philharmonia Orchestra.

Mr. Gillinson joined the London Symphony Orchestra cello section in 1970 and was elected to the Board of Directors of the self-governing orchestra in 1976, also serving as Finance Director. In 1984 he was asked by the Board to become Managing Director of the LSO, a position he held until becoming the Executive and Artistic Director of Carnegie Hall in 2005.

Under Mr. Gillinson’s leadership, the LSO initiated some of that city’s most innovative and successful artistic festivals, working with many of today’s leading artists. In the international touring arena, the LSO established an annual residency in New York from 1997 and was a founding partner in the Pacific Music Festival in Sapporo, Japan, in 1990, with Leonard Bernstein and Michael Tilson Thomas. Mr. Gillinson believes in taking great music to society at large. In this area, his initiatives with the London Symphony Orchestra included the development of the LSO Discovery music education program, reaching over 30,000 people of all ages annually; and the creation of LSO St. Luke’s, the UBS and LSO Music Education Center, which involved the restoration and reconstruction of St. Luke’s, a magnificent, but previously derelict 18th-century church. Mr. Gillinson also created LSO Live, the orchestra’s award-winning international CD label.

Clips from This Episode

• Clive shares his best advice for being a manager: "ask questions."

• Clive on leveraging Carnegie Hall’s power to increase diversity and change lives

• Clive on Carnegie Hall’s shared mission of service

Episode Transcription

Alan Fleischmann

You’re listening to “Leadership Matters” on SiriusXM and leadershipmattersshow.com. I’m your host, Alan Fleischmann.

Our guest today is an extraordinary leader and musician who sits at the helm of one of the truly great concert halls of the world. In fact, probably the greatest concert hall in the world. Sir Clive Gillinson is the executive and artistic director of Carnegie Hall — the nation’s premier concert hall — and is responsible for the management and oversight of Carnegie Hall’s extensive operations. Clive is an innovative leader who continues to expand its educational and cultural programs and take them to bold and new directions. Before joining Carnegie, Clive served as the longtime managing director of the London Symphony Orchestra, helping to vault an already acclaimed organization to even higher levels.

As is true for music venues across the country, the coronavirus pandemic hit Carnegie Hall hard, resulting in the longest closure in the institution’s history. But under Clive’s careful leadership, Carnegie Hall weathered the storm and has bounced back powerfully, reopening last fall to full venues and critically acclaimed performances. He did a lot of very innovative things during the pandemic as well. I am thrilled to have Clive join us today to discuss his incredible life, career, leadership, and work, both onstage and off, to enrich and inspire countless music lovers — and frankly, anybody that I know who’s ever met Clive, all around the world.

Clive, welcome to “Leadership Matters.” It is such a pleasure for me to have you on here. You are both my friend and someone I admire deeply. I love the work that you do quietly, but powerfully, and I think we’re going to learn a lot about you today — which is gonna be very exciting to our listeners and viewers.

Clive Gillinson

Alan, thank you so much for inviting me. I always love talking to you anyway, so it’s another good chance.

Alan Fleischmann

We’re gonna have a lot of fun.

So there’s a lot about you that I learned — and I consider you a friend, someone that I know, along with your beautiful wife Anya. Yet I learned that you were born in Bangalore, India, just before independence. Maybe I had forgotten that. I knew that your mother was a professional cellist and your father was a businessman. But I don’t think I remember that you were born in India.

How long did your family remain in India? What were the circumstances around that? What was life like around that house growing up?

Clive Gillinson

Well, not a lot to tell you, since we left when I was a few months old. So I’m not quite fluent.

It was literally, my father had gone into the British Army straight out of school for the war. Like so many people who did, he hadn’t had time to have a university education or profession. So he literally came out of the war and he met my mother, in fact, in Palestine. I was conceived in Palestine, they met and married there. Then they decided to go to India because his father was doing business there. So they went there.

In fact, my dad decided not to do business with my grandfather. So he bought a farm in Africa, in Kenya, and decided to farm, which he’d never done in his life before. So he bought a book and he learned to farm 5000 acres, doing wheat and cattle. And so that was, in fact, where I spent the first few years of my life.

Alan Fleischmann

Wow. And you have strong memories of that time?

Clive Gillinson

Not strong memories. We left when I was about 5, it was the rise of Mau Mau, the independence movement. So my mother took me and my sister back to the UK then and my father stayed behind because he was hoping he’d be able to sell a farm, which he was never able to do really. So in the end, he came back to England with almost nothing, he had to start his life all over again.
But she came back with us. And in point of fact, he sent her a letter a few months after she arrived, saying the marriage was over. So she actually, from me being the age of 5 and my sister 4, she had to bring us up all on her own. So it was incredibly tough for her

Alan Fleischmann

Yeah. And she was a professional cellist?

Clive Gillinson

She was an incredible cellist. She’d been building a huge career in Europe before the rise of the Nazis, and she played the project cello, was a concerto soloist with the Czech Philharmonic and Kubelík. So she had a remarkable career in the making.

But then she decided, with the rise of the Nazis, she just didn’t feel she could stay in Europe, it was too risky. And so she went to Palestine and she was playing the cello in kibbutzim, playing all the way around Palestine and in Egypt. Then she met my father because he was on leave from the British army fighting in Iraq. He heard her play and they traveled in a taxi back from the concert with a number of other people. He said, “Can we meet for lunch tomorrow? Can I take you out for lunch?” He took her out for lunch and gave her a watch with the initials R.G. on the back. She said, “I don’t understand, what’s R.G.? I mean, I love the watch, but thank you.” He said, “It’s Regina Gillinson. We’re gonna get married.” So that was where the relationship started.

