E-Mail The celebrations in the 250th anniversary of the birth of Ludwig van Beethoven would not be the same without Herbert von Karajan's brilliant performances conducting Beethoven's memorable symphonies. The execution of any musical symphony is a hugely difficult task, demanding very significant skills on the part of each individual musician - but perhaps the most difficult task lies with the conductor who has to orchestrate the musicians into making the music cohesively come alive and speak to our deepest emotions. In many ways the human brain is like an orchestra, where different regions perform very different types of processing, such as in the individual musician in the orchestra who needs to be able to read the music, play their instrument and listen to the music produced. Still, the role of the conductor is different, namely to coordinate and orchestrate the output of each musician into a cohesive whole. Without a conductor, the music invariably fails - as shown beautifully in Fellini's magisterial film "Prova d'orchestra" (eng. "Musical rehearsal").