This is The New Yorker Radio Hour, a co-production of WNYC Studios and The New Yorker.

Welcome to The New Yorker Radio Hour. I'm David Remnick.

Like nearly everyone my age, I grew up on rock and roll.

Little Richard, the Beatles, the stones, Aretha.

But in that heroic pantheon of mine, one figure stood out,

the classical conductor, composer, and teacher, Leonard Bernstein.

Bernstein was a personality as kaleidoscopic as any rock star.

On podiums from New York to Berlin, conducting Beethoven or Mahler,

he was as physical in his way as James Brown or Tina Turner.

Bernstein wrote the music to West Side Story and other Broadway hits,

and he was a vivid and accessible presence on television,

leading the famous young people's concerts.

It's a funny thing about this meaning business, in music anyway.

When you say, what does it mean?

What you're really saying is, what is it trying to tell me, what ideas does it make me have?

Bernstein drew you into a long tradition of music that might otherwise have escaped your ears,

and what a loss that would have been.

Bernstein also had a personal life that was chaotic and for its time revolutionary.

His marriage to a brilliant actress, Felicia Montalegra, is the subject of Bradley Cooper's thrilling

new film, Meistro. Carrie Mulligan plays Felicia, and Cooper plays Leonard Bernstein. He also

co-wrote the screenplay and directed the film. I had the chance to

watch Maestro with Bradley Cooper, and then we sat down to talk about it at length. So let's get to it.

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