Alan Fleischmann

What an amazing proposal, actually.

But when she started off on her own with you and your sister, did she manage to play the cello? Then at that point, she had to probably figure out a different career.

Clive Gillinson

No, no, she made her life playing the cello. She was such a remarkable player. But in those days, the men got all the jobs. So as a woman, even though she was better than most of the men, she had a tough time, but she actually was able to earn the money to bring us up. We were very lucky because in fact, in those days, the local government would help support things. So we started off in a boarding school, which my father initially could fund. But shortly afterwards, he hadn’t any money with the problems in Kenya. They gave us a scholarship for the rest of our schooling. So she didn’t have to find that.

But she did have to support us all the way through school and so on. So it was a really tough time for her. In a way, it was the reason why, even though I love music and wanted to go into music, she said, “Music is a horrible profession, don’t do music.” Because as a woman, of course it was. And she said, “Do your mathematics as a profession, do the music for fun.”

Alan Fleischmann

But you didn’t listen to her ultimately, as we know.

What boarding school did you go to? Did you play cello then?

Clive Gillinson

Well, I started playing cello at the age of 13. She insisted, to begin with, that I play the piano, I was useless, I had no talent. I was completely hopeless. I knew I wanted to play the cello. Then — sorry, it was at the age of 11 — she in the end gave in and I learned the cello.

I loved it, it just came naturally to me. I played in the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain as a kid, which was one of the greatest experiences of my life and it was one of the reasons why I wanted to create a National Orchestra of America, which I couldn’t believe didn’t exist when I came here. So I mean, I adored music. I love mathematics as well, I loved the two things. So I went to London University because of her advice. I initially went to study mathematics, but I realized very quickly I made a mistake. After a year, I went to the Royal Academy of Music and went back to my cello studies.

Alan Fleischmann

Had you dreamt at that point about being… I mean, you obviously were extraordinarily talented as a cellist, like your mother. Had you thought you would spend the rest of your career as a cellist at that point?

Clive Gillinson

Correct. I mean, that's what I thought my life would be. So, almost straight out of the Royal Academy of Music, I got into the London Symphony Orchestra as a cellist and spent 14 years playing the cello.

During that time as well — because one of my big loves was antique furniture — I used to buy and restore furniture, which I learned to do over a period. My wife at the time and I started an antique business because of my background in antiques. This was whilst I was a cellist, so I’d often come back from concerts at ten or half-past ten at night, go straight to the shop, and start working on the furniture until two or three in the morning. It was completely insane. But anyway, that meant I got a bit of business experience by doing that.

But I love the cello. I couldn't imagine… I was never interested in management. In fact, I knew I did not want to go into management at all. So it’s one of the ironies of my life that I've ended up doing something which I knew I didn't want to do. Which I love, which was the best mistake of my life.

Alan Fleischmann

The best mistake of your life, yeah.

But you played at the London Symphony Orchestra for 14 years, and then you had this night job, the non-day job, of your antiques.

Clive Gillinson

It was probably about five or six years we had the antique business. Then the orchestra moved into the Barbican Centre, which was a new concert hall in the city. It was a disaster; the manager got it completely wrong, the orchestra was losing a ton of money, it was on the verge of bankruptcy. He thought people would bail the orchestra out, so he wasn’t prepared to change the strategy, which was a totally failing strategy.

He used to repeat the concerts three or four times, which you can’t do in London, there just isn’t the audience for it. So the concert halls were half empty. I remember as a player, we used to sit there on the stage with half-empty halls, it was so depressing. He was sacked. So they couldn’t find a manager, because of the orchestra being in such a parlous state. They thought they’d get a player to go in temporarily. I don’t know why they asked me to do it, I think, probably, I was last out of the room. I'm not sure why. So they asked me to do it for three months while they looked for a real manager.

Alan Fleischmann

Had you had any management experience at all, any experience that made them think you should be their manager?

Clive Gillinson

I hadn’t had any management experience, except I guess, running the antique business, which really wasn’t management experience. I mean, maybe they thought it was, because it was a very small business. So I don’t know whether that was the reason. I think the mathematics possibly was, as well, which was unbelievably helpful when I did go in there because there were no financial systems or anything.

So I had to work it all out. That was, I wouldn’t say easy, but because of my mathematical background, it was something I was very happy to do. It was part of how we put the whole organization straight and sorted out all the financial problems within a couple of years.

Alan Fleischmann

What was it a bit of love at first sight when you started in the interim job? You were temporary at the beginning for a few months, before you got the permanent job. Did you like it immediately? Or was it one of those things like, “What have I gotten myself into?” Or both?

Clive Gillinson

It was a nightmare at the beginning. A complete nightmare, because I knew nothing about management. I’d been a player, that was all I wanted to be. So learning on the job… When people are coming to you every minute of every day, saying, “Clive, what do we do about this? What do we do about that?” I had, obviously, no idea. But it taught me one of the most important management skills that has stood me in good stead ever since. Which is, the questions are more important than answers. All I could do was just ask questions. Ask questions and explore every issue as quickly as possible, but in as much depth as possible. Then at least, you can come up with what seems like the best answer at that time. That doesn’t mean it’s always going to be the best answer — you have to keep questioning and challenging everything. But the questions being more important than answers, I think, is what saved me at the beginning.

