The key to that elusive quality known as brilliance is the result of systematic practice - the kind of practice that is a daily, familiar routine that awakens your muscle memory and hones the basic skills of your artform.
“It's a lot like sports - like athletes who stretch before practice and stretch before a game,” Peled told University of Montana music students Sunday afternoon. “You don't just perform without warming up.”
For him, the ritual is very much akin to meditation, Peled explained. It is a time when he keenly focuses on each note - how he is holding his body, how he is breathing and how all of those elements affect the quality of sound.
“It's pretty incredible to hear him explain his techniques and then watch him perform,” said UM student Bethany Joyce during a short break from the intensive workshop.
“He's given me a lot to think about, and I'm eager to hear his feedback after I play for him,” she said. “He's such a phenomenal musician, and it's really exciting I get to work with him - a cellist of such high caliber.”
Peled has been the featured guest artist in some of the world's major concert halls and is a professor at the Peabody Institute of Music at Johns Hopkins University. He is in Missoula this week to inspire, teach and play with music students from around the state who are assembling at UM for the 10th annual orchestra festival.
On Sunday, Peled's gave his full attention to UM students, many of whom will perform when he joins the UM Symphony Orchestra for a public concert on Monday night.
During the day on Monday and Tuesday, Peled will join UM music professors Fern Glass, Margaret Baldridge and Don Beller and guest clinicians E. Daniel Long and John B. Schimek to tutor 500 Montana middle-school and high-school orchestra students.
“Logistically, this is a big deal for us. It's a big deal to meet the schedule needs of everybody,” said Luis Millan, a classical guitarist, UM music professor and director of the university's orchestra. “But it is always an exciting time for us.”
“We see it as a duty to the state to give these kids this kind of opportunity they may otherwise not ever get,” Millan said. “It certainly doesn't hurt our recruiting, because it gives students the chance to get to know our campus, our faculty and to hear the university orchestra.”
The event is dedicated to learning and improving skills, not to competition, Millan explained.
“To be taught by and critiqued by some of the best string educators in the country is a big deal,” he said. “And one of the other benefits is that these students get to hear other high-school and middle-school orchestras, which is rare opportunity.”
Listening - and watching - is how most musicians learn, Millan said, and sometimes classroom instruction can only go so far.
“As is the case sometimes, a teacher might tell a student something and they may not fully understand it until they see someone play and the information finally sinks in,” he said.
“I still have these ‘aha' moments,” he said, “and I've been doing it for a while - for about 27 years.”
Peled has been to Montana four times before to teach, and said he enjoys every visit.
“Montana students are very open-minded and eager to learn,” Peled said. “They are very teachable.”
On Monday, when UM's symphony orchestra rosins their bows for a public concert, expect a stunning musical experience.
The orchestra will perform Stella Sung's “Atlas' Revenge” and Mendelssohn's Symphony No. 5 in D minor, “Reformation.” Peled will perform Max Bruch's “Kol Nidrei” and Tchaikovsky's “Variations for Violoncello and Orchestra.”
“It will be a wonderful night of music,” Millan said.
Monday's music
Fans of classical music are cordially invited to a special performance of the University of Montana Symphony Orchestra with guest cellist Amit Peled on Monday at 7:30 p.m. in the University Theatre.
The concert is part of UM's 10th annual orchestra festival, and is free to the public.
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