At 80, Andrew Davis Still Conducted With Vitality Of Irrepressible Youth [Video]

APPRECIATION — This was a shocker. Not because 80 is an unseemly age at which to make an exit, but because Andrew Davis, the British conductor who died of leukemia on April 20 in Chicago, had cut such a convivially youthful figure onstage for so many decades. 

Only last November, this writer praised a notably non-lethargic performance of Fauré’s Requiem in Toronto as “moving in more senses than one” and took note of his vigorous stride from the wings. If he led the concert seated on a stool, what of it? Many podium veterans do the same.

Presumably, a few insiders knew about his condition, but Davis was not one to make a fuss. He certainly would not let anything stand in the way of connecting music with those …