No, I didn’t enjoy it at all at the beginning. I hardly slept. It was a huge responsibility, having responsibility for the livelihoods of about 110 people and knowing absolutely nothing about what you were doing. I’d also add, I’d only got the suit in which I’d got married. So when I had a meeting, I’d go off and change. I’d go to the men's room, change out of my jeans into a suit, do the meeting, and then change back into jeans. Because I was so not thinking the part of a manager, I couldn’t even get that right at the beginning, that you have to dress for it.

But in the end, because there were some very good people there, I learned a lot from the people around me. It was a very tough time, because the Arts Council, which was the national public funding body, gave us three years to eliminate the accumulated deficit, which was huge by our standards in those days. They apparently wrote a report. The person who did stipulated this wrote a report for the Arts Council — which I only saw many, many years later when we became the best-funded orchestra in the country, because they supported what we were doing — apparently, he wrote a report which said, “I’ve given them three years to get rid of the accumulated deficit, there’s absolutely no way they’ll achieve that. And then we’ll have less of a funding problem, because there’ll be one less orchestra to fund in London.” In fact, we got rid of it in two years, not three. Within a few years, we were the best-funded orchestra.

So obviously, by later on I was really enjoying it. But at the beginning, it was it truly was a nightmare. What was difficult as well was developing short-term strategies — which were, how do you get out of the mess? — which were not all things that I believed in, like doing very populist concerts without enough rehearsal with relatively cheap conductors. So we were doing things that we knew could get us financially out of the mess, while at the same time, trying to develop a long-term strategy that was all about quality, all about something that was really meaningful and important. So trying to do those two things at the same time was very, very difficult, convincing the players to invest both in the short-term palliatives at the same time as the long-term mission of turning this into something extraordinary.

Alan Fleischmann

Did you miss performing? Or were you still serving in the orchestra in those early years?

Clive Gillinson

I mean, it was a literally a 24-hour-a-day job, morning ‘til night. So I couldn’t possibly play the cello. What I said to them — because they asked me to do it for three months — I said, “Well, I’ll do it. But obviously, you need to keep my place open in the cello section. I’ll need time to practice to get my playing back, because I’ve got no time to practice whilst I’m doing this.” So they agreed all of that. Then after three months, they offered me the job — because they couldn’t find anybody, not because I was doing so well. I said, “Well, no. Firstly, after three months, you have no idea if I’m the right person. But secondly, after three months, I have no idea if I want to do it. Because I’ve always wanted to be a musician.” So I said, “I’ll do it for a year. At the end of the year, you’ll know if I’m the right person, and I’ll know if I want to do it. So as long as you keep my job open in the cello section for that year and give me time to get my playing back again, if either you don’t want me to do the job or I don’t want to do it.” They agreed that, that was actually how we went forward.

By the end of the year, I was beginning to enjoy it at last. The fog had lifted. I remember in the early days, it was like I was seeing like through a gauze veil because I was so exhausted all the time, never getting any sleep because it was so worrying and there was so much to think through. But the gauze veil was beginning to lift and I was beginning to enjoy it. What was most enjoyable was, it demanded creativity every minute of every day. That’s what I had never realized that management is all about. I’d always assumed, as a player, that that is where the creativity lies. Then I discovered that, in fact, it’s much more creative being a manager, where you’ve got to come up with solutions where one plus one equals more than two every minute of every day, because it’s no good coming up with one plus one equals two. Otherwise, you can’t do anything much.

Alan Fleischmann

You’re known at Carnegie Hall — we’ll get to that later — as being a great boss. People love you and they’re so loyal to you. I'm just curious, were able to kind of create your own team when you when you took over at the London Symphony Orchestra? Did you inherit most of it and then had to work around it? How did that work? Because you had a lot of people.

Clive Gillinson

Yeah, I inherited a team. I’ve always believed — I mean, I believed then, but I hadn’t thought about it at that stage — that you have to give everybody a chance to succeed. Almost everybody did succeed and rose to the challenge, and exactly the same thing happened to Carnegie Hall.

I’ve always believed one’s job as a manager is to help people succeed. It’s never to expect to see somebody fail or even want them to fail. Even if you have reservations about how they do a job, I’d still rather… If you really have a problem, for instance, if somebody needs additional training to do their job properly, I’ll make sure we give them training to at least give them the chance to get it right. Only then do you have to consider saying goodbye to somebody.

And that does have to happen occasionally. It happened very little at Carnegie Hall, it happened very little at the LSO.

Alan Fleischmann

Tell us a little bit about the LSO. You obviously created an extraordinary turnaround. You went from a certain struggling level, where it could have gone under, to what became a glorious 14 years.

Clive Gillinson

Well, it became by far the top London orchestra — the top UK orchestra, therefore, because the London orchestras really do lead the UK in that way. That was acknowledged by the Arts Council, the funding body; they ended up giving us more money than anybody else because they believed not only in our artistic programming, but I also started an education program, which the other London orchestras were not doing at that time.

I've got a fundamental passion about education, everybody's right to have education, and everybody's right to have access to music. So we built a fantastic education program. A lot of it with kids in schools, but also I remember… One of the funny stories was when I went at the beginning to the players and said, “We're going to start this education program. Are there any things that any of you've dreamed of doing in education?” One of our brass players, the bass trombone player, said, “I want to start a brass band in a prison.” So we tried to find a prison that was interested. We did in the end, I took him down, and he stood in front of the prison governor. We introduced him, and he said to the prisoners there, “Look you guys, I hope you realize it's very difficult to play a brass instrument. So I hope you can all be here for a very long time.” They all laughed, you know, but what was amazing was, as it came to the first concert, one of the prisoners had just been released. It was the first time in British prison history where a prisoner came back voluntarily to play in the concert, because he didn't want to miss it. So not only had it built a camaraderie amongst the prisoners, but they all developed skills, which then were skills that they could take with them into the rest of their lives.

So we did a lot of things that had social impact benefits, which has been a big part of what we do at Carnegie Hall now as well.

Alan Fleischmann

I’m seeing a lot of things that you built when you were in London now in Carnegie Hall, I can see where they come from. It's amazing, actually,

Clive Gillinson

When we took over, we bought a derelict church just around the corner from the Barbican. In fact, the Barbican is within the City of London, which is the richest part of Britain. Then nearby are some of the poorest parts of Britain. So we deliberately took this church on, in one of the poorest parts, so that we were taking music out into communities that would never otherwise have access. So we converted the church into a Music Education Center and a rehearsal hall.

Ironically enough, through COVID, I understand it had a huge benefit for the orchestra itself throughout the COVID period, as they were able to film concerts and do all sorts of things that they couldn't have done otherwise. So it's played a very central, important role in the orchestra’s life going forward.

Alan Fleischmann

That's amazing, actually. Your profile became so big when you were there. I imagine that there were no thoughts in your head that you would actually leave London.

Clive Gillinson

There were no thoughts in my head to leave London. In point of fact, I was offered various jobs around the world, as well as in the UK, and it never interested me. I mean, the LSO was my family, I loved it, I loved being there.

We created our own record label, a CD label. Which again, we lead the world in that, which was really exciting. Having spent so many years building something that I really believed in and cared about — because I was manager in the end for 21 years — the notion of starting again somewhere else was not particularly exciting. There were still so many things I wanted to do at the LSO, so I wasn't looking to move.

But when Carnegie Hall called and said, was I interested in applying or being considered for the job?... Well, ironically, they called in January 2004 because, very sadly, the guy who was running Carnegie Hall had just died, he was a relatively young man, somebody I liked very much. They called then and I said, “Well, I can't even talk about it. Because June the 9th, 2004, is our 100th birthday and we’re doing the biggest fundraising gala of our entire history.” If there was any notion that I was leaving — not because I was indispensable, but because instability can have a big effect on funding — people might not give us the money they were going to.

This was January. I said, “If by June you haven't filled the job and you want to call, let's talk again. If you fill the job, then you fill the job.” So they call the day after the gala and they said, “We’re were down to our shortlist of three people. But we'd still like to meet you and to at least consider you.” So they flew me over, I went there in July 2004. I was very clear that, even if they offered me the job, I wouldn't be able to start for a year because my twins were about to start their last year of university and I wouldn't leave until they had completed university. Because again, instability for them, I think, would not have been helpful in their last year. They said that they still wanted to see me.

So I went over, I did all these interviews, and my motto of “questions are more important than answers” stood me in very good stead. Because firstly, I never thought there was a hope in hell of me getting the job, because I thought, “I've only managed an orchestra, I've never managed a venue. I'm not American, I’m too old.” I thought there was no hope. So I thought, “This is great, I can just ask questions and really have a great conversation.” So I did the interview, I think, probably quite differently than I would have done if I really thought I had a chance of getting the job. In which case, I probably would have thought, “Well, what do they want to hear?” I didn't actually think about what they wanted to hear. I thought, “What do I want to ask and what are the opportunities? This is a sleeping giant, it has so many opportunities.” I really wanted to know and understand more about that.

I think the fact that I never thought I would get the job was probably the single most powerful thing in getting it. Because if I'd actually done the usual bit, where you try and think, “What do they want to hear?” Maybe I'd never have got it, I don't know. But we had some wonderful conversations. And then I was astounded that they offered it to me.

Alan Fleischmann

How long was the whole journey there, of you going, interviewing, them offering you the job, and you saying yes?

Clive Gillinson

Well, they flew me over in the morning, I had interviews that afternoon and dinner that evening with the vice chairman. I had interviews all of the next day. Then, I took the night flight back. So it was virtually 24 hours of interviews, they had lots of different panels interviewing me.

So all of that happened. Then I went on holiday with my family. I was in France, it was a very remote area with terrible phone connections. After a couple of weeks, the phone went and it was Carnegie Hall. Because the line was so bad, I couldn't actually hear whether he was telling me I hadn't got the job or I had got the job, I couldn't work it out. I mean, in the end, I found out that I had got the job. But it took me quite a while to realize.

I had a year in which I was going to be staying in London. So they were very generous about me getting involved in artistic planning during that year nonetheless. So the first season that I came would still be related very much to what I was interested in and wanting to do there. Meanwhile, I set myself a huge list of everything I wanted to achieve at the LSO before I left so I could leave it in the best possible state for the next person.

Alan Fleischmann

It wasn't just that you were there for 35 years, which is an enormously great, incredible tenure. You also were living in London and would be leaving your home in order to go to the US. Which you knew well, but obviously, living in New York is very different than traveling in New York. So going from London to New York must have been a big deal as well.

Clive Gillinson

It was. Well, I've always loved New York, and because I'd set up a residency for the LSO in the ’90s where we came every year. Ironically, not to Carnegie Hall, but to Lincoln Center. I offered it to Carnegie Hall — three concerts a year, festival — and they said it was too risky. So I said, “Well, in that case, I'll have to offer it to Lincoln Center.” So Lincoln Center grabbed it and it was a huge success. So a few years later, Carnegie Hall asked me in for a meeting and said, “Can we now bring it to Carnegie Hall?” And I said, “Well, no, I don't think we should. Because we offered it to you and you declined. So if Lincoln Center backed us when you declined, I think we should support them now and stay loyal.”

So we did stay at Lincoln Center. Then, when I left the LSO to come to Carnegie Hall, I told my successor that I wasn't going to invite them. I told her the story and said, “You should stay at Lincoln Center and stay loyal whilst Jane Moss — the person who brought us there — is still there. It's different if she leaves.”

So in fact, that residency was really important, but it meant I really got to know New York, I knew quite a lot of people here. I had some friends here. So it wasn't alien territory in any way.

But you're right, completely different to live here than to visit.

Alan Fleischmann

Very different. Were there any culture shocks, any cultural things that you remember being different than you anticipated? Being such a global citizen at that point, it would be interesting for people if even then there were some cultural differences that you learned about when you came here.

Clive Gillinson

There were various things, but because I knew it well, it wasn't as big a shock as I expected.

The thing that I found very different, which I've tried to change, is there's a bigger deference to senior management here than there is in the UK. I mean, people in the UK who worked for me were very happy to joke about things and feel that they could make jokes about me as well. We were very open to treating each other in a very informal way, I found here, people were a little bit more reticent to do that. They treated me as the manager, they treated me with more deference, which I don't really like. So it was very important for me to establish relationships which were more relaxed, more easygoing, and more natural. So that was one of the things that I had to work on with my team. It took a bit of time, because the American way is different in that way.

I also had to get used to fundraising being such a massive part of the job. Even though I've done a significant amount of fundraising in the UK, public money there, as you know, is 30% of our budget. Here, with public money being almost nonexistent, you have to get used to the fact that that changes completely. But that's where, again, I found the culture shock was fascinating. In Britain, if I approached board members and said, “I've got this incredible idea,” and outline it to them, they'd say, “Fantastic, wonderful. Please let us know how you're getting on.” And in America, they'll say, “Fantastic, wonderful. How can I help?” That's the difference. That American approach to generosity and a sense of personal responsibility to what happens, if they love the idea of an institution with which they're involved, is something that is quite different. Sometimes in Britain, people who are involved with an organization will actually feel offended if you ask them for money, because they think they should be there for their brains, their thoughts, and their ideas. Which of course, they should be. But they also should have some responsibility, financially. Americans don’t question that. Americans know that is part of what you take on when you join an organization. In Britain, it's a very hard journey to travel. I think it’s moved a lot in the 17 years since I've left, but certainly when I came here, it was utterly different and really inspiring.

There was a very good example; my very first board meeting, I went to the board with two big ideas. One was to create national and international festivals, which we've done every year since… I mean, I joined in 2005, so it took until 2007 for the first festival to be created because of the planning timelines, but we've done a huge festival every year since then. There was that idea and Ensemble Connect, which is a fellowship program for the most brilliant young musicians so they not only fulfill their talent as musicians, but they learn to put something back into society. They are working in schools, prisons, hospitals, and so on to become real citizens of the world in that way, in terms of their contribution.

So I went to the board with the two ideas. A number of trustees were very nervous, because they were both expensive ideas — $2 to $2.5 million a year for each of them. So a number of them were very nervous about them in terms of cost. So when we discussed it at the first board meeting — and the recommendation was that we do one at a time — I said, “Could you give me at least the chance to talk to anybody who doubts whether we can do both of them? Because we think we have not only a strategy for implementation, but a strategy for raising the money.” They agreed and I went to see the first person, which was Jerry Speyer. I saw Jerry, whose offices are a ten-minute walk away, and talked him through the whole thing. At the end of an hour, Jerry said, “Look Clive, I’d hate you to have come all this way for nothing. Here’s half a million dollars to get you on your way. I think you can do them both.” I then had a lunch with Mercedes Bass, who gave us a million.

But what was inspiring was, they challenged and tested the ideas to the limit and really pushed me on them. But when they believed it was possible, they felt it was their responsibility to give money to make sure they happened. So both of the ideas were then off the ground and it was clear to the board that it was possible to raise the money and do them both right at the beginning. So that was a huge change and it’s one of the things that’s most inspiring about America.

Alan Fleischmann

I love that. It’s kind of like de Tocqueville, you’re describing an America that we all cherish and love: the generous spirit, the philanthropic nature, and the fact that the best of us want to get something done. I get that as well.

When I think of what you've done at Carnegie Hall over the years, you do so much for others. You spotlight so many members of the board, you spotlight the artists, obviously. But you lead with a bit of extraordinary humility. I happen to know that you’ve created — like you started doing in London — programs and initiatives to create access. And here, Carnegie Hall is probably considered, if not the greatest stage of the world, certainly one of them. Probably in my opinion and yours, the greatest one.

Clive Gillinson

I agree with you, it is the greatest.

Alan Fleischmann

You’ve managed to create something where… It wasn’t just that you went out and created programming for young musicians, which you’ve done through the Ensemble Connect program and the National Youth Orchestra, both of which you’ve mentioned. But you also really focused on diversity, and you really focused on vulnerable communities. Where you could literally be a mile away, but it could be as if you were 15,000 miles away. You found a way to draw in and create programs that brought in those who dreamt of Carnegie Hall and could never imagine getting there, and also those who never dreamt of Carnegie Hall because they couldn’t imagine getting there. You did both.

So I’m just curious where that came from. You’ve been doing that so quietly and profoundly over the years. I now consider it one of the great landmark parts of Carnegie Hall — not only who performs on stage on a regular basis that are well known and famous, but who will be, one day, well known and famous because they’ve been given access that, frankly, they never would have gotten otherwise.

