"As the cacophonies piled up and the rhythms came apart and the whole thing got really loud --- with percussionist Tom Sherwood whacking the life out of the big bass drum, which was positioned high and in back, like a sacrificial altar --- Spano's concept turned from modesty to savage brilliance."

"Robert Spano has that great skill in a conductor of making every performance radiate joy. You would think, each time, that he has been waiting all his life to make this music happen, and that he is darned well going to make it happen to the utmost."

"Spano, Brooklyn's music director, is a phenomenon: He pulls together the most intellectually enticing and emotionally gripping orchestral concerts in New York."

"The revelation of the evening was the detailed shaping of the score by conductor Robert Spano. 'The Aria of the Falling Body' swayed, but with a tensile strength, and the closing pages were a fine demonstration of the very gradual release of musical tension. It's far harder to release than to build up tension, and his success here made the thought of Spano's performing Wagner enticing."

"He seems the most comprehensively gifted American conductor to emerge since James Levine, Michael Tilson Thomas and Leonard Slatkin."

"Spano continues to improve as a baton technician, finding more efficient and effective ways to communicate with his players during the performance. He's also on a steep growth curve as an artist, and his Mozart had cheer, pathos, determination, even a little sexiness - world-class Mozart."

"It was a triumph for conductor Robert Spano, his Atlanta Symphony Orchestra and Chorus, the team of vocal soloists, and for Adams' masterpiece itself. Falling temperatures made Spano turn up the interpretive heat."

"Self-effacing and restrained to a fault, Spano elicited remarkably clean, taut, well-balanced performances from an orchestra that can be recalcitrant with visitors. He invariably mustered a broad dynamic scale, focused telling nuances, sustained forward momentum and avoided cheap effects. For the challenges at hand, it was enough."

"Robert Spano barely broke a sweat as he produced a radiant sound of unusual depth and tension from the [BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra] that was nothing short of dazzling." Read More...

"Spano conducted from his muscles, and what we heard was powerful music, powerfully played. There was no mistaking the authority from the podium."