Great artist AND great human being

[springrite]

It is actually rather rare, when a great artist is also a great human being loved by just about everyone both as a great artist AND a great human being.

I will start with one person: C. M. Giulini

Agree?

Whom would you nominate?

[Opus106]

You probably may not have heard of her: M. S. Subbulakshmi (not the most informative entry in Wikipedia, unfortunately). Everyone I know who are ardent fans of Carnatic music, including my immediate family, have the utmost respect for as a highly spiritual artist with utmost humanity.

[madaboutmahler]

Bernstein came into mind for me!

[Lisztianwagner]

Mariss Jansons for me.

[DavidW]

Papa Haydn.

[Mirror Image]

Ralph Vaughan Williams, Michael Tippett, Heitor Villa-Lobos, Alban Berg, Dmitri Shostakovich...

[knight66]

Bernstein came into mind for me!

I think the great human being title was somewhat tidal there. He evinced many of the standard faults in spades.

Mike

[Lethevich]

From what I've read Antal Doráti. Additionally, Fritz Busch.

[knight66]

I had forgotten about Dorati. Many years ago I read his autobiography. He seemed like he would indeed qualify.

He told one story that stuck with me. Pre-war in Budapest he was conducting quite a few opera performances. One house tenor was well known as a drunk. He excelled himself at a performance of Lohengrin when on his first entrance he bowed to the cast, clicked his heels and announced that his name was Lohengrin, thereby rendering the next three hours unnecessary.

I add: Sandor Veigh and Menuhin.

Mike

[Sergeant Rock]

Bernstein came into mind for me!

If you want to maintain that impression, don't read Joan Peyser's biography of Lenny 

Sarge

[Archaic Torso of Apollo]

From what I've heard, Haydn and Dvorak fit the bill.

[Lisztianwagner]

Mariss Jansons for me.

Also Respighi, Boskovsky and Ashkenazy.

[madaboutmahler]

If you want to maintain that impression, don't read Joan Peyser's biography of Lenny 

Sarge

haha


others....
I'd like to add many of my friends at the Academy!
and some more conductors:
Nelsons... Tilson Thomas... Abbado... Rattle

[ibanezmonster]

Wagner and Gesualdo.

[Josquin des Prez]

Define what makes a human being "good".

[The new erato]

Also Respighi, Boskovsky and Solti.

Solti?

I remember a reasonably well known and thrustworthy singer on record in a Norwegian newspaper telling how Solti had told her that if she didn't sleep with him, she would never work again.

[Lethevich]

Klemperer, Karajan, Beecham.

[Karl Henning]

Wagner and Gesualdo.

(* chortle *)

[springrite]

Eventually Percy Grainger, Walter Rummel, and a couple of my counseling clients will all be mentioned, I guess.

[Antoine Marchand]

Maybe this thread would even be more interesting, if every proposed name were accompanied by some anecdote or short comment about why it is thought that that person was a good person. As the comment of Erato, but the other way.