Clive Gillinson

Well, and hundreds of thousands of kids who will love music who might never have had access to it — they won’t be professionals, but it can be part of their life.

One of the things I mentioned earlier, I felt when I came here that this was a sleeping giant. I can say it because I’m British, not American: I genuinely think it’s the greatest concert hall in the world. But in many ways, it is so iconic that it has a unique power to change and transform lives for the better. I think almost none of that was being used before. The last 17 years has really been about, how do you leverage the power of Carnegie Hall to do just that, transform people’s lives? Whether it’s creating a National Youth Orchestra or the National Youth Jazz Orchestra, which are both for 16-to-19 year olds, the best in the country, and they now travel the world as musical ambassadors for their country.

We then created NYO2, which is younger, because we felt National Youth Orchestra was not diverse enough and that there are so many people with the talent but not the opportunities. So we proactively sought out kids who have not had the opportunities but do have the talent. That’s much tougher than NYO, which is for the people who had all the advantages and will apply anyway. Lots of the kids who’ve got into NYO2, some of them are good enough to get into NYO. When we asked them why they haven’t applied for the major orchestra, the older orchestra, they say, “We assumed we wouldn’t get in.” So the whole thing is about making sure we’re reaching out to people who have that talent — it may have been lack of access to best teachers, it may be lack of confidence, whatever it is — so that we bring them into NYO2, which has then transformed the pipeline into the older orchestra, is now transforming the pipeline into music colleges around America, and then will ultimately have a big impact on diversity in orchestras in America. So that’s been a really important part of what we do.

On the festivals, one of the very first things I did was speak to Jessye Norman, the incredible singer. I said to Jesse, would she curate a series on African-American culture? Because I think it’s one of the most important dimensions of what we have to do going forward.

Alan Fleischmann

What year is that, by the way? This is several years ago that you did this.

Clive Gillinson

Well, we did it in 2008, but I went to see her in 2005.

Alan Fleischmann

Just to give a little perspective here, that you were doing this way back when.

Clive Gillinson

I went to see Jessye in 2005 as soon as I arrived — I knew her from before, we’d worked a lot together — and asked her to do this. I explained what I was dreaming of. I was worried she’d say, “I’m too busy. No way I can do this.” And she just looked at me and smiled ­— because she invited me to her home for lunch to talk — and said, “Clive, I’ve been waiting my entire life to do this project.”

She did a fantastic job. In fact, out of the 15 or 16 festivals we’ve had since that time, we’ve addressed African-American and Black issues in virtually half of all the festivals we’ve done. Very deliberately so, because of the challenges America still has in addressing racism and lack of opportunity. So that has applied to the festivals, it’s applied to all the education work we do, it’s applied to the board. Nearly nine years ago, I took on a consultant to advise us on and make introductions to people so that we could bring more diversity onto the board. She has introduced me to many people who have really transformed our board. So we have a very, very diverse board now. We’ve been working on that for the last nine years, very specifically and deliberately.

So diversity, access, and opportunity have really been things that have been a driving force for this institution since I came here. I don’t mean they weren't before, but they weren’t center focus.

Alan Fleischmann

Clearly, when you look at the board and you look at Robert Smith — who I know well, and you know and work with every day as the chairman of the board — I mean, there’s a mission and a purpose. I get to see that. There’s a mission of purpose at Carnegie Hall that you’ve developed that actually allows people to realize the magnitude of what you’re doing. When you start sharing these numbers of how many young people in particular have access to this great stage, the greatest stage, that would not otherwise have had it, it’s pretty amazing. It gives everyone a sense of a real, defined purpose and impact.

Clive Gillinson

To me, it’s thrilling. What was wonderful when I met Robert first — which would probably be over eight years ago now — was being able to talk to him about what we were doing and what we believed in was the reason he wanted to join. Your board grows out of who you are, what you are, and what your mission is. It’s no good bullshitting about what you want to do if you’re not doing it and if you’re not committed to it. Somebody like Robert will only join if that's really what drives the organization. The words don’t count, it’s the actions that have to count.

And what is interesting now — as you know as one of our fantastic board members — it’s a very diverse board. But it’s also diverse in other ways. A lot of women have joined, we’re bringing a lot of younger people on, it’s also very international. It wasn’t at all international before. But now, because we take our National Youth ensembles around the world and a lot of our education work is being shared worldwide, it means that people from around the world feel it’s relevant to them as well.

So by defining the mission in the right way, it then brings in people who want to be part of that. And that is what’s exciting.

Alan Fleischmann

You’re listening to “Leadership Matters” on SiriusXM, and at leadershipmattersshow.com. I’m your host, Alan Fleischmann. I’m here with Clyde Gillinson, my friend, who is the executive and artistic director of Carnegie Hall.

Something else you’ve done, which I think allowed you to sustain through the pandemic as well, is that you’re building a community. I don’t know whether that can happen without the kind of leadership that you’ve done, by giving that purpose, by setting aside mission the way you did and have done. Anybody gets involved at the board level, anyone that’s involved within the organization — the musicians, the artists, but also the administrative team — they feel part of your community. And truly your community, Clive. It glues everybody together in a way, frankly, I’ve rarely seen in any other organization.

