It has been a while since I spoke with Wyn Morris, the mercurial and brilliantly gifted conductor who made a number of pioneering recordings of the music of Gustav Mahler. I just learned this afternoon of his death at age 81. Click here to read his obituary from his own favorite Tory-leaning paper, The Telegraph.

I had the pleasure of joining Wyn and some of his friends for a few memorable London meals — and a couple of rousing late-night chats at London pubs. He had very strong opinions about conducting and interpretation, consistent praise and admiration for Wilhelm Furtwängler, some surprisingly scathing criticism of the post-Deryck-Cooke BBC, and hilarious tales of his colleagues and rivals.

I also had the pleasure of seeing two of his all-too-rare appearances as a conductor during the 1990s — the feature works being Mahler’s Fourth and Sixth Symphonies — both with John Boyden’s remarkable period-instrument New Queen’s Hall Orchestra, both still strong in my memory. Up until that time I had never heard the level of transparency and balance Morris delivered with both works. I remember conductor John McGlinn, an admirer but not a huge enthusiast for Mahler, sitting next to me during the latter concert — and jumping about a foot out of his seat when the NQHO’s percussionist delivered the last hammer-blow.