You don’t usually see that in academia and you don’t usually see that in the music world, because usually there’s enormous infighting and competition, because everybody is fighting for their own little turf. That does not seem to exist at Carnegie Hall, at least from what I can see, because people talk about their greater mission. Renée Fleming will describe what she’s doing in her world of philanthropy. You’ll hear stories of other board members who are artists. They’re all trying to collaborate. It is that community that is singular at Carnegie Hall.

Clive Gillinson

You’re absolutely right. One of the things that I found very important and fundamental is, very many arts institutions are driven by seeking the glory of the institution, the glory of the leadership, the glory of the people there. Rather than, “How do we serve?” For me, the only thing that matters is, how does Carnegie Hall serve people? Most institutions do not work that way. There is institutional ego, there is personal ego, and all these things that, I think, get in the way of service. If we think purely in terms of service, then you start making the right decisions. And that is what drives us. It’s why I think the right board members want to join, people who truly believe in the mission of the Hall and how we serve people and transform people’s lives through music. It’s why people want to work here as staff. It’s something that binds everybody together.

One of the things I’ve always felt about company culture — because for me, company culture is one of the most important things you have to create — is that it’s only built out of shared vision, shared mission, shared passions, shared beliefs. That means that in the end, you bring together the people who do share all those things and it becomes self-perpetuating. Equally, if you have a culture that's all about, “What can I take out?”, then those are the people you attract and that is self-perpetuating, too. So I think what is wonderful about Carnegie Hall now is, I love the people who want to be part of this. They’re really terrific people, and I think it’s only because of what we believe in jointly. It really is a joint belief. I’ve loved my partnership with Robert Smith, our chairman, because we both totally believe in what we’re trying to do and in the same things. The whole thing of how we serve kids, how we serve people who don’t otherwise have chances, just use music to create a better world — all of these things are things we share, but that the whole board and the staff share as well, as well as the artists we work with. It’s what inspires everybody who works with Carnegie Hall.

Alan Fleischmann

I imagine all that became urgently essential during the pandemic. Had you not had that community — that mission, that purpose, that unity across the administrative team, the board, the artists — it would have been almost impossible to have done what you managed to do.

You have brought innovation to everything you've done in your career. You certainly brought it to Carnegie Hall. You had to be pretty innovative as well in keeping everybody on that mission, even though the concert hall itself was closed.

Clive Gillinson

It was very tough. And we created this Live with Carnegie Hall where we've worked with artists to look at some of the big issues of the day, we did quite a lot of streaming of past performances. But we also then set out during COVID to create Carnegie Hall +, which is our video-on-demand channel. So we spent most of the COVID period working on that, which is now the first project like this that is run by any concert hall in the world. We’re working with Unitel, we have the greatest performances available in the world, both historic ones and current ones. We’re at the moment on Apple TV, but we will be launching within the next few months on several other platforms as well. So it will become something that is very, very broadly available across America.

We deliberately priced it at $7.99 a month so it would be accessible, because most of these channels are something like $15 or $16 each month. But we wanted to make it something that really could be affordable by most people. Which was the same thing when I created LSO Live, the CD label at the London Symphony Orchestra. We priced it at £4.99, which was about $5 or $6 at the time. Again, deliberately, because we wanted it to be something for everybody. Our whole philosophy always is, we want to create the best, but we want to create the best that everybody can have access to. And that runs through every single aspect of what we do.

Alan Fleischmann

The technology part of this, the fact that you’re creating that next level of access and innovation through platforms of technology, is pretty extraordinary. And where, as you said, it’s never been done before.

Clive Gillinson

I mean, that’s what the fun is. You know, it’s fun to create all these things. Always, we’re never satisfied. I heard a quote from Shimon Peres where he said, “The greatest contribution the Jews have made to the human race is dissatisfaction,” which I loved.

In many ways, he’s right. One must never, ever stop wanting to be better tomorrow than you are to do today. It’s what all the great artists are. I think Carnegie Hall has to behave like a great artist in that way. It’s always got to be wanting new ideas. You should never be satisfied, you should never feel you’ve arrived. Every project has to get better each year, just apart from creating new projects. It’s that whole sense that everybody’s got to be thrilled with what they’re doing and really excited about it. But equally, they’ve got to be very aware that tomorrow has to be better than today.

Alan Fleischmann

I love that. Which is what drives you every day, I’m sure.

Who are people that have been your greatest role models? Obviously, you don’t have a role model quite in a job that you could emulate, because you really have created your own path that others have emulated. But I’m just curious — you mentioned Shimon Peres — are there people out there that you kind of look to and say, “Well, I’m learning from them, and therefore, I will take what I got there and share it with others”?

Clive Gillinson

Well, some of the greatest role models for me have been Mstislav Rostropovich — who I think was possibly the greatest cellist who ever lived — and Leonard Bernstein. They were people I worked very, very closely with. Both of them, firstly, had total humility. They never believed they’d arrived, they always wanted to perform better tomorrow than today, they were always looking for deeper meaning in the music. They always felt that whatever you’re doing now is the most important thing you’re ever doing. Otherwise, don’t do it.

I remember Rostropovich once, when somebody came backstage and said to him, “Which is your favorite piece of music?”, he said, “The piece I’m playing now, or I shouldn’t be playing it.” That was his whole approach to life. So, both of them stimulated me to think about what really were my values. They were both some of the most extraordinary people who you’re ever going to meet. Unbelievably inspiring, and always putting the music first, never themselves. They had huge personalities, they had a monumental presence. But the fact is, they were humble in front of the music. I have met people who are equally talented who are not humble in front of the music, and then they never grow.

So people like Rostropovich and Bernstein, but people like Mariss Jansons, who, when he was in his 20s, probably nobody would have said he was going to be one of the world’s great conductors. But because of his humility, he just got better, and better, and better, and he ended up being one of the world’s great conductors. Claudio Abbado was another person I worked with. With all of them, it was only about how you serve the music.

Alan Fleischmann

I love that. And look, you deal with people with great egos when you’ve got the kind of people that you have around you, in all elements of what you do. How do you manage? what are your secrets there?

I think of you as a strong leader, but in many ways, a selfless leader. Those who are your biggest fans — and I consider myself to be one of them — we want to seek out opportunities to spotlight you. Because what we see you do is quite selfless. You spend a great deal of time giving credit to everyone around you, which can’t be easy. But it’s also why, I think, we have such a mission-ful organization at Carnegie Hall and why we have that community that I mentioned. Where do you draw that from?

Clive Gillinson

Well, it’s funny, it’s something I only sort of discovered without realizing I had discovered it. Which is that, whilst I was a cellist, like all musicians, I was very self-focused and really quite self-centered. Everything was about my playing, how I could be the best possible cellist I could be. I mean, yes, I loved the music, of course, and I was focused on the music. But as a musician, you tend to be very focused on everything you’re trying to do and achieve.

I didn’t realize that, when I moved into management — it didn’t occur to me until sometime later — that I changed completely as a person. The reason was because I’d moved from somebody who was relatively self-centered to somebody whose life was all about service, because I realized that all I was trying to do with the London Symphony Orchestra, and now of course, with Carnegie Hall, is think, how do you use the power of this institution to transform people’s lives? In other words, we serve.

My own view is, I’m irrelevant. For me to think I matter is really not important. My job is to bring the greatest artists and performers into Carnegie Hall, create the greatest education programs. All of the things that we do, but to serve other people. It’s never about being successful, that’s irrelevant.

It’s a little bit like when people, which they often do, they’ll come along and say, “Look, I’ve got fantastic ideas for how you can develop a Carnegie Hall brand. You could do this, you could do that, and really grow the brand.” And I always say, “I’m not interested in that.” The brand is what we do, all that matters to me is what we do and how we serve people. That defines the brand.

If we play and if we present things in the concert hall, or in SingSing, or in schools, or whatever they are… I mean, who cares about what I think? Nobody. I’m immaterial. I’m a facilitator. I’ve got to be an enabler for the greatest artists to do the things they believe in, because that is what an audience wants to hear. It doesn’t want to hear Clive Gillinson speaking. It wants to hear Renée Fleming, Yo-Yo Ma. It wants to hear all of these great artists and what they believe in and care about. That’s what an audience is paying for. They’re not paying to hear what Clive Gillinson cares about.

So it’s my job to offer them the best, but make sure that that best is about what those artists are made of and what they represent in life. That’s why I think our own personal egos as leaders in the arts are really not very important.

Alan Fleischmann

You said something earlier in the show about how you learned early in life to ask the right questions and then from there seek the answers. I heard that and I thought that was really amazing, because I’ve always thought that the people who are always relevant are the people who show an insatiable curiosity. The best way to demonstrate that is through questions and not necessarily assuming you have all the answers.

Most people, especially leaders, walk in the door and think, “I have the answers, now let me share with you,” in a transactional type of way. You don’t. You really walk in there curious, asking questions. It’s powerful to do that, not only because it’s the right thing to do — the harder thing to do — but it also makes other people join you on the journey. It’s something that I have seen. Your wife, Anya, does the same thing. She’s curious, she asks lots of questions. So do you. That’s a big part of your leadership.

Clive Gillinson

I think it’s fundamental. I mean, Einstein said, “Questions are more important than knowledge,” which is absolutely true. You’d never know all the answers.

There’s a Daniel Kahneman book, Thinking, Fast and Slow, which I think sums up a lot of this. Which is, people make assumptions. Because they think they know the answers in their own field, those answers are transferable, and they think you can just have a quick answer, that you can transfer knowledge quickly, and that it means you can tell other people what to do in other areas. Almost never true. You’ve got to stop and think. Again, too many people, as you said, walk in the door thinking they know the answers and they don’t ask the questions.

When I’m interviewing staff for jobs, I am not interested in the people who think they know the answers. I don’t want to employ somebody who thinks they know the answers. The only people I’m interested in are the ones with an insatiable curiosity. Which is what how Einstein described himself, in fact, talking about Einstein and curiosity. You want staff, trustees, and so on who are like that. It’s something that needs to be part of the culture of the organization.

Alan Fleischmann

Well, that’s how you innovate. That’s why you keep innovating. It also guarantees a certain amount of humility as well, because if you if you don’t have the arrogance of assuming you know all the answers, then you’re going to be open to extraordinary questions, which leads to new ideas and new innovation.

You’ve been listening to “Leadership Matters” on SiriusXM, and at leadershipmattersshow.com. I’m your host, Alan Fleischmann. We’ve enjoyed this last hour with Clive Gillinson, the extraordinary executive and artistic director of Carnegie Hall. We’ve been discussing his life journey, his impact globally, and how he has managed to take what is really one of the greatest, if not the greatest, stage of the world to new heights by creating access.

Everyone says practice, practice, practice gets you to Carnegie Hall. But under this leadership, under your leadership, you’ve managed to make it access, access, access. It is something that I’m proud to be part of and really proud to call you my friend. Thank you for being on the show today.

Clive Gillinson

Well Alan, thank you so much. And thank you for what you do for Carnegie Hall as well. I love working with you and it’s great to have you involved. So